Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School, Faversham

192 QUEEN ELIZA.BETH'S nly thirteen years before, and the accounts show the wages of the carpenters at one shilling per day. This was a relic of the old guild system in which the materials were provided by the patrons (in this case the Corporation) and contracts made with craftsmen for the labour of erection. In both cases much of the carting of materials was done by different freemen as their contribution towards the building cost. The building consisted of a large schoolroom, with a smaller room for the masters' use, carried upon well proportioned and moulded hexagonal oak pillars ( of which those on the east side remain) leaving the ground floor free and forming a covered playground for the scholars. There was a small room on the ground floor at the north end for use as a school library, and a staircase led out of this room to the schoolroom above. It is uncertain when the pillars on the west side were removed and the wall erected, but the original beams which carry the floor above still remain. Some of the timbers are elaborately moulded and carved. The spaces between the external timber framing were filled in with brick or wattle and daub, and plastered. The shallow windows with their leaded lights have moulded frames and mullions, and are fixed well above the floor. The roof was covered with tiles as at present; and the wide over-hanging eaves with a plastered cove allowed the roof water to fall clear of the building. The whole of the timber framework was fitted together on the ground and marked before erection. The walk in front of the school was given by John Smith, who owned the Old Abbey Gate Farm. The Indenture is dated Nov. 10th, 1591, and recites that" the Governors have erected a school house on the land given by William Saker 'lying next a parcel of ground now John Smith's known as the Amery Croft." " Whereas there is no convenient or sufficient way for the schoolmaster, usher and scholars to go to and from the said schoolhouse," the said John Smith gave" one 'sufficient way to lead out of the churchyard along and before the east side to the corner of the stone wall near the gate leacling to his garden." This is the identical gateway through