Constance Aston White (?1875–1952) was the daughter of an Indian Judge. Of French and Scottish bloodlines, she was, according to her son, a beautiful woman who in her youth attracted many admirers. She seems to have travelled a good deal when she was growing up, mainly in the company of her mother, with whom she did not get on well. She had at least a smattering of languages, and played the piano expertly enough to be asked to give a concert. She had little knowledge or interest in what went on in the kitchen. Servants were plentiful in those days; most probably they were a perquisite of the judge's position, like the privilege of keeping confiscated murder weapons. The Astons do not appear to have been people of any great means although they lived well and, upon their retirement, bought a house large enough to delight the four rampaging grandchildren whom they raised. One has the impression in reading her memoirs that Constance White's early life was a circumscribed round of tennisparties, teas, thés dansants, afternoon drives, and dinner parties—all in the company of safe civil servants and professional military families: she complains that she never found herself in the company of cultured people.