from his privileges. The Poor Brethren
resent the lordship of the pluralist. The
Vicar of St. Giles's Cripplegate, and
Archdeacon of London, and Canon Residentiary of
St. Paul's, comes among them manifestly
playing turtle to their sprat: well beneficed
as he is, he draws large funds out of the
institution which, though meant for them,
barely supplies their wants, and therefore
they readily resent all his authoritative dealings
with them.

By this light let us observe what are the
main points of their case as stated in a document
of their own framing, and we shall see
at once how even the best intentions of the
Master (and that he has meant and has done
well in many respects we cheerfully admit) are
defeated by the false position in which, as a
pluralist, he necessarily must stand. With
the case, let us take also the Master's answer
to each point on which it dwells.

After reciting the origin of the charity,
the Poor Brothers venture to remind the
Governors and the Master, that three years
subsequently to the founder's death, the
hospital was opened by his executors, who had
been solemnly enjoined by the old man, "as
they will answer at the Day of Judgment, to
endeavour to see my last will performed,
according to my true meaning and charitable
intent." Accordingly, it is urged, there
entered into the hospital when it was opened
by the executors—who knew what the true
meaning of the founder was—captains and
gentlemen (meaning the Poor Brothers),
scholars, and officers.

Hereupon replies the Master, in his
pamphlet, that the emphatic warning as to the
performance of his true meaning and charitable
intent "had not more direct reference to
the interest which the hospital might have in
his will, than to his other numerous charitable
bequests and legacies." As to the supposed
intention of the founder to constitute the
society of the poor men in his hospital a
society of gentlemen, it will be proved,
writes the Master, that this idea is erroneous,
and refuted by evidence the most conclusive
—viz., the founder's own acts. Having
boldly stated this, the Master has supplied
his proof and refutation, and assumes the
question to be settled. The only most
conclusive refutation of the right of the Poor
Brothers to be selected from the rank of
decayed gentlemen, and treated as such with
proportionate consideration, is that which
occurs three or four pages later, in this
passage: "The founder, during the six weeks
which elapsed between the completion of the
foundation by the conveyance of the estates
and his death, never exercised the power of
making orders; but if the palace which had
been purchased for the hospital had been
ready to receive its inmates, it is probable
that the poor, aged, maimed, needy and
impotent people placed in it would have been
persons such as the founder had designated
for his hospital at Hallingbury—viz., poor
men, who would have been maintained in
diet, clothes and fuel, at the cost of ten
pounds thirteen shillings and fourpence
a-year." (No small sum, a quarter of a thousand
years ago.) Upon the strong assertion,
evidence like this comes as a strange
anticlimax; but the Master of the Charterhouse
appears to be an autocrat complete at every
point. His method is: I say the case stands
positively thus. Come to me afterwards with
no rebellious arguments; because, if I have
said a thing—as was observed to Slow—the
matter has been disposed of.

But, the Poor Brothers in their case show
further evidence of the position it was meant,
from the beginning, that they were to hold,
and which it is now commonly supposed they
do hold, notwithstanding any sneers of the
Master, who repeatedly scorns in italics, as
applied to Poor Brothers, the words gentility
and gentlemen,—to which we again most
earnestly call the attention of Colonel
Newcome's patron. He even produces a table
put into a peculiar form for the purpose of
still further discrediting the notion of the
Poor Brothers' gentility. The present
Brothers are grouped by the Grand Master
according to their former stations:—

Clergymen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Legal and Medical Men . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5
Military and Naval Men . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Merchants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8
Schoolmasters and Literary Men . . . . . . .7
Land Stewards. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2
Tradesmen, Clerks, Servants. . . . . . . . .41
                                                               79
One Vacancy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  1
                               Total . . . . . . . . .  . . .80

Behold how the great pluralist makes out
his case by winding up with a riff-raff of
forty-one tradesmen, clerks, servants! Is
the tradesman, in this land of shopkeepers, in
no case to be reckoned among gentlemen?
May he not be as wealthy with his honest
gains, as any lofty churchman who pockets
gains honest men condemn. Possibly, in a
well-adjusted table of respectability, the
pluralist might rank with people meaner than
the servants.

But there is no doubt that many
wear the gown of the Poor Brother, for
whom it never was intended. That is one
part of the abuse. The patronage of the
school blesses the nobleman's young friend;
the patronage of the Poor Brother's stall
trumpery as it is, may allow your lordship
to be charitable to your superannuated
lackey. And so the worn-out lackey is sent
as a companion, to the ruined gentleman,
and the magnificent archdeacon as a haughty
Master.

Furthermore, urge the petitioners: After
the nature of the foundation had been settled
and defined, it was declared in the letters