and overlooked, enough is left to show what it must have been like in former days.  Beside the main path is a tall and well-cut sundial of stone, with a weather-vane at the top pierced with the initials of Robert Cookes, and the date 1720.  At the end of the garden is a break in the wall, formerly railed across, and flanked on either side by tapering columns.  This was a favourite device for obtaining a long vista extending beyond the garden, and when it was constructed the view over the meadows and river to Clark’s Hill must have formed a charming outlook.  It is now obstructed and spoiled by a modern street.  In the farther corner of this old-fashioned garden is a tower of wood known as the Temple, and at the back of this an external staircase winds, giving access to the upper rooms, both curiously decorated with carving and painting.  There is little doubt that some of the woodwork came from the Abbey.  Facing this is an arbour formed of a huge Jacobean mantel of carved oak, bearing in the centre the arms of the Borough of Evesham.

[Illustration:  (High Street)]

An eighteenth century romance attaches to this property.  A young doctor, skilful, extravagant, and presumably attractive, won the hand of a Miss Cookes, who inherited the place from her father.  After the death of his wife this physician, Baylies by name, being deeply in debt, and having mortgaged his property, disappeared.  The house and garden were taken possession of by one of the principal creditors, who must have justified his claim, for the house long remained in his family.  The enterprising doctor was next heard of in Prussia, where he became court physician and adviser to the Emperor Frederick the Great.

Three old streets lead out of High Street.  To the west, Magpie Lane ends in the river meadows; and to the east, Swan Lane and Oat Street reach the river at the Mill.

Vine Street is little more than a continuation of the Market Place towards Merstow Green; and its old name, Pig Market, shows that it was used in the same manner.  Here, again, many of the old houses have been refronted, thus appearing of a much later date than they are in reality.  The Georgian dislike of gabled irregularity is once more exemplified.  But Vine Street is saved from becoming commonplace by the low line of buildings at the end, still known as the Almonry, and over which the Gatehouse, in spite of its dismantled and modernised state, still seems to keep guard.

Bridge Street is probably the most ancient of the streets.  The houses on the south side have gardens reaching to the Abbey walls, a position which would add greatly to their security in early times, and the narrowness of the roadway also goes towards proving its antiquity.  This must have been the most frequented thoroughfare, leading as it did in old times to the ford, and afterwards to the bridge and the Abbot’s mill beside it.  Here were the oldest inns; and though all the house-fronts have been sadly modernised, either by the insertion of huge plateglass windows or in some less defensible manner, yet the eye still passes with pleasure from house to house, and the effect of the irregularity, heightened by the contrast of light and shade, is picturesque in the extreme.