RUINED EASTJHjRY 255 



davs later, when tliu l\aiii>er, Lavino- a uuii in liis 

 hand, put his threat into execution and shot the 

 three dogs as they were drinking in a j)ool, with 

 their heads close together, in one of the Hidings. 

 Dodington, in a first outburst of fury, sent a 

 challenge to the Ranger over this affair, and the 

 Ranger bought a sword and sent a friend to call on 

 the challenger to fix time and place for the encounter ; 

 but by that time Dodington had thought better of 

 it, and instead of making arrangements to shed the 

 enemy's gore, invited both him and his friend to 

 dinner. They met and had a jovial time together, 

 and the sword remained unspotted. 



On Dodington's death his estates passed to Earl 

 Temple, who could not afford to keep up the vast 

 place. He accordingly offered an income of £200 a 

 year to anyone who would live at Eastbury and keep 

 it in repair. No one came forward to accept these 

 terms ; and so, after the pictures, objects of art, and 

 the furniture had been sold, the great house was 

 pulled down, piecemeal, in 1795, with the exception 

 of this solitary fragment. 



There is room for much reflection in Eastbury 

 Park to-day, by the crumbling archway with the two 

 large fir-trees growing between the joints of its 

 masonry ; by the remaining wing, or the foundations 

 of the rest of the vanished house, which can still be 

 distinctly traced in the grass during dry summers. 

 The stories of ' Haunted Eastbury ' and of the head- 

 less coachman and his four-in-hand are dying out, but 

 the panelled room in Avhich Doggett, Earl Temple's 

 fraudulent steward, shot himself is still to be seen. 



