THE RIVER AT LONDON
There is a subtle difference in the river above and below Hammersmith:
above, it is a stream of pleasure--below, it is something less
beautiful, but grander, more crowded with memories, more important.
[Illustration]
Though pleasure boats are to be seen in quantities any summer evening
about Putney; though market gardens still border the banks at Fulham;
yet the river is for the greater part lined with wharves and piers and
embankments. It is no wild thing running loose, but a strong worker
full of earnest purpose. It is the great river without which there
would have been no London, the river which bears the largest trade the
world has ever known.
Unfortunately, the habit of using the river at London as a highway
was lost some time in the eighteenth century and has not yet been
recovered, notwithstanding the gallant attempt of the London County
Council to educate the people to it. At one time the river was used
for every sort of traffic: tilt boats, covered with an awning, ran up
and down like omnibuses and charged sixpence a passenger; and every man
of importance kept his private barge, for the smoothly gliding waters
made an infinitely preferable route to the vile roads. At every set
of stairs--and the stairs were frequent--numberless wherries awaited
hire. In the sixteenth century there were two thousand on the water,
and it was reckoned that nine thousand watermen earned their living
by transporting people up and down or from shore to shore. When it is
objected that these men were a pest and a nuisance, so that we are well
rid of them, that their language was unspeakable and their manners
filthy, it may be replied, _autres temps autres mœurs_, for there
are a few watermen still to be had at Westminster, at the Tower, and
at most of the river stairs, and they are civil and obliging, only,
alas, the public rarely patronises them. Occasionally, an uncommonly
adventurous person, probably a visitor staying in London, penetrates to
the haunt of the watermen, and, upon inquiry, he finds a respectable
man, duly licensed like a cabman, liable to be reported for rudeness
or misconduct, strictly limited by law as to the fees he may demand,
and ready to add greatly to the pleasure of the trip by his genial,
shrewd humour and his keen observation; qualities found frequently in
men whose business is upon great waters.
[Illustration: BEYOND HAMMERSMITH BRIDGE]
Without counting the railways, fourteen bridges now span the Thames
from Hammersmith downward, and even fourteen we sometimes find
inadequate to our needs in this hurrying life. Not until the middle of
the eighteenth century was the historic London Bridge backed up by a
second. Before that time, all men crossed by boat, or by the ferry at
Westminster, or even by the ford there, a feat which the embanking of
the river has long rendered impossible.
We can see it, this great river of ours, as in a vision, gradually
emerging from its primeval wilderness. First it spread widely between
the rising ground on each side, a vast area of lagoons, flooded at
high tide, and at low tide a swampy place full of half-submerged
islets. Then one or two small settlements for trade were planted on
its banks, first at Westminster, and others about the site of Cannon
Street Station, where the Walbrook leapt to meet the larger current.
There was a gradual extension of houses along the brink. At last an
attempt was made to bridge the river over, probably by a wooden bridge.
This succeeded, and when the bridge had stood for some time it was
replaced by another in the twelfth century. This was built and rebuilt,
as the turbulent river, feeling the erection of earthworks to curtail
its flood, fretted to be free, and rushed seaward with force, tearing
down the obstruction offered by this quaint old London Bridge with its
double line of houses. Many a picture of this bridge still remains.
It was a fascinating, a wonderful structure. Numberless children have
yearned to have lived there, high above the flood. What delight to look
out from one's nursery window and see the grey-green water hastening
past. To see it mysteriously stop as if by some command from on High,
then slowly turn and race inward again. Marvellous feat! Miraculous
bridge! There was a beautiful chapel, a veritable gem of work, upon
this bridge. There was a house like a puzzle-house, put together with
pegs, without an iron nail in it. There were gateways at each end, and
on the gateways were the grisly remains of the heads of men and women
who had been executed. There were shops on each side of the road where
ribbons and laces and other haberdashery might be bought at will.
[Illustration: THE CUSTOM HOUSE]
There were gaps between the houses, where one could escape for a moment
from the lumbering, creaking, groaning traffic pent up in the narrow,
mud-splashed roadway, and see the water itself, and see how the houses
were built out over it, resting on nothing. Another miracle! A mighty
tome might be written about Old London Bridge; of all the relics of
a past London, it is the one I should like most to have seen. Mills
there were on this bridge, to which the people could bring their corn
to be ground by the force of the water. Waterworks there were, too,
and the bridge itself contained a drawbridge to protect London against
invasion, for, as there was none other crossing, an enemy prevented
here might well be held in check altogether.
