The Thames

As far as Hampton the river may be said to lie within the zone of the Londoner. By means of the District Railway and the London and South Western Railway he can get at any part...

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 m...

Close your eyes and conjure up a vision of the river Thames; what is the picture that you see? If you are a prosaic and commercial person, whose business lies by the river side,...

One of the greatest calumnies I ever heard expressed was the remark, "What, writing a book about the river! Why, the river is all alike, isn't it?" It is true that many reaches...

The Thames is a great national possession, affording means of recreation and delight to thousands yearly. It is difficult to compare it with anything else in Great Britain. It s...

Wargrave is one of the most delightful of Thames-side villages. There is not much that is old among the houses that line the village street; thatch has almost gone. Wooden beams...

However disappointed a foreign monarch, on his first visit to England, may be with the drab hideousness of Buckingham Palace, he cannot but confess that in Windsor Castle we hav...

Human beings are by nature sociable; and to state that a crowd of well-dressed people will be at a certain point of the river at a particular date, is to ensure that everyone el...

This account of the river may well begin at Folly Bridge, seeing it is folly in any case to attempt to cut off a section of a river, and, as before explained, our course from Ox...

When two villages stand facing one another across a bridge, it is inevitable that comparisons, however impertinent, will be made. And it may be said at once that Streatley, for...

As a headquarters for boating, for those who want to dawdle and explore odd corners and have no desire to rush through as many locks as possible in a day, Abingdon makes a good...

Between Chertsey and Penton Hook is Laleham, where the tiny ivy-covered church is too much hidden away to be seen easily. An old red brick moss-grown wall is the chief object ne...

Who can ever think of Henley without its regatta? And yet Henley is very well worth thinking of at all times of the year. It is a pleasantly-built, middle-aged, red-brick town....

There are certain notable details of the river-side which stand out in the mind after the rest have been merged in mere general remembrance of lazy happiness. In these we may in...

The island near Day's Lock, lying beneath the Wittenham Woods and Sinodun Hill, is particularly well kept and neat, and, