ALDINGTON VILLAGE--THE MANOR HOUSE--THE FARM.

"There's a divinity that shapes our ends."
--_Hamlet_.

"Deep-meadow'd, happy, fair with orchard lawns."
--_Morte d'Arthur_.


In recalling my earliest impressions of the village of Aldington, near
Evesham, Worcestershire, the first picture that presents itself is of
two chestnut-trees in full bloom in front of the Manor House which
became my home, and their welcome was so gracious on that sunny May
morning that it inclined me to take a hopeful view of the inspection
of the house and land which was the object of my visit.

The village took its name from the Celtic _Alne_, white river; the
Anglo-Saxon, _ing_, children or clan; and _ton_, the enclosed place.
The whole name, therefore, signified "the enclosed place of the
children, or clan, of the Alne." There are many other Alnes in England
and Scotland, also Allens and Ellens as river names, probably
corruptions of Alne, and we have many instances of the combination of
a river name with _ing_ and _ton_, such as Lymington and Dartington.
The Celtic _Alne_ points to the antiquity of the place, and there were
extensive traces of Roman occupation to which I shall refer later.

The village was really no more than a hamlet ecclesiastically attached
to the much larger village of Badsey. In addition to Celtic, Roman,
and Anglo-Saxon associations, it figured before the Norman Conquest in
connection with the Monastery and Abbey of Evesham, the Manor and the