Next to London Bridge, the oldest bridge across the river was at
Kingston, and it is on record that in 1554, Sir Thomas Wyatt, finding
London Bridge closed against him, marched all the way to Kingston
in order to cross, but on arrival there, found that he had been
anticipated, and that the bridge was broken down.
The present London Bridge has been recently widened. At one end of
it rises the white tower of St. Magnus, a Danish saint, and behind
it is the pointing finger of the Monument, while down the river are
the market of Billingsgate, the quay of the Custom House, and beyond,
rising tall and ghostly, close to the Tower itself, the Tower Bridge,
the latest addition to the list.
On the south side of London Bridge, over the houses peep the pinnacles
of St. Saviour's tower, Southwark. Anciently, it was called St. Mary
Overies, and was once a priory, one of the most ancient houses in
London. From this there ran a ferry, which was in use long after the
bridge was built, for the narrowness of the street and the continual
blocks made a passage by the bridge a process of time. Gower, the poet,
was a benefactor to the priory, and is buried in the church.
[Illustration: DUTCH BARGES NEAR THE TOWER]
As the Tower Bridge can swing open, ships of all sizes can get up as
far as London Bridge, when the tide allows them sufficient water-way,
and a busy scene, watched by a never-failing crowd of idlers, is always
to be witnessed in the reach below. Ships there are of all shapes and
sizes, but mostly hideous, made for merchandise and not for show. Many
of them are iron, and run between eight and twelve hundred tons. They
come from Hamburg, Hull, Newcastle, Holland, and many another port.
There, out in the river, is a dredger working with a hideous grinding
noise, and beyond it are two or three brilliantly painted green and red
boats with great wooden flaps, or lee boards, on their sides. They are
Dutch eel boats, and are allowed to lie in the river free from dues,
if they keep always in the same place. It is a survival of an ancient
custom.
As we pass through under London Bridge, and come out on the other side,
we can see the grey river with its bustling craft, framed like a series
of pictures in the wide arches.
Some of the oldest theatres in London stood on the part called
Bankside, about Southwark Bridge; at present the view is dingy
and uninteresting. The Bishop of Winchester's palace once adjoined
Bankside, as that of the Archbishop of Canterbury, at Lambeth, still
stands near Westminster Bridge; but it fell into ruins and the bishops
removed to Chelsea.
It is impossible to enumerate the palaces and fine houses that once
stood along Thames Street, which, in the fourteenth century, was
the most fashionable street in London. The part of the foreshore
now occupied by wharves and great warehouses--where cranes swing and
lighters await their loads all day long, and every working day--has
all been reclaimed from the river. Once it was covered at every
returning tide, but strong piles were driven into the mud, and on this
unpromising spot houses began to rise and débris accumulated, until
firm ground was made, and this became one side of a busy street.
On the up-side of Cannon Street, close to the cavernous jaws of the
station, is a wharf marked in white letters, "Walbrook Wharf." This
is as near as we can get to the first site of London, where the Briton
made his modest lake-fort, Llyn-din, and afterwards the Romans pitched
their strong citadel.
[Illustration: THE TOWER OF ST. MAGNUS]
Queenhithe was given by King John to his mother, Queen Eleanor.
Hence arose the name. It was no trifling gift, for this was the most
important dock on the Thames at that time, and dues were collected from
all the ships unlading here. Now it is a small area in which the water
laps at rotting lichened posts as it slowly uncovers and re-covers the
slimy mud.
The whole of this district lying north of the Thames is the oldest part
of our ancient city, and it is thick with memories. Down the crooked
streets Spenser came as a boy from his home beyond the city ditch to
his school of the Merchant Taylors in Dowgate. Here a fair-haired
gentle lad, called Chaucer, loitered many a time, for his father's
house was in Thames Street.
Not far from Puddle dock stood Baynard's Castle with its high
buttressed walls. In it Edward IV. was proclaimed, and in it, also,
Richard III. made a feint of refusing the crown belonging to his
imprisoned nephew. Tower Royal, Montfichet, and many another glorious
building, have gone utterly, so that their sites can be fixed only
approximately. The river Fleet, up which large ships could ply once,
flowed into the Thames where is now Blackfriars Bridge. By its banks
the great religious houses of the Black and White Friars rose, and the
boundary cliff hewed by its current may still be traced in the steep
rise up Ludgate Hill, which tries the patient omnibus horses day by
day. Over all, as we draw further up the river, towers the great dome
of St. Paul's.
