THE RIVERS OF ENGLAND
There is no spot in England more than sixty miles away from the sea as the
crow flies. So the land gives no room for great river systems. But the
larger rivers are navigable to a more than ordinary degree, because they
run their courses gently. Reinforcing the rivers are hundreds of charming
streams. By the side of these rivers and streams is to be found the most
charming scenery of the English country-side.
[Illustration: THE RIVER ROTHER. SUSSEX]
A typical English stream takes its course--shallow at the outset, deepening
its bed as it nears the sea--through meadows which bring their green to the
very edge of its sparkling water, past trees which take the caress of the
water with their roots and give it back in kisses from their leafy
branches. Rarely does the English stream have a ravine to pass through:
generally the ravine has been softened to a gentle valley, with a wooded
hill rising steeply on one side, a marshy meadow stretching away on the
other. These marshes are flecked in proper season with most beautiful
golden and blue and purple flowers, and fringed with handsome sedges. When
it is meadow-land that meets the river there are buttercups and daisies and
daffodils, and, at the very edge, forget-me-nots, as if to be remembrancers
from the land to the water stealing away to the sea, to come back again on
the chariots of the clouds. When a hill-side is passed, its woods will
throw their cool shadows into the river; or perhaps a rough stony hill will
reflect in summer the colour of the heather, purple like spilt wine on the
ground; and, at almost all seasons, a touch of gold shows from the gorse,
which is of such a glad nature that it must blossom a little almost all the
year round, so that they say: "When the gorse is not in flower girls do not
like to be kissed."
I have found joy by the side of many English rivers, from the wilder--and
yet only a little wild, though they seem torrents by the side of most of
their quiet, silent brothers of the south--streams of Yorkshire to the
gently-stealing rivulets of Kent, and it would be a puzzle to say which
English river is the most charming until one remembers the Thames, in which
can be found an epitome of all river delight, from its estuary all along
its winding course past London, Richmond, Hampton, Windsor, Maidenhead,
Henley, Goring, Didcot, Oxford, and beyond Oxford until it turns south and
south-west to find its source under the hills which bound the valley of the
Avon. There is no joy of forest, or park, or lawn, or garden, or meadow
that may not be had by the banks of the Thames; and those banks are
decorated with more noble mansions and sweet homes than are the banks of
any river in the world.
To watch in the valley of the Thames the oncoming of Spring is a pageant of
dear delights. Dobell thus gives his impression of the Spring march of the
flowers:--
First came the primrose
On the bank high,
Like a maiden looking forth
From the window of a tower
When the battle rolls below:
So looked she,
And saw the storms go by.
Then came the wind-flower,
In the valley left behind
As a wounded maiden, pale
With purple streaks of woe,
When the battle has roll'd by,
Wanders to and fro:
So totter'd she
Dishevell'd in the wind.
Then came the daisies
On the first of May,
Like a banner'd show's advance,
While the crowd runs by the way,
With ten thousand flowers about them they came trooping through the fields,
As a happy people come,
When the war has roll'd away,
With dance and tabor, pipe and drum,
And all make holiday.
On a Spring day let us go out from London to do honour to the Thames,
seeking its nearer delights. Because it is Spring the day is delightful.
The English seasons are often disappointing. The summer is not as good,
winter not as bad as one has had reason to anticipate. One often at the end
of the year has neither revelled in a fine summer nor felt the happiness of
heroism in enduring a rigorous winter; for there has been no spell of
really fine weather and no rigours. Always the climate has been soft and
apologetic. But Spring in England is ever delicious. The first awakening
of the year is brimful of stirring delights. Perhaps the summer has been
"unsatisfactory," one of these cold, damp summers which drift unaware into
autumn; and autumn, though providing a few perfect days, has been generally
overcast, and every day has threatened the winter. But the winter has never
come at all in any real earnest. No snow, no big freeze for skating, just
dull half-cold days with occasional hours as warm as though stolen from
autumn. Nature goes to sleep grudgingly, but goes to sleep; taking off all
her draperies of green and brown and gold.
Then suddenly one morning you may see the crocus running like a trail of
fire through the grass; and around all the shrubs and bushes steals a
luminous mist of verdancy which, the more nearly approached, resolves into
a starry way of little budding leaves of pale angelic green, so pale and
pure that they were surely sprinkled from heaven in the night, and had not
been drawn from the gross soil beneath. Yes, Spring is beautiful, and there
is the stimulating note in its beauty which is so often lacking in the
English landscape. Much of bright serene content, much of reverend grace,
much of misty and soft charm with a note of wistfulness, almost of
melancholy, England may show through the summer, the autumn, and the
winter. On an odd day she will deck herself almost in gaiety, but there is
ever a Puritan note of reserve, a hint of grey hairs. In early Spring,
however, the country is all young in spirit. One might almost forget
decorum and be rash, and whoop out one's joy aloud, coming thus under
suspicion of being an uncontrollable Latin sort of person.
