A HISTORY OF SURREY 



nnfitt . . . that a minister's wife should have 

 served tables, especially the wife of one (be it 

 spoken without arrogancye) that hath taken 

 tie degree of a Master of Artes. 



He wrote begging lettere to Allen and asked 

 him to be godfather to his child, but got only 

 an angry letter. Anne was however given a 

 legaqr of L^o by Allen's will. The ' 3 Rogers 

 went away' soon after Harrison, 28 October, 

 and Woodward on 13 January 1621. On 

 29 December 1620, however, ' Richard 

 Caulden came here to bord,' the master then 

 being Martin Symonds, previously usher, 

 Peter Symonds becoming usher in his place. 

 This last soon fell a victim to matrimony, and 

 departed at the end of 1 62 1. 



On 28 June 1632 Allen's wife died and was 

 buried in the College Chapel. This event 

 would probably have wrecked the whole estab- 

 lishment had not AUen already put it out of 

 his power to do so by his conveyance of lands. 

 For on 28 October he was being pressed for 

 security for the settlement on his intended 

 second wife, Constance Donne, daughter of 

 the Dean of St. Paul's, a girl of twenty, AUen 

 being fifty-seven. He had apparently be- 

 come engaged a month earlier, when three of 

 the four fellows left, and WiUiam George was 

 appointed to be both Preacher and School- 

 master. In the following summer the organ- 

 ist left, and Matthew Sweetser was the sole 

 schoolmaster and the sole fellow. The mar- 

 riage took place on 3 December and there 

 was talk next year of ' child bed Hnen.' * 

 But there was no child. The settlement was 

 secured in 1625, when the lease of The Barge, 

 Bell and Cock in Southwark and other pre- 

 mises was assigned as security for ^11,500. 

 The same lease was given by AUeyn's will to 

 the College to meet the additional charges 

 imposed by the statutes, i.e. the ' chaunters ' 

 and the thirty poor. As the property never 

 came into possession, the additional charges 

 fell through. But at the time of his death, 

 AUen's finances had improved, and all four 

 fellowships were full. He died at the age of 

 sixty on 25 November 1626. 



Matthew Sweetser the schoolmaster, left 

 in the February succeeding AUen's death,^ 

 and the usher, Charles Faldo, succeeded. 

 In 1627, the year after the founder's death, 

 there was a surplus of i^o divided beyond 

 the fixed salaries, the schoolmaster, Mr. Faldo, 

 receiving £3. But there was oot another 

 surplus during the century. 



Evil times came on the college. The steeple 

 fell down in 1638, and from 1635 till after the 

 Restoration the income was diminished by 

 £128 a year by the closing of the Fortune 

 Playhouse, first on account of plague, then on 

 account of prohibition by the Puritans. 



We really know next to nothing of the 

 school and absolutely nothing as to what work 

 it did for outsiders, if any. Grammar and 

 music were taught, as we find such entries as 

 on 6 February 1630, ' 3 grammers, 6 con- 

 struing bookes and catechismes for the schole 

 boyes, 5/.' 25 July, 1 631, '2 Catoes ^ and 

 other bookes for the schole y. iid., and a 

 Latin grammer 8d.' 8 September 1633, 

 ' 2 gramers for the schoole ' is. Sd. For 

 music we gather, ' Paid Mr. Walker for a new 

 pair of virginalls for the schole, £2 6s.' on 

 6 December 1631, and on 3 February follow- 

 ing • mending the base violl 6s.,' and 12 

 November 1632, ' the virginalls mending, 3/.' 

 29 October 1633, ' mending a base violl, 

 6s. 6d.' ; 26 January 1635, ' a table for the 

 singinge schoole, 5/. 6d. ' tuneing the schoole 

 organ, S'-' 



During the Civil War and the Common- 

 wealth the school received more attention. 



In March, 1643-4, it was in the hands of 

 two Welshmen, William Jones and Cadwalla- 

 der Roberts, who had been elected in 1639. 

 The latter having been absent for a year, 

 James Meade was appointed in his place, and 

 paid the stipend, but not admitted as fellow. 

 Roberts was now however proceeded against, 

 and on 28 March 1644 Meade was elected 

 Usher Fellow. The preacher resigned on 

 3 May, and the schoolmaster on 4 May. So 

 on 23 May the ' Committee for the safety of 

 the county,' finding the other fellowships 

 void by the delinquency of some and the 

 resignation of others of the fellowes,' made 

 John Crofts, M.A., preacher, and gave him 

 the salaries of the two senior fellows, and 

 confirmed Meade, who was only a B.A., in the 

 place and salaries of the two junior fellows. 

 The master and warden demurred to this 

 order as unstatutable, and were for a short 

 time imprisoned for refusing to obey it. 

 Meade resigned 17 October 1645, and the 

 ' Committee of Plundered Ministers ' ap- 

 pointed Edward Colby to succeed him. The 

 terms of appointment referring to teaching 

 ' children and schollers in the said free school ' 

 may perhaps be taken as evidence that there 

 were other scholars besides the twelve on the 

 foundation, which latter, like the scholars of 



' Tu°j"?' *■ ^^' ■ ' "^^"^ so-called Cato's Moralia, a first Latin 



> Ibid. 1. 428. But he signed the first audit on reader for many centuries, now entirely disused and 

 6 November 1627. forgotten. 



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