The Surrey side of the Thames continues unlovely--a medley of browns
and greys, tall chimneys and tumble-down sheds; it needs the veil which
the atmosphere of London mercifully throws over it.
The railway bridge and Blackfriars are so close together, they almost
touch. As we pass underneath there is a hollow reverberation, like
the beat of the surf in a cave on the shore. Just above the bridge is
anchored the _Buzzard_, the Naval Volunteer training ship.
[Illustration: ST. PAUL'S]
Along the northern side now begins the Embankment, with its solid
granite walls and fringe of young planes. The green lawns and red
buildings of the Temple can be seen only when the river is very high.
Further on is Somerset House, followed by a line of hotels, the palaces
of modern days. Somerset House is the successor of the palace built
by the arrogant Protector Somerset, from the stones of churches and
religious buildings; between it and the Temple stood Arundel and Essex
Houses. The latter had earlier been called Leicester House, and Spenser
lived there for a time as secretary to the Earl of Leicester.
The tide has turned and is coming in. Little steam tugs, gallantly
towing six barges, two abreast and each twice as large as themselves,
pant up stream; while the bargees, with faces the colour of brickdust,
the colour they are so fond of reproducing in their paint and even in
their sails, stand by their huge rudders. Some barges are struggling
along without mechanical aid. The men in charge bend back horizontally
in their manipulation of the huge sweeps. There must be a knack in it.
No one could work so hard as they seem to be doing; spine and sinews
would give way altogether. Their whole strength results in but a slow
progress, and the barge, responding to the push of the water, makes
a kind of crab-like movement, sidling up the river broadside on. One,
laden with yellow straw till it appears like a huge barn, is stranded
right in mid-stream. The long ends of the straw sweep in the water, and
there is no moving until the current increases.
Here and there red-brown sails, patched and stained, spring up, and
others still furled, stand up along the wharves like crooked warning
fingers. Just before Waterloo Bridge there is, neatly tucked away below
the Embankment, so that few ever know of its existence, a station of
the river police, with trim muslin curtains over the windows.
Between Waterloo and Charing Cross Bridges the same sort of thing
continues. An enormous chimney on the Surrey side mocks the dignity
of Cleopatra's Needle, now safe in haven after many vicissitudes. The
sweep of the river makes these two bridges radiate out like the spokes
of a wheel, so that the southern ends are nearer than the northern. The
chimneys and wharves and the ubiquitous barges still continue, and as
we pass beneath the hideous red iron bridge of Charing Cross, we get a
vision of the many towers and pinnacles of Westminster ahead.
[Illustration: THE HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT]
Besides the great houses of old times already mentioned, there were
others down this stretch of the river too--the Savoy, home of John
of Gaunt, and in its time prison and hospital; Durham, Worcester, and
Salisbury Houses. These were all either flush with the water or hemmed
in by high walls in which were stairs "to take water at." The only
relic of these mansions lies in the watergate of York House, now about
a hundred yards from the river, behind a strip of land which has all
been reclaimed by the making of the Embankment. But that the Embankment
does not always suffice to curb the current was proved not so long ago,
for in March, 1906, there was a combination of circumstances which
swelled the volume of water abnormally. Sudden floods of rain caused
every weir far up the river to be opened, and bounding, exulting to
be free, the huge mass of water, swelled by every brook and tributary
and swollen to twice its usual size, rushed seaward. But it was met by
a high spring tide, and the collision was increased by a strong wind,
so that the water rose higher and higher, and the curious spectacle
was witnessed of barges floating above the roadway, propelled by
sweeps braced against the granite walls. The water burst up through
the pavement and the manholes, and ran in a flood under Charing Cross
Bridge, but it just did not overtop the Embankment wall by an inch
or two, and as the tide subsided the tension relaxed. In the higher
reaches, about Barnes and Chiswick, "tide-boards" were used to fill up
the crevices below the doors, and by this means alone many a house was
saved from being swamped.
The scene is lively enough. Seagulls of all ages--big dingy drab ones
and neat ones in liveries of dove-grey and white--float merrily on the
ripples, or poise and wheel in the air. Here a County Council steamer
ploughs past, churning the river into wavelets, there a lad paddles
a boat from shore to shore with a single oar used rudderwise, a feat
possible only to a born waterman.
