This manor at the reformation passed into the hands of the Established Church. Much as I value the Reformation I cannot pass on without asking what the people to whom this manor of Paddington was given have done for the poor. If the poor had that which others have taken from them we should not have the sad spectacle of old couples driven into a workhouse in which no provision is made for them to end their days together. Married by a church which says “What God has joined together let no man put asunder.” That very church has become possessed of the means which would have enabled them to end their days in peace and comfort. In Henry the Eighth’s time the manor of Paddington was valued at £41 16s. 8d. Edward the Sixth granted the manor and rectory to Bishop Ridley, then Bishop of London, and to his heirs and successors. KENSINGTON church lands were also very extensive, as much property was given in the reign of Henry the First to the monastery of Abingdon. St. Mary Abbot’s district of Kensington will indicate the ground which was thus handed over to the abbots. In 1527 a curate of Kensington (Sebastian Harris) was charged with having in his possession a New Testament and a Lutheran book. He was ordered to leave Kensington within 2 days and not to return within 4 miles of the place for 2 years. Tyndale’s New Testament was published 1525. In 1612, in the reign of James I., the Archdeacon and other officials of churches were commanded to make answer to certain questions which threw some light upon the condition of the church and people of Kensington. From those answers I gather— 1. That all the parishioners receive Communion at Easter. 2. That the ministers are very careful about baptizing children at the font. 3. There is no stranger preacher, only men of worth. 4. That they intend to have a new Bible shortly. 5. That two poor men teach the children—sometimes they have a few, sometimes none. They are men of honest behaviour and sound of religion. 6. That there was a woman—Alice Maybanke—who did not go to church, but frequented an ale house. 7. That certain strangers were excommunicated for not attending Communion at Easter. 8. Also one honest man, who had been tried by the Archdeacon, and not satisfying him, he, the honest man, was excommunicated. Non-Communicants, none. Communicants (both sexes), 400. As the authorized version of the Bible was printed in 1611 it is probable the churchwardens wished to substitute that for the Bishops’ Bible which was published 1568. And as James I. had stated that “he would make all men conform or harry them out of the land, or else worse,” perhaps the strangers and honest man were Baptists, Independents, or Puritans. A happier time, however, came with William III. The old church, which was taken down a few years since, was built in 1696, King William III. giving £300 and Princess Ann £100 towards the cost, the whole charge of which was £1,800.