James Wilkins, the builder of Downing, must be distinguished from the later William Wilkins, the gothic experimentalist. If the second Wilkins had worked in the manner of the first, we should have missed some valuable historical relics, but should have gained in other respects. Downing, with its heavy angularities and immense porticoes, is not a very great advance on the plans so cherished by Mr James Essex, but it bears the marks of a good intention, and is an excellently proportioned building. It was begun in 1807, but has never been finished, and now simply consists of two parallel ranges running north and south, with a wide space of lawn between them. Its situation is very remote, but to this it owes its chief beauty, the lovely park with its fine avenues. The view northwards from[264] the park, embracing the fellows’ garden, and ending in the towers of the new Roman Catholic Church, is worth seeing, although the contrast of the classical college with one of the latest examples of modern Gothic work is somewhat inharmonious.

Downing is almost the youngest of Cambridge colleges, and its history is chiefly concerned with its foundation. At Gamlingay, in the only part of Cambridgeshire that can be called picturesque, there lived from about 1680 to 1749, a baronet named Sir George Downing. He had been the victim of a compulsory marriage. At the early age of fifteen, he had been married to his cousin Mary Forester, who herself was only thirteen. They never lived together, and in 1717, Sir George made a will by which he bequeathed his estates to some collateral relatives. This document contained the provision that, if his heirs died out, the estates were to be applied to the use of a college which his trustees shoul............