[Illustration: A]UDLEY END, the most celebrated of the mansions in Essex, takes its name from Sir Thomas Audley, Chancellor to King Henry VIII., to whom the Abbey of Walden and most of the lands at the west end of the parish had been granted at the Dissolution by Henry VIII.; and who is believed to have fixed his residence there, although, as Lord Braybrooke remarks in his history of this house, “the fact cannot now be established. Horace Walpole, notwithstanding, and, after him, Mr. Gough, assumed that Audley Inn was the original designation; but for this assertion no authority whatever is adduced: not to mention that many of the neighbouring hamlets are still distinguished by the names of North End, Sewer’s End, Sparrow’s End, &c.; and that similar instances frequently occur in different parts of the County of Essex.” The manor of Walden having been originally granted to the celebrated follower of William the Conqueror, Geoffrey de Mandeville, Earl of Essex, after many mutations, again reverted to the crown, and so remained till May 1538; when it was granted by Henry VIII., with the recently dissolved Abbey of Walden, and the greatest part of the advowsons and estates belonging to that foundation, to Sir Thomas Audley, from whom are descended the Earls of Suffolk, Berkshire, and Carlisle, the Earls and present Marquis of Bristol, and the Lords Howard de Walden; besides the Earls of Binden and Lords Howard of Escrick, whose titles are extinct. Sir Thomas Audley, a clever and crafty man, was the principal instrument in the hands of the king in effecting the dissolution of the religious houses; by which he also greatly enriched himself, for the rapacity of Henry never exceeded that of Sir Thomas, who was all his life employed in asking for grants and emoluments, under the plea of ill-paid services or absolute poverty--an excuse as disgusting as it was untrue; and nothing can exceed the fawning perseverance of his begging-letters, as printed by Lord Braybrooke in his “History of Audley End,” or the meanness of soul that runs throughout them, and which his lordship, with right feeling, does not do otherwise than unequivocally condemn. The first step in the king’s favour made by Sir Thomas (after he was, at the recommendation of the Duke of Suffolk, to whom he was steward or chancellor, introduced to Henry) was occasioned by his conduct as Speaker of the Long, or Black Parliament, to which office the king had caused him to be elected, which first sat in November 1529, and continuing, by prorogation, six years, effected the dissolution of all the religious houses whose revenues did not annually exceed 200_l._