ROYAL INSTITUTION OF CORNWALL. 57 



that it was " old and ruinous, and first built with, bad materials." 

 Towards the restoration of Euthin Church, which was old and 

 ruinous, the damage amounting to £128, there was collected l^d., 

 and the liberality of the parish seems to have been fairly- 

 exhausted by this year, 1715, for the highest collections we find 

 are those for Slimbridge, in Gloucester, and Kentford, in Suffolk, 

 the former amounting to 5d., and the latter to 4^d., for in fact 

 the tale of "churches old and ruinous" must have somewhat 

 palled upon the parishioners, as the briefs for "All Saints' Church, 

 in Derby, old and ruinous;" "St. Peter's Church, in Chester, 

 old and ruinous;" Shoreham Church, in Sussex, old and 

 ruinous ;" St. Mary's Church, in ye city of Lichfield, old and 

 ruinous," only realised l^d. each ; but this sum was slightly 

 exceeded in one case when the town of Liverpool, in Lancaster, 

 after a loss by fire, collected 2d. from the remote country 

 parish of St. Allen, in Cornwall. 



It was stated during the discussion, that at St. Clements, in 

 the day of the E,ev. Francis Jentins, when a brief was received 

 from head quarters, and the vicar knew from experience that the 

 probable amount collected would be less than the cost of trans- 

 mitting it, the clerk would be instructed to walk around the 

 cliurch with a plate, and not to receive any donations, the result 

 being be returned as nil. 



A paper was then read from Mr. Edward Whitley, on " The 

 College of St. Columb." On the western side of the present 

 churchyard of St. Columb Major, lies a piece of land enclosed 

 and used for garden purposes, which still bears the name of the 

 college. On this site stood the parsonage house, formerly 

 denominated here, as in other parts of England, " The College," 

 because it contained a collegiate kind of family, with a collegiate 

 kind of school within it. In tbe times when this community 

 flourished, the parsonage household or retainers of the church 

 consisted of six persons, under the Eector, viz., the deacon, sub- 

 deacon, the acolyte, the exorcist lector, and ostiary. The priest 

 and deacon only being allowed to be in holy orders, while the 

 others were denominated clerks ; thus were formed those first 

 colleges of clergy in our island, the immediate parents of what 

 we call colleges in the present day. The grand old church of 

 St. Columb was once nearly destroyed by some pupils of this 



