Then followed a “Carmen seculare lyricum,” recited by Anthony Dopping, son of the Bishop of Meath—
“Alterum in lustrum meliusque semper
... Proroget ævum.”
Concerning the increase of University studies, in a humorous speech by Thomas Leigh, B.A.
Eugene Lloyd, Proctor of the University, closed the Acts.
A skilled band of musicians followed the procession as they left the building.
To this Dunton, writing from Dublin in 1699, while the memory of it was still fresh, adds some curious details—
Leaving Dr. Phœnix’s house, our next visit was to the College of Dublin, where several worthy gentlemen (both Fellows and others) had been great benefactors to my auction. When we came to the College, we went first to my friend Mr. Young’s chamber; but he not being at home we went to see the Library, which is over the Scholars’ lodgings, the length of one of the quadrangles, and contains a great many choice books of great value, particularly one, the largest I ever saw for breadth; it was an “Herbal,” containing the lively portraitures of all sorts of trees, plants, herbs, and flowers. By this “Herbal” lay a small book, containing about sixty pages in a sheet, to make it look like “the Giant and the Dwarf.” There also (since I have mentioned a giant) we saw lying on a table the thigh-bone of a giant, or at least of some monstrous overgrown man, for the thigh-bone was as long as my leg and thigh; which is kept there as a convincing demonstration of the vast bigness which some human bodies have in former times arrived to. We were next showed by Mr. Griffith, a Master of Arts (for he it was that showed us these curiosities), the skin of one Ridley, a notorious Tory, which had been long ago executed; he had been begged for an anatomy, and, being flayed, his skin was tanned, and stuffed with straw. In this passive state he was assaulted with some mice and rats, not sneakingly behind his back, but boldly before his face, which they so much further mortified, even after death, as to eat it up; which loss has since been supplied by tanning the face of one Geoghagan, a Popish Priest, executed about six years ago for stealing; which said face is put in the place of Ridley’s.
At the east end of this Library, on the right hand, is a chamber called “The Countess of Bath’s Library,” filled with many handsome folios, and other books, in Dutch binding, gilt, with the Earl’s Arms impressed upon them; for he had been some time of this house.
On the left hand, opposite to this room, is another chamber, in which I saw a great many manuscripts, medals, and other curiosities. At the west end of the Library there is a division made by a kind of wooden lattice-work, containing about thirty paces, full of choice and curious books, which was the Library of that great man, Archbishop Ussher, Primate of Armagh, whose learning and exemplary piety has justly made him the ornament, not only of that College (of which he was the first scholar that ever was entered in it, and the first who took degrees), but of the whole Hibernian nation.