[Illustration: WESTMINSTER BY NIGHT]
As we pass on we can see the high bastion towers of Scotland Yard.
Northumberland Avenue stretches over ground which was once the gardens
of Northumberland House--they came down to the water--and beyond this
were quadrangles and a medley of buildings, mostly low and mostly
of brick, which formed the palace of Whitehall, snatched by Henry
VIII. from Wolsey because the royal palace at Westminster had fallen
into decay. The Houses of Parliament, standing on the site of the
latter palace, are the finest work of Barry, who has been abused for
many things, but who seems to have been touched by a genuine spirit
of architecture in this instance, and to have realised the right
characteristics of majesty and delicacy in his work. But he had a
noble chance, for the position of the building, standing on the edge
of the water, with the bridge rising beside it, gave room for a fine
conception.
From Westminster to the Tower or Fleet prison, how many prisoners have
come and gone--come up against the current full of hope, and returned
of hope bereft! The ghosts are endless, because the river was the usual
mode of communication between the Tower and the Court at Westminster,
as the Strand was full of holes and seamed by watercourses. If this
reach of water were to tell its tale, much of the history of England
would be interwoven with it, and it would be tinged with the bitterest
sorrow human life can know--death with disgrace.
From the time of Edward the Confessor to the time of Henry VIII., our
kings were housed at Westminster as one of the chief of their royal
palaces. Luckily the Great Hall, which Rufus built, escaped the fire
of 1834, and still may be seen, but all else, with the exception of the
crypt of St. Stephen's, has vanished utterly.
The time to see the Houses of Parliament is undoubtedly at night,
when Big Ben's illuminated face sheds a sort of ethereal light on the
architectural fretwork near him.
Wordsworth admired the view most in the early morning, before the first
waking of the great world of bustle and business:
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres and temples lie
Open unto the fields and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour, valley rock or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep;
The river glideth at his own sweet will.
Dear God, the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still.
Westminster Bridge is particularly wide, and has a low parapet. In the
sudden gusts of wind that come sweeping down the river it is a marvel
that no one has been caught up and tossed over into the rolling green
torrent. These peculiarities also are noticeable when the bridge is
seen from the Embankment, for the traffic looms up very high on it, and
the omnibuses and cabs look almost as if they were careering along on
the parapet itself.
From Westminster to Lambeth is but a short way, and what Westminster
Palace was, while it existed, to the lord temporal, so Lambeth has
been, and is, to the lord spiritual; from the very earliest times the
Archbishops of Canterbury have lodged here.
In our peaceful days the holder of the highest dignity of the Church
has not to fear the Tower and the "sharp medicine of the axe" as some
of his predecessors did. Laud and Juxon were executed, and for Cranmer
there was the worse horror of the torturing stake. Lambeth has seen
much cruelty mingled with the name of religion in the time that it has
stood above the flood. The Lollards, imprisoned within the tower which
still bears their name, made deep incisions on the walls to wile away
the weary hours of suspense, and the groans of prisoners have been
stifled by these walls as well as by those of the grim Tower.
On the same side as Lambeth, nearer Westminster Bridge, are the curious
detached buildings of St. Thomas's Hospital, looking like nothing in
the world less than a hospital.
Where Lambeth Bridge is now, was once the ferry by which King James II.
passed when he made a hurried exit from the kingdom that repudiated
him. It was a bitter night, and, attended by only one gentleman, the
king slipped secretly out of his palace at Whitehall, and crossing the
Privy Gardens, made his way to the ferry, where he entered a small
boat with a single pair of oars. In mid-stream he threw the Great
Seal into the water. A curious and dramatic incident this, that might
well be made the subject of a picture by some historical painter. The
Great Seal was afterwards accidentally drawn up in the net of some
fisherman. But there is another memory further back still, which gives
to this strip of river an importance which no other part can boast.
Here lay the first ford, to which all the traffic of the north, on
its way to the south coast, had to come. In the ages before even the
oldest London Bridge was built, a string of pack horses, of weary
men and of travellers, continually wandered down through the marshes
lying around Thorney Island, on which stands the present Abbey, and,
guided by stakes placed for the purpose, arrived at the river's bank,
there to await low tide, when they could cross over to the further
shore. Through the ages we see them continuing, and when England was
Christianised, to the procession were added monks and pilgrims bent on
holy missions. When London Bridge was built, a great majority of the
age-long procession was diverted that way, but many still continued to
prefer the ancient ford at Westminster. Of course, since the Embankment
was made, and the river no longer wanders uncurbed over the lowlands
and meadows of Westminster, the current runs deep and strong and no
fording is possible.
