THE LENCHES. 245

into a farm-house, and so it continued till the year 1856, when Sir Charles came into the property, and immediately set about reconverting it into a family mansion, adding a new wing to it and building a new farm-house close by for the occupation of the previous tenant. Rouse Lench Court is now a very characteristic building in the Elizabethan style, constructed of oak noggins, on a stone foundation. Over the gateway is the couplet in old English characters-

"Welcome ye coming,

Speede ye parting guest; "

and the family monogram, " C. H. R. B.," with the motto, "Sibi et Amicis," is over the portico of the principal facade. This ancient seat, the gardens of which are distinguished by fine old yew trees coeval with the building, stands on a pleasant eminence, commanding lovely scenery, and surrounded by extensive woods for some dozen of miles. The estate comprises about 3,000 acres of rich pasture and arable land, in which great improvements have been made by drainage and otherwise. Sir Charles likewise deserves much credit for the care he takes of his farm-houses, the school he has erected, and the comfortable cottages he has raised for the labourers - an act at once of kind consideration and sound policy which cannot be too highly commended. In the village which he has thus adorned and improved Sir Charles received an ovation when he took possession of the renovated mansion in July, 1863, the memory of which will no doubt be a ray of sunshine for the remainder of his life.

Urso and the church of Evesham in Norman days held the best part of the Lenches; Hales Owen Abbey and the nuns of Cookhill also had possessions here. The predecessors of the Rouses took their names from the parish - as Randulph de Lench, from whom, on the principle of "give and take," it was called Lench Radulphi; and when the Rouses entered, at the tune of the Conquest, the name was altered to Rouse Lench. This family were great supporters of Cromwell's cause, almost