and Chapel, coach-houses, stables, offices, gardens, and yard, thereto belonging, with the right, members, privileges, and appurtenances," (except ingress and egress for reparation, as recited) "shall be vested in the imperial crown of this realm, and shall remain for ever unalienable from the same. And his Majesty, his heirs, &c., in the imperial crown of this realm, shall for ever hold and enjoy the same against the said Bishop of Ely," &c. Thus, after a possession of nearly five hundred years, Ely House, and the reserved grounds, were conveyed to the crown for £6,500, to be laid out, with £3,600, the amount of dilapidations charged on the family of the preceding Bishop, in providing a town residence for the see in another situation. It was at first contemplated to build a house at Knightsbridge; but the site determined upon was that of Clarendon House, Dover-street, Piccadilly. In addition to this, an annuity of £200 was settled, payable to the Bishops of Ely for ever. The site and materials of the old buildings of Ely House, including the Chapel, were, after the transfer, purchased by Mr. Charles Cole, architect and deputy-surveyor for the crown; the property having been duly conveyed to him by the Lords of the Treasury, under the powers of the Act, 15 Geo. III. Finding, however, that he had not sufficient funds to complete the buildings which he had designed, Mr. Cole, in 1778, by indentures of lease and release, granted the fee to certain parties to hold, on the condition of their granting him building leases as he should require them. He, therefore, and his descendants, thus became leaseholders for various long terms. As the proprietor of the estate, he then built the houses in Ely Place; and to these houses the Chapel was intended to serve as a place of worship.

In February, 1781, a trial took place in the Court of King's Bench, before William, Earl of Mansfield, Lord Chief Justice, and a special jury, in which the said Mr. Cole, then an inhabitant of Ely

Place, was the plaintiff, and Joseph Girdler and William Blackborrow, Esqrs., two magistrates of Middlesex, were defendants, it being an action of trespass for taking the plaintiff's watch to pay a poor's rate under a warrant of distress signed by the defendants. After hearing the evidence, Lord Mansfield delivered the following charge to the jury:

"THE question for you to try is simply, whether the palace of the Bishop of Ely in Holborn, sold to the public, and by them to the plaintiff, lies within the parish of St. Andrew, Holborn, or is extraparochial. It is impossible at this day to trace how such places became extra-parochial. It has happened in various ways: but where grants have been long lost, possession and enjoyment, unless explained, must be taken as evidence of the title. The tenants of Privy Garden upon a trial were held to be extra-parochial; and the main ground of their claim was, that the premises belonged to the Archbishop of York as his palace, that they were held as such by Cardinal Wolsey, and were by him given to the crown. The jury found them to be extra-parochial, and they now enjoy that privilege. The tax for the poor was introduced in the reign of Queen Elizabeth; but from that time to the present the bishop has never paid it. Bishops have not any personal privilege from payment of taxes. They have not had any pew in the Church, nor have any of their family been baptized or buried there; they had great suites of officers in their families, who all used the bishop's own Chapel. If the enjoyment in this case is evidence that the premises were extraparochial, they ought to be so now; and I must say that where it was notorious under the act that they were to be sold to private persons, the parish should then have set up their claim, and not have waited till the plaintiff had expended his money in the building*.”

* From a MS. in the Register-Book belonging to the Chapel.

The jury, without going out of court, found a verdict for the plaintiff.

Lord Stowell remarks, that this verdict was probably obtained on the assumption of mistaken facts, or on some insufficient statement of the circumstances.

Ely Place has since been ruled to be liable to rates.

A register-book belonging to the Chapel, which is continued from one in the custody of the Bishop of Ely, shows about fifty entries of baptism between 1780 and 1802. It commences with the baptism of "Charles, son of Charles and Elizabeth Cole, born December 1, 1779, baptized January 1, 1780." Only thirteen baptisms appear to have been solemnized in this Chapel between the last-mentioned date and the 7th of August, 1783.

The following Memorandum occurs as the next entry :"The extraparochial Chapel in Ely Place, having been thoroughly repaired and beautified by the proprietor, Charles Cole, Esq., was opened for divine service on Sunday, the 10th day of December, 1786, by the Rev. Christopher Wells, D.D., Chaplain to the Right Honourable the Earl of Harcourt, and rector of Leigh, in the county of Worcester."

In March, 1787, the register of baptisms is resumed, and continued to September 1802, during which time thirty-six baptisms took place.

By a manuscript note, it appears that this register book came into the possession of the Rev. William Elisha Faulkner, as minister of the Chapel, on the 25th of March, 1793.

With reference to this clergyman, the following melancholy notice occurs in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1798:

Died, November 4, of malignant fevers,

The third son of the Rev. Mr. Faulkner:

On the 8th, aged forty, after preaching three times on the Sunday before,

the Rev. William Elisha Faulkner, Lecturer of St. Giles in the Fields, and

minister of Ely Chapel.

And on the 12th, his youngest son.

His wife and second son were also attacked by the same disorder, and have recovered.

It remains shortly to trace the history of the Chapel to the present time. After the death of Mr. Cole, which happened in the year 1803, his representatives let the Chapel to Mrs. Britannia Faulkner, at a rent of £125 per annum, a clause being inserted in the deed obliging the party to defend extraparochial privileges. In 1814 the Chapel was let to the Rev. J. Wilcox, at a rent of £135, over and above a ground-rent of £75 per annum.

On the establishment of the Central School in Baldwin's Gardens, under the superintendence of the NATIONAL SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING THE EDUCATION OF THE POOR IN THE PRINCIPLES OF THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH, Mr. Joshua Watson, the benevolent treasurer of that institution, considered Ely Chapel to be a suitable place of worship for the children and their parents, and determined to take measures for securing it for this purpose. He, therefore, in the year 1815, purchased the lease at a large cost, and, in 1820, munificently presented it to the Society; assigning the whole management and direction to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Bishop of London, for the time being. Forty-two years of the lease still remain unexpired. The Rev. William Hart Coleridge*, M. A., Lecturer of St. Andrew, Holborn, was appointed to the ministry of the chapel under the new tenure. It being supposed that the inhabitants of Ely Place, and the adjoining neighbourhood, would continue to rent the pews, suitable arrangements were made in the body of the Chapel for their accommodation; and when the Central

* Consecrated Bishop of Barbados in 1824.

National School was transferred from Baldwin's Gardens to Westminster, the galleries which had been erected for the children were refitted for general use.

The expectations which had been formed, as to the attendance of persons in the district, having, in a great degree, failed, the Chapel was closed; but attention was called to it on the occasion of an appeal being made to the friends of the Church by the Lord Bishop of London, in April, 1836, for supplying means towards the erection of additional churches in the metropolis; and it became a subject of regret to many who reflected on the statements contained in the Bishop's powerful Address, that a venerable building, in every respect calculated for the purposes of public worship, should remain unoccupied. Accordingly, in the year 1836, at the instance, and by direction of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Bishop of London, Ely Chapel, after having been shut up for about two years and a half, was re-opened. The Rev. A. D'Arblay, M.A., of Christ's College, Cambridge, undertook the care of the Chapel for one year at least, without any other expense to the National Society than that of the requisite preparations for divine service. He commenced his duties in the autumn of that year, when several pews were taken. A few Sundays, however, had only elapsed, when Mr. D'Arblay was attacked by an illness, which, after a short but severe struggle, terminated in his death. Divine service is now regularly performed in the Chapel, morning and evening, by the present Minister, the Rev. Joseph Edwards, M.A., of Trinity College, Cambridge, and Second Master of King's College School, London.

G