[Illustration: HAY BARGES NEAR WESTMINSTER BRIDGE]
Above Lambeth we pass the Tate Gallery and the new bridge at Vauxhall,
and then traverse a dreary strip of river, dreary on both sides,
until we come near to Chelsea Bridge. This is a high-swinging and
imposing bridge of the same type as the Albert Bridge further up. How
different the Chelsea we see now from the ancient Chelsea. Ours is a
Chelsea mainly of red brick, with many tall flats and many beautifully
designed houses in pseudo-ancient style. A long line of planes runs
along the embankment, which is one of the prettiest embankments on
the river. The gardens and green lawns of the Royal Hospital reach to
the roadway, and away behind them at some distance can be seen the
comparatively low and long range of buildings dating from the time
of the Stuarts, and forming an asylum for old soldiers. On the strip
of ground to the east of them once stood Ranelagh, the gay rotunda
which played such a part in all London flirtations; where misses met
their beaux and walked round in stately steps to the sound of music.
The breakfasts at Ranelagh were at one time almost as popular as the
evening entertainments:
A thousand feet rustled on mats,
A carpet that had once been green;
Men bowed with their outlandish hats,
With corners so fearfully keen;
Fair maids, who at home in their haste
Had left all clothing else but a train,
Swept the floor clean as slowly they paced,
And then walked round and swept it again.
Thus Bloomfield satirically described the scene. Ranelagh plays a
large part in _Evelina_ and other romances of that date. The last
public entertainment was given in 1803, and of the gay rotunda with its
gorgeous fittings not a vestige now remains.
High red-brick flats which stand at the foot of the Royal Hospital
gardens by the river, are succeeded by smaller houses, and beyond
the Albert Bridge the district has not yet been transformed, as it
assuredly will be.
In the small public gardens that face the river there is a bronze
statue of Carlyle, the Sage of Chelsea, and not far off rises the
curious little tower of dark brick that belongs to the old church,
a very mausoleum of tombs. Chelsea has, perhaps, been more altered
by the formation of the Embankment than any other part of the river.
Its very name implies a bank of shingly beach stretching down to the
water, and so it was in old times, and to this beach the gardens of
the stately palaces reached. Chelsea has been called a village of
palaces. A village it was in old times, quite detached from London, and
considered a country residence by many a famous nobleman and statesman.
On the site of the row of houses in Cheyne Walk stood the New Manor
House built by Henry VIII. as part of the jointure of Catherine Parr,
who afterwards lived here with her fourth husband, Thomas Seymour, Lord
High Admiral. Both Princess Elizabeth and Lady Jane Grey spent part
of their childhood in it. The palace of the Bishops of Winchester, at
Southwark, having become dilapidated, as we have seen, a new one was
built at Chelsea in 1663, and was occupied by eight successive bishops.
Shrewsbury House was another palace built in the reign of Henry VIII.
The wife of the Earl of Shrewsbury was the founder of Chatsworth,
Oldcotes and Hardwick. In Lawrence or Monmouth House, near the church,
lived Smollett the novelist, and further on, somewhere near the end
of Beaufort Street, was the house once occupied by Sir Thomas More,
whose memory is still cherished in Chelsea. No garden among all the
famous gardens of Chelsea was so carefully tended as his. When More had
been made Lord Chancellor, and had spent his days hearing cases in the
stuffy precincts of the court, how joyfully must he have stepped into
his barge in the cool of the evening, to be rowed back up-stream to his
roses and his children, where he could indulge his kindly humour and
his playfulness, and unbend without fear. Sometimes the royal barge
would sweep up after him, and the tyrant Harry himself spring ashore
and walk up and down the sweet-scented alleys, with his arm round the
Chancellor's neck, a dangerous fondness that in time resulted in More's
being cut off altogether from his garden and his peaceful evenings, and
in his going down that stream never to return. His monument is in the
church, with an inscription written by himself, but whether his body
lies here is a question that can never be definitely answered.
