welcomed Ferdinando d'Adda, the Pope's nuncio, to Windsor, had never been accorded to them;-all these are facts so glaring that to deny them would be to deny the light of day.

In the course of my extensive tour through England, particularly in the northern counties, I declare that the tokens and appearances of Romanism met me in so many places that I could almost have fancied myself travelling through a Roman catholic state. I do not remember having seen more places of worship, or many much more magnificent ones among them, in the Roman catholic state of Baden and even Bavaria (except in the capital of the latter), than I have noticed in my peregrination north of Birmingham. I was admiring, one day, a recent and very imposing structure of Mr. Pugin, having the outward show of a cathedral, which had just been opened for the Roman worship, when a gentleman well acquainted with that skilful architect assured me that he was then engaged in superintending the construction of twenty-two other Roman catholic churches, principally in the Gothic or English style of architecture, in which Mr. Pugin is known to excel.

Indeed, their chapels and churches in England and Wales are said to be upwards of five hundred, many of which are larger and handsomer than the majority of the churches of the dominant religion; besides twenty convents, and not fewer than nine colleges in England alone for the education of the Roman catholic youths.

One of the latter institutions, conducted by the Jesuits at Stonyhurst, I have already mentioned and described in a previous volume.* A second, still more important, and one which deserves, on every account, the attention of my Protestant readers, is that the title of which I have placed at the head of the present chapter. As it laid in my way more than once going to and from the Spas of the midland counties, I

In that account there are two typographical errors, as "Ascott" for "Oscott," and "Brownhill" instead of "Brownbill."

could not resist the temptation of visiting it; the more so as I knew that among the students of the establishment there were three or four belonging to Roman catholic families of the highest respectability and exemplary character, with whom I had been in habits of professional intercourse.

Another motive for such a visit I found in that universal attention which the subject of education, with or without the aid of the church, commands, at the present moment, in this country, especially in reference to the Romanists. Such a motive is indeed paramount, and my readers can hardly blame me for introducing into my present work, as an episode, the account of the new college of St. Mary's Oscott. Thither, therefore, I drove from Birmingham on Sunday, the 27th of October, 1839.

Within the last three or four years an almost barren tract of land, part of an elevated plateau, distant about five miles north of Birmingham on the road to Sutton-Colefield, and a little to the left, has been invested, by the liberal support of the Roman catholic gentry, and the munificent donations of one of the higher clergy of that creed, with an importance which, though unperceived at this moment, may and will exert, at some future period, a commanding influence through a very extended sphere of society in England.

In the centre of that previously barren spot, over the surface of which parterres of flowers, green-plats, and serpentine walks have been traced by a skilful hand, and plantations raised as screens against the colder winds, and a noble extensive parapeted terrace erected, commanding a vast panorama before it—in that centre an imposing mass of building has been reared, which presents one of the most striking and solid examples of the Elizabethan style of architecture that has been executed in modern times. That building is St. Mary's College, which, with its adjoining Gothic chapel, is the combined production of Pugin and Potter of Lichfield.

The edifice, which is of red brick with sandstone ornaments and accessories, extends nearly three hundred feet in length, with its front to the south, and contains within every possible collegiate accommodation which the classical, moral, and physical education of one hundred and thirty, or more, children of the Roman catholic nobility and gentry of this and of one or two foreign countries can require, or the theological instruction of young men destined for the priesthood can demand.

The engraving here introduced will convey to the reader a better idea, than any description of mine can, of the general elevation and appearance of the college, with its central square tower, over the entrance door of which are inscribed the words "Religioni et bonis moribus."

To the right of the College, and connected with it, is the church recently finished under the special direction of Mr. Pugin, which has cost at least 15,000l. The view exhibits a processional ceremony performed in the open air by the clergy

of the college, proceeding to a temporary altar erected under a gorgeous tent outside the chapel.

The origin of this institution and imposing building is shortly this prior to the French revolution the Roman catholic clergy of this country were educated in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. That ever-memorable convulsion, and the perpetual state of warfare which it led to between this country and France, as well as the abolition which ensued of almost every institution for ecclesiastical purposes in many parts of the continent, threw the Roman catholic bishops in England on their own resources, with regard to the education and formation of the required number of clergymen for their flocks; and they endeavoured to meet the pressing wants of the times by establishing in this country separate colleges under the exclusive jurisdiction of each. Circumstances rendered it expedient to combine the education of the laity with that of the clergy, and the practice has continued to the present time.

It was for similar reasons that the "famed" Maynooth College was established in Ireland in 1795, with the sanction as well as the pecuniary aid of government, continued ever since, for the special object of educating and qualifying persons to be parish priests. But there a first and very important error was committed in its organization, which has extended to this day its baneful influence over the results of that system of education. That error consisted in confining the object of the institution to the rearing up of none but young aspirants for the priesthood; instead, as in the case of the Jesuit's college at Stonyhurst, and of this of St. Mary, of devoting it to the education of laymen as well as ecclesiastics; thus tending to infuse liberality of sentiment among the latter, by bringing men of all classes and professions together.

Old Oscott was founded two years before Maynooth College,

that is about 1793, and the building was gradually added to, as increasing wants rendered that step necessary. Further and more extensive additions becoming again urgent, it was deemed advisable to erect a new edifice, instead of increasing the already unsightly pile of the old buildings. The new college, accordingly, was commenced in March, 1835, and opened in August, 1838, a little more than a year before my visit.

It at once bespeaks the liberality of the Bishop of Cambysopolis, Dr. Walsh, the papist prelate of the midland district, as well as the thriving condition of the old college institution, that the necessary funds for the purchase of the land, the construction of the building and for its furniture, amounting to about forty-five thousand pounds, have been supplied partly by the former and partly by the latter.

This fact, as far as it concerns the college itself, shews one of the advantages to be derived from combining with the ecclesiastical the secular education of many young people; inasmuch as by such a plan pecuniary resources are obtained, which render the establishment what it ought to be,-independent of all government subvention, and of course control, on the one hand, and of all eleemosynary support, which would be derogatory, on the other. And yet the pecuniary charges made at this establishment for the secular education of youth are exceedingly liberal.

Not satisfied with merely contributing towards the establishment of the new college a great part of his own wealth, which he so well knows how to distribute in works of charity and benevolence (as I learned from various quarters), the pious and reverend person just named has added another precious gift to his previous munificent donation of money, by presenting to the college a collection of 12,000 volumes, well known as La Biblioteca del Marchese Marini, at Rome, the publisher of a new edition of Vitruvius, from whose