CHAPTER III. 



CHARITIES AND ENDOWMENTS. 



" Ye have the poor with you always, and whensoever ye will ye may do 

 them good." — Mark xiv. 7. 



The late Sir John Bowring, in a paper read at the 

 meeting of the Devonshire Association for the Advancement 

 of Science, Literature, and Art, July, 1872, when speaking 

 of the Cathedral Yard, at Exeter, says : — " In the same 

 Cathedral Yard lived Thomas Crispin, one of those public 

 benefactors, founders of schools and alms-houses, who did 

 for Exeter what Gresham accomplished in London, and 

 Colston in Bristol. * * * Crispin was born in Kings- 

 bridge, where he endowed a school, still prosperous, and 

 ornamented with his portrait. Of the charities left for 

 the encouragement of the woollen trade, several will, ere 

 long, have to be devoted to other purposes. They represent 

 the conditions and requirements of bygone times, and their 

 appropriation must be accommodated to new-born wants." 



In the portrait alluded to by Sir J. Bowring, Crispin is 

 represented "with a large hat, grey hair, and a crutch 

 stick." 



Crispin's Tree Grammar School is situated in the higher 

 part of Fore Street. Over an arched entrance in the front 

 of the building, is the following inscription, cut in stone — 



