South Front.
Richard, third Baron Braybrooke, born in 1783, succeeded his father in 1825, and married the Lady Jane, eldest daughter of Charles, Marquis Cornwallis, by whom he had issue five sons—Richard Cornwallis Neville, Charles Cornwallis Neville, Henry Aldworth Neville, Rev. Latimer Neville (now Master of Magdalen College, Cambridge, and heir-presumptive to the title), and Grey Neville—and three daughters. Lord Braybrooke was well known as the author of the “History of Audley End,” and as the editor of the “Diary and Correspondence of Samuel Pepys.” He was succeeded by his eldest son, Richard Cornwallis Neville (better known as the Hon. R. C. Neville), as fourth Baron Braybrooke. This nobleman, who was born in 1820, was an eminent antiquary, and was author of several important works. He was educated at Eton, and in 1837 entered the army, serving in Canada till 1838. Ill-health, which continued throughout his life, compelled him to retire from the army in 1841, and he devoted himself thenceforward to the study of history and antiquities. He became a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, a member of other learned bodies, and contributed many papers to the Archæologia and to the Transactions of the Archæological Association and Institute. Having undertaken and carried out some important excavations at Chesterford, &c., he published his “Antiqua Explorata,” which afterwards he followed by another volume, “Sepulchra Exposita.” In 1852 he issued his great work, “Saxon Obsequies;” and, later still, the “Romance of the Ring; or, the History and Antiquity of Finger Rings.” His lordship married, in 1852, the Lady Charlotte Sarah Graham Toler, sixth daughter of the second Earl of Norbury (who afterwards married Frederick Hetley, Esq., and died in 1867), by whom he left two daughters, and, dying in 1861, was succeeded by his brother, the Hon. Charles Cornwallis Neville, the present peer.
Charles Cornwallis Neville, fifth Baron Braybrooke, was born in 1823, and educated at Eton and at Magdalen College, Cambridge, of which he is Hereditary Visitor. In 1849 he married the Hon. Florence Priscilla Alicia Maude, third daughter of the third Viscount Hawarden, by whom he has issue one daughter, the Hon. Augusta Neville, born 1860. The heir-presumptive to the title is, therefore, his brother, the Rev. Latimer Neville, Master of Magdalen College, Cambridge, and Chaplain to the Bishop of Rochester, who is married to Lucy Frances, eldest daughter of John Le Marchant, Esq., by whom he has issue.
Lord Braybrooke is patron of seven livings—viz. Arborfield, Waltham St. Lawrence, and Wargrave, in Berkshire; Shadingfield, in Sussex; and Littlebury, Saffron Walden, and Heydon, in Essex. His arms are—quarterly, first and fourth, gules, on a saltire, argent, a rose of the field; second and third, or, fretty, gules, on a canton of the first, a lymphad, sable. Crests—first, a rose, seeded and barbed, proper; second, out of a ducal coronet, or, a bull’s head; third, a portcullis, proper. Supporters—two lions reguardant, argent, maned, sable, gorged with wreaths of olive, proper. Motto—“Ne vile velis.”
The Entrance Porch, West Front.
The history of Audley End has been pretty fully told in the history of the families to whom it has belonged; but little, therefore, need be added. The architect of the mansion has been variously stated to be Bernard Jansen and John Thorpe, but the weight of evidence seems to be in favour of the latter. Regarding the house itself, and especially the “admirable drink” kept in the cellar, we have two striking pictures written by “quaint old Pepys” in 1659-60 and 1667. “Up by four o’clock,” he says on the 27th February, “Mr. Blayton and I took horse and straight to Saffron Walden, where, at the White Hart, we set up our horses, and took the master of the house to show us Audley End House, who took us on foot through the park, and so to the house, where the housekeeper showed us all the house, in which the stateliness of the ceilings, chimney-pieces, and form of the whole was exceedingly worth seeing. He took us into the cellar, where we drank most admirable drink, a health to the king. Here I played on my flageolette, there being an excellent echo. He shewed us excellent pictures; two especially, those of the Four Evangelists, and Henry VIII. After that I gave the man 2s. for his trouble and went back again. In our going, my landlord carried us through a very old hospital, or almshouse, where forty poor people was maintained; a very old foundation: and over the chimney-piece was an inscription in brass, ‘Orate pro animâ Thomæ Bird,’ &c., and the poor-box also was on the same chimney-piece, with an iron door and locks to it, into which I put 6d. They brought me a draft of their drink in a brown bowl tipt with silver,[45] which I drank off, and at the bottom was a picture of the Virgin and the Child in her arms, done in silver. So we went to our Inn, and after eating of something, and kissed the daughter of the house, she being very pretty, we took leave, and so that night, the road pretty good, but the weather rainy, to Epping, where we sat and played a game at cards, and after supper and some merry talk with a playne bold mayde of the house we went to bed.” Again, in 1667, he says: “I and my wife and Willet (the maid), set out in a coach I have hired with four horses, and W. Hewer and Murford rode by us on horseback; and before night come to Bishop’s Stortford. Took coach to Audley End, and did go all over the house and gardens; and mighty merry we were. The house indeed do appear very fine, but not so fine as it hath heretofore to me; particularly, the ceilings are not so good as I always took them to be, being nothing so well wrought as my Lord Chancellor’s are; and though the figure of the house without be very extraordinary good, yet the stayre-case is exceeding poore; and a great many pictures, and not one good one in the house but one of Henry VIII., done by Holbein; and not one good suit of hangings in all the house, but all most ancient things, such as I would not give the hanging up of in my house; and the other furniture, beds, and other things, accordingly. Only the gallery is good, and above all things the cellars, where we went down and drank of much good liquor. And indeed the cellars are fine: and here my wife and I did sing to my great content. And then to the garden, and there eat many grapes, and took some with us; and so away thence exceeding well satisfied, though not to that degree that by my old esteem of the house I ought and did expect to have done, the situation of it not pleasing me; thence away to Cambridge, and did take up at the Rose.”
