nd the endowment was adequate to the
establishment, for the revenues at the dissolution amounted to 595l. 12s.
11d. Among the various donations to this college, the following taken
from the Parliamentary rolls of the year 1450, will not be found unworthy
the attention of the curious. The king (Henry the seventh) grants to the
dean and Canons of the church collegiate of our lady at Leicester, "a
tunne of wynne to be taken by the chief botteller of England in our port
of Kingston upon Hull," and it is added "they never had no wynne granted
to them by us nor our progenitors afore this time to sing with, nor
otherwise."

When it is considered that the castle just surveyed occupies a station
most pleasant as well as commanding; that from the buildings of the
Newark it derived all the splendor which the arts and taste of the times
could bestow, and that its adjoining a large, well fortified, and not ill
built town was calculated to contribute most essentially to the
convenience of its possessors, it will appear to have been one of the
most agreeable residences in the kingdom for such powerful noblemen as
were the dukes of Lancaster; nor will the visitor be surprised to find
that it was occasionally used as a seat by the kings, its owners.

But of all the periods of its history that will surely appear most
interesting, in which Henry de Gresmond, first earl of Derby, and on the
death of his father, earl and then duke of Lancaster, already renowned
thro' Europe for his atchievements in arms, aud crowned with laurels from
the fields of Guienne, where he taught the English how to conquer at
Crecy and Agincourt, returned to reside at Leicester, and to add to the
distinction of wise and brave the still more valuable title of _good_,
which he was about to earn by the practice of almost every virtue at this
place. Then indeed was Leicester castle the scene of true splendor and
magnificence, for it was the scene of bounty influenced by benevolence
and guided by religion, of taste supported by expense yet directed by
judgment and regulated by prudence, and of elegance such as the most
accomplished knight of that most perfect age of chivalry might be
expected to display. This nobleman died of a pestilential disorder at
the castle, in the year 1361, greatly lamented by the inhabitants of
Leicester. The order of his funeral appointed by himself, and curiously
recorded by our local historians, is a pleasing proof of his good sense
an