Where brave I show myself.
The Irwell and the Irk still mingle their waters round the base of the rocky precipice on which the College stands, but alas for the daintiness or bravery of either!
As you enter the spacious courtyard a long, low, monastic-looking pile with two projecting wings meets the eye, presenting all that quaintness and picturesque irregularity of outline so characteristic of buildings of the mediæval period, with scarcely a feature to suggest the busy life that is going on without its walls. On the right is the great arched gateway giving admission from the Long Mill Gate, and which in old times constituted the main entrance. At the opposite or north-western angle is the principal entrance to the building itself. As you pass through the low portal you notice on the right the great kitchen, large and lofty and open to the roof, with its fireplace capacious enough to roast an ox; adjoining is the pantry, and close by that most important adjunct the buttery. On the other side of the vestibule, and separated from it by a ponderous oaken screen, panelled and ornamented, and black with age, is the ancient refectory or dining hall, where the recipients of Chetham’s bounty assemble daily for their meals and chant their “Non nobis.” It is a spacious apartment, with a lofty arched roof and wide yawning fireplace, preserving not merely the original form and appearance but the identical arrangement of the old baronial and conventual halls. In pre-Reformation times this was the chief entertaining room, and its appearance suggests the idea that in those remote days the ecclesiastics of Manchester loved good cheer, and were by no means sparing in their hospitalities. At the further end, opposite the screen, may still be seen the ancient daīs, raised a few inches above the general level of the floor, on which, in accordance with custom, was placed the “hie board,” or table dormant, at which sat the warden, his principal guests and the chief ecclesiastics ranged according to their rank above the salt, whilst the inferior clergy and others were accommodated at the side tables—the poor wandering mendicant who, by chance, found himself at the door, and being admitted to a humble share of the feast, taking his position near the screen, and thankfully fed, like Lazarus, with the crumbs that fell from the great man’s table.
At the further end of the vestibule you come upon the cloisters surrounding a small court, and note the crumbling grey walls and vaulted passages of this the most perfect and most characteristic portion of the original building.
Just before reaching the cloisters, you ascend by a stone staircase, guarded by massive oak balusters, that leads up to the library, where, as “Alick” Wilson sings—
Booath far and woide,
Theer’s yards o’ books at every stroide,
From top to bothum, eend and soide.
They are disposed in wall cases extending the length of the corridors, and branching off into a series of mysterious-looking little recesses, stored with material relics of the past, old manuscripts, and treasures of antiquity and art of various kinds, each recess being protected from the encroachments of the profane by its own lattice gate. Here
The dim windows shed a solemn light,