SALFORD HUNDRED 



MANCHESTER 



the bookcases standing at right angles to the external 

 walls, and entered from a corridor on the inside by 

 latticed doors. The bookcases originally stood only 

 about 7 ft. high, or the height of the doors, but were 

 raised in the 1 8th century. The series of wide 

 square-headed three-light windows which light the 

 library recesses are of late date, but the original open 

 timber roof, similar to that of the hall, remains. At 

 the north end of the west library corridor there 

 is a piece of late 14th-century glass representing 

 St. Martin of Tours and the beggar, in a frame in 

 front of the window, together with a 17th-century 

 fragment, the subject of which is Eutychus falling 

 from the window. The south wing of the library is 

 sometimes styled the chapel of St. Mary, but 

 there seems to be no reason to suppose that it 

 was ever so used in college times, and if a 

 chapel was ever situated there it must have 

 been during the Derby occupancy, or after- 

 wards, when the buildings were put to various 

 uses, including those of a Presbyterian and In- 

 dependent meeting-house. The east end of 

 the room, however, shows a portion of a 1 7th- 

 century altar-rail and a bracket in the wall 

 above, which, if they belong to the building 

 at all, would seem to indicate the latter part of 

 the Derby residence. The upper cloister is 

 now used on the west and south side for storing 

 books, and the north side forms a corridor. At 

 the east end of the south cloister is a doorway 

 opening on to the landing at the top of the 

 stone steps from the great hall to the warden's 

 room (now the reading-room of the library), 

 which is situated immediately over the audit- 

 room. There is also a later door to this room 

 from the end of the library corridor adjoin- 

 ing, by which it is now usually entered. The 

 room is the same shape as that below, with 

 a similar square bay window on the east side, 

 but has an open timbered roof of framed spars 

 divided into two bays by a single central prin- 

 cipal. During the Derby occupancy the spars 

 were plastered over and a plain elliptical-shaped 

 ceiling inserted, closely following the line of 

 the spandrel over the fireplace at the north 

 end of the room, which is of slightly later date, 

 having been erected in honour of Humphrey 

 Chetham by his executors, probably in the early 

 years of the reign of Charles II. The wall 

 plate, which is about 10 ft. high, is moulded 

 and of oak, and apparently of the time of la 

 Warre's foundation, but it is ornamented with 

 theDerby badgeof an eagle's claw and with port- 

 cullises, and the panelling which goes all round 

 the room to the wall-plate is of 1 7th-century date. 

 Over the mantelpiece is a portrait of Humphrey 

 Chetham, and in the plaster spandrel above are 

 displayed his arms with helm and mantling. The 

 bay window has an elaborately vaulted plaster ceiling, 

 with bosses ornamented with the Derby badges, but 

 apparently of comparatively modern date, and the 

 room contains a good deal of 1 7th-century furniture, 

 and makes, perhaps, the most charming apartment in 

 the whole building. In the bay is a table at which 

 Harrison Ainsworth is said to have written several of 

 his novels ; "= the connexion with Sir Walter Raleigh 

 which is claimed for it must unfortunately be ruled 



out. A tall clock case with a barometer dated 1695, 

 and given by an old scholar of the hospital, Nicholas 

 Clegg, is a more genuine relic. In the north-west 

 corner a door in the wainscot leads by a second outer 

 door of two thicknesses (2 J in.), under a four-centred 

 stone arch, through a passage in the thickness of the 

 wall to a small room, about 1 2 ft. long by 5 ft. wide, 

 built over the stair and bay window of the hall with 

 a range of windows on the west side to the quad- 

 rangle. The opposite or east side seems to have been 

 originally open to the hall, a heavy oak beam, with 

 wall posts and curved brackets, being still in position, 

 the posts cut away about 4 ft. from the floor, prob- 

 ably giving the height of a rail or balustrade. At a 



Poets' Corner 



later time the opening has been filled in with a narrow 

 stone wall pierced by two quatrefoil openings, but 

 what purpose the gallery or room originally served is 

 not at all clear, and the date of the stone filling is 

 equally a matter of conjecture, but it seems most 

 likely that it was in the first instance a gallery open to 

 the hall and was later turned into a private room, at 

 which time, perhaps, the range of windows to the 

 quadrangle assumed their present aspect. These 

 window*, so noticeable a feature from the outside, 

 preclude the idea that the room was intended as a 

 hiding-place. 



In 1878 a new school building was erected on the 



9= Ainsworth lived and worked in London after 1824. 

 227 



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