h he
dissected an elephant, which had been burned to death in the booth where
it was kept for exhibition on the 17th June, 1682. According to Haller,
oculists are indebted to him for some important discoveries connected
with the organs of vision.[534]

The old Custom-house stood on the site of houses now comprised in that
part of Dublin known as Wellington-quay. Here a locality was selected,
in the reign of James I., for the purpose of "erecting cranes and making
wharves." This street, now so busy and populous, was then in the
suburbs, and is described in the lease, A.D. 1620, as "a certain parcel
of ground, lying in or near Dame-street, street, in the suburbs of the
city of Dublin." A new Custom-house was erected about the period of the
Restoration, with the addition of a council-chamber, where the Privy
Council and Committees of the House of Commons were accustomed to
assemble. By an order of the Privy Council, 19th September, 1662, the
Custom-house-quay was appointed the sole place for landing and lading
the exports and imports of the city of Dublin. In 1683 the public
Exchange of Dublin was transferred from Cork House to the Tholsel, a
building erected early in the reign of Edward II., and described by
Camden as built of hewn stone. Here the Mayor was elected on Michaelmas
Day, and the citizens held their public meetings. A clock was set up in
1560, no doubt very much to the admiration of the citizens. A new
Tholsel or City Hall was erected in 1683, on the same site, and there
was a "'Change," where merchants met every day, as in the Royal Exchange
in London. Public dinners were given here also with great magnificence;
but from the marshy nature of the ground on which the building had been
set up, it fell to decay in 1797, and a new Sessions-house was erected
in Greenstreet.

Nor did the good people of Dublin neglect to provide for their
amusements. Private theatricals were performed in the Castle at the
latter end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, if not earlier. The sum of
one-and-twenty shillings and two groats was expended on wax tapers for
the play of "Gorbodne," "done at the Castle," in September, 1601.
Miracle and mystery plays were enacted as early as 1528, when the Lord
Deputy was "invited to a new play every day in Christmas;" where the
Tailors acted the part of Adam and Eve, it is to be supposed because
they initiated the trade by introducing the necessity for garments; the
Shoemakers, the story of Crisp