Only the site, and garden, and a few traces of the foundations of New Place, Shakespeare’s home in his latter years, remain. Nothing of the mansion originally erected for Sir Hugh Clopton has been left standing. The fact that it was probably the most imposing residence in the town in Shakespeare’s time affords interesting evidence of the prosperity which undoubtedly came to him from his companies of players and the performance of his plays. On acquiring the property of New Place, Shakespeare made considerable alterations to fit it to his requirements and ideas; the house at this time having two gardens attached to it, one small and one larger. It is probable that the famous mulberry tree, which was in all likelihood one of a considerable number distributed through the Eastern Counties and Midlands by a Frenchman of the name of Verton or Verdon in 1609, was planted by the poet in the smaller garden. Of the great garden Shakespeare made an orchard, and in it there is some evidence that he passed much of his time. Prior to the year 1609 the house was occupied by one Thomas Greene, Town Clerk of Stratford, who claimed cousinship with the poet; and after the latter’s death in 1616 the property descended to his married daughter, Mrs. Hall, and here in 1643 she entertained Henrietta Maria, consort of Charles I. After passing through several hands the house and property came into the possession in 1753 of the Rev. Francis Gastrell, Vicar of Frodsham, in Cheshire. This event afterwards proved to be fraught with disastrous consequences, for the Vicar, cursed with a violent and selfish disposition, soon began a work of destruction upon the Shakespearian relics, which unhappily for posterity he had acquired. Angered by the frequency with which travellers, admirers of the poet, and antiquarian students applied to him for permission to view the celebrated mulberry tree, in the shade of which Sir Hugh Clopton in 1742 is by tradition stated to have entertained David Garrick, Dr. Delany, and Macklin, he proceeded to cut it down. This was in itself an act of vandalism which would have earned for him an unenviable notoriety for all time; but far worse was to follow. It appears that during a portion of each year Gastrell was obliged to be absent, ministering to his flock at Frodsham. The Stratford local authorities were (from his point of view) unreasonable enough to expect him to pay his rates all the same. Resenting their action and to show his anger he promptly had New Place demolished, and the materials of which it was constructed sold! Thus vanished for ever, in the act of a maniacal priest, a building only second in interest and archæological value to the birthplace itself, leaving but the site and a few traces of the foundations remaining.