[Illustration: THE THAMES AT RICHMOND, SURREY]
It is probably in part what has gone before that makes the Spring so
glorious. It is a resurrection. With the chill breath of November most of
the trees in England prepare to hibernate, shedding their leaves and
withdrawing their life within their grim-looking trunks. In the quiet
stillness everything snuggles down to rest, and week after week, month
after month, you become accustomed to seeing Nature asleep. Then of a
sudden a south wind comes bearing the notes of the _reveille_, and
everything is deliciously athrill, and it is Spring; and as you look upon
the _feu de joie_ of the crocuses in the grass, you understand the
exultation in Horace's lines about his Spring on the Tiber:--
_Solvitur acris hiemps grata vice veris et Favoni,
Trahuntque siccas machinae carinas,
Ac neque iam stabulis gaudet pecus aut arator igni,
Nec prata canis albicant pruinis._
And if you are wise you too prepare to drag down a dry keel to the waters
of the Thames. Not at the first note of the crocuses must you do so, unless
you are greatly daring, for the Spring sends out her heralds to walk some
distance before her steps; and there may be biting winds and nipping frosts
yet. But the message is sure. Soon the daffodils will be dancing, demure
and stately in the grass; the trees will be alive with their intensely
young green; daisies and cowslips will be waking to deck the meadows.
Take the rapture of the river little by little. Richmond and Kew--Kew
Gardens at daffodil time are exquisite--should give you new joys for many
days. The gentle march of the crocus, of the daffodil, and the narcissus,
and the rhododendron, and the azalea at Kew, the gradual filling up of the
great valley which stretches below Richmond Hill, with colour and light and
warmth,--these are not to be seen in an hour or a day, but call for many
visits. If an occasional day of fog and mist obtrudes from out of winter,
and you are resolved, nevertheless, to worship at the shrines of Father
Thames, explore the reach from Chelsea to Greenwich, and learn what magic
the mist can lend to drape all that is harsh, to bring out all that is
fine, in the works of man.
[Illustration: SPRING BY THE THAMES]
As the Spring ripens, carrying your exploration of the Thames farther, go
to Hampton Court, built by the great Cardinal who was too great to be
pleasing to the arrogant temper of King Henry VIII. They tell that it was
Wolsey's love of good Latin that first set the jealous temper of the King
aflame. "Ego et rex meus," the Cardinal had written to a correspondent. To
be correct in his Latin he could have done nothing else. The poorest beggar
in Rome would say, and would write--if he knew how to write--"Ego et Julius
Caesar," for the Romans were not hypocrites enough to pretend that any man
does not think himself as of the first importance to himself. Our modern
way of pretending to be humble and "putting oneself second," the Romans
knew nothing of; and their language made no provision for it. Wolsey wrote
good Latin; and in time he came to lose the favour of the King, and with it
this fine palace of Hampton Court, set like a great pink flower in the
midst of its gardens by the Thames side. Hampton Court was a royal palace
for some generations after, then it was given up to the people for their
common enjoyment, and is now a show-place open to all. Its gardens are kept
with the old care and generosity. In Spring the parterres of tulips and
hyacinths and wallflowers and other blossoms suggest the dreams of all the
great pottery decorators of every age come to life in flowers.
Not only the gardens of Hampton Court but also the state rooms of the
palace are open to the public, including the great hall which ought to be
called Blue Beard's Hall, because of its series of stained-glass windows
picturing Henry VIII. and all his wives. Do they of nights climb down from
their windows and trip a measure together?
After Hampton Court the Thames winds past Staines to Eton and Windsor. The
great castle, which is the chief residence of the British Court, has no
longer in these days of widely-ranging artillery any purpose of
guardianship. But one can see that at the time of its building it was well
designed to stand siege and assault, and to hold the passage of the Thames.
From Windsor spreads one of the royal forests, and the valley of the Thames
is now for a long stretch well wooded. At Bourne End begins definitely the
long series of little pleasure houses--afloat or ashore--which mark the
Thames with a gay note for some miles up and down from Henley. In the
summer these house-boats and bungalows, painted always in glowing colours,
decked out with bright flowers, sheltering brightly-dressed people, are as
gay as gay can be. The Englishman is a little serious in his pleasures some
think; "on the river" he is usually hilarious. On Sundays and holidays in
summer the dwellers by the river are reinforced by thousands of trippers
from London. There are musical comedy stars and their swains who have
motored down, and will dawdle in a punt or a skiff--also sometimes in a
motor launch or a steam-boat--mainly as an exercise before and after a
massive lunch. There are visitors from the theatres who are not stars, and
shop girls, and typewriting girls, and sporty girls--all, or nearly all,
with men to match. Also there is a slight flavour of plain 'Arriett with
her 'Arry, though she favours more the reaches of the river near to London.
Between them all they make the Thames very very gay. Some sing or play
banjos. Many bring phonographs and gramophones, which will give canned
music at the call of the merest fraction of skill and effort. All are
dressed in bright colours, and not too much dressed at that. It is the very
lightest side of London life, that "on the river" of a summer Sunday; and
over it all great quiet woods brood, and some of the sweetest church bells
in Christendom send out their silver summons; and past all Father Thames
glides quietly, making his way from the Western Hills to the sea, tolerant
of all, with a smile of sweetness for all.
But who may tell of the full delights of the Thames? We must be content
here with the mere glimpse at the life of this one river of England, and
leave out any description of other streams, whose very names are sweet and
cool, or cheerful and exhilarating, or gentle and peaceful. What poetic
syllables these rivers have won for their names--the Severn, the Darenth,
the Avon, the Wye, the Dove, the Eden, the Dart, the Tamar, the Lynn, the
Arun, the Ouse, the Rother, the Medway, the Trent, the Erme! And how
sweetly English all the names are! No hotch-potch here of dog Latin and
Levantine Greek, but plain straight English, cool and fresh in the mouth.
[Illustration: WINDSOR CASTLE FROM FELLOWS' EYOT: EARLY SPRING]