126 



GARDENS OLD AND NEW. 



others who wish to adorn such houses suitably and 

 appropriately. 



The beauty of the situation, which is in the 

 pastoral valley of the Culm, where it flows from its 

 source in the Blackdown Hills by Uffculme to Cul- 

 lumpton, will not be forgotten. There are scenes in 

 the vicinity that might have employed the pencil of a 

 Claude, and waters that will still make the angler 

 happy. Here the Walronds have long been seated, 

 the lands of Bradfelle having been transferred to 

 Richard Walrond by Fulke Peynel in the reign of 

 King John and the old deed, written in the same 

 character as Magna Charta, is still preserved in 

 the family, whose male line, however, ended in 

 the last century, and the estates were carried by 

 the heiress to a member of the Dickinson family, 

 who assumed the name and arms of Walrond in 



that the Elizabethan builder must have laid out a 

 garden. This building owner, as we find by dates 

 on the house, was at work from 1592 to 1604, and 

 produced a fine and typical H -shaped house, of 

 which the hall, rising up to a noteworthy hammer- 

 beam roof, occupied the centre, and was entered by 

 a porch which led to the screens, with the office wing 

 to the south, while the north wing contained the 

 parlours. It had, however, suffered severely from 

 eighteenth century treatment ; but drastic restoration 

 was effected by Sir John Walrond in and about the 

 year 1861. Nothing of the old features that could 

 be saved was lost, the work being carried on in a 

 spirit of veneration, and with a great regard for the 

 evidences of the past. The mansion still retained 

 its mullioned windows, but had lost all other dis- 

 tinction, its walls having been plastered with 



THE YEW LAWN 



1845. Little remains to tell us of the lives of 

 the long generations of this ancient house, and we 

 are left to assume that its members took their part 

 in the local affairs of their district, and in some of 

 the larger concerns of the estate. Of one of them, 

 who was knighted by Charles II., a love-letter 

 survives, written by him to Nina de Monpellon and 

 preserved in a beautiful bag or envelope of jewelled 

 tapestry. That they had a house of importance 

 at Bradfield may be implied from the fact that John 

 Walrond obtained a licence for his oratory there on 

 May ryti'., 1332. Lysons says that there was an 

 ancient chapel, of which no traces remained save 

 some old offices, which from their ruinous state 

 had been pulled down. Tradition places it some- 

 where on the strip of ground between the house and 

 the carp pond, where the fine old clipped yews prove 



rough-cast, and being almost destitute of buttresses, 

 cornices and string-courses, while the parapets had 

 nothing but plain flat copings left. The changes 

 effected by Sir John in the hall for the greater 

 security of the splendid roof needed the division of 

 the many-mullioned old hall window into two ; this 

 did not seriously affect the fine architectural character. 

 The ornamental details added at the time did much 

 to increase the beauty of the structure, and that it is 

 not lacking in architectural merit will be seen in our 

 pictures. 



It was necessary, however, to enlarge and adapt 

 it to modern needs, and as the kitchens and offices 

 occupied a large part of the south wing, they were 

 removed to the back. The straight forecourt 

 entrance up to the porch of the banqueting hall was 

 abandoned as a main entrance, and a new one 