[Illustration: CHELSEA REACH WITH THE OLD CHURCH]
Beyond Battersea Bridge is a little creek, and from a small house on
the other side of the road Turner used to look out upon the river.
He came here incognito from his real house in Queen Anne Street, and
studied the gorgeous sunset effects, which can be seen nowhere better
than at Chelsea.
Now in his palace of the west,
Sinking to slumber, the bright day,
Like a tired monarch fanned to rest,
Mid the cool airs of evening lay;
While round his couch's golden rim
The golden clouds like courtiers crept,
Struggling each other's light to dim,
And catch his last smile ere he slept.
--_Moore._
Turner brings us to modern memories. Besides himself and Carlyle, there
lived in Chelsea, Rossetti and George Eliot, not to mention living men.
Opposite Chelsea is the long wall that bounds Battersea Park, and after
passing Battersea Bridge, we encounter a very unlovely strip of water,
with wharves and chimneys and tumble-down buildings. It is utilitarian
and not beautiful.
The green embankment which hems in the grounds of Hurlingham Club
gives a touch of relief, and the fine trees which existed long before
the club, since the time that the house was a private mansion, rise
towering above it. On the other side the river Wandle, from which
Wandsworth takes its name, a river known to few, empties itself into
the Thames. Then we reach Putney Bridge, with its wide, curved white
arches. On the east is another embankment which bounds Bishop's Park,
partly turned into pleasure gardens open to all the world. The palace
itself is not well seen from the river, for it is low and hidden by
trees.
The manor of Fulham has belonged to the See of London since the end
of the seventh century. The palace is built round two courtyards, the
older of which dates from Henry VII.'s reign, and the other from the
middle of the eighteenth century. The west or river side contains the
rooms used by Laud while he was bishop.
As we draw away from the bridge we see to advantage the two churches,
curiously alike, one belonging to Putney and the other to Fulham,
which stand at two corners of the bridge, diagonally, looking at one
another. Boat-houses and flats fill up the western shore until they are
succeeded by the trees of Barn Elms Park, otherwise known as Ranelagh.
The chief memories of Ranelagh centre about the Kit-Kat Club, which met
here, and included among the members such men as Walpole, Vanbrugh,
Congreve, Addison and Steele. Their portraits were all painted by
Sir Godfrey Kneller, and hung round the club room; consequently,
this particular size of portrait, 36 inches by 28, became known as a
kit-kat. The name of the club itself is said to have originated in a
pastrycook named Christopher Kat, who used to make excellent mutton
pies, called Kit-Kats, which were always included in the bill of fare
at club dinners.
Many a visit did Evelyn and Pepys and other notable Londoners make
to Barn Elms in summer evenings in the seventeenth century. Pepys was
particularly fond of idling under the well-grown trees. Hear him:
After dinner, by water, the day being mighty pleasant, and
the tide serving finely, I up as high as Barne Elmes and
there took one turn alone.
This was in April; and another time:
I walked the length of the Elmes, and with great pleasure saw
some gallant ladies and people come with their bottles and
baskets and chairs, to sup under the trees by the water-side,
which was mighty pleasant.
On the opposite side of the river from Barn Elms stood Brandenburg
House, where lived Queen Caroline, unhappy consort of George IV.
Below Hammersmith Bridge there is a very untidy bit of foreshore, with
factories and chimneys and many dreary objects scattered about it,
and always a superfluity of clumsy barges. Beyond the fine suspension
bridge there is another bit of foreshore not quite so untidy, where
racing boats and other boats lie, and from which many a crew turns out
to practice. Along this stretch runs the Mall, Upper and Lower. In the
coffee house near the junction of the two, Thomson wrote "Winter," in
_The Seasons_.
The Mall is associated with the Kelmscott Press, founded by William
Morris, who named it after his country house. Turner lived in the Mall
for six years, and the novelist Marryat was a resident for a short time
in 1830. Here also was a large house occupied by Catherine of Braganza
after the death of Charles II. The river at Hammersmith is 750 feet
wide. The inhabitants make the bridge a favourite lounging place, for
seats line both sides; the total amount of fresh air thus imbibed no
man can calculate, for the tide races up bringing ozone straight from
the sea, and the wind blows freshly over the glittering water. On the
south bank are the reservoirs of a large water company.
With Hammersmith we must end this chapter, for we have joined the
account of the stream of pleasure which comes down to London.
[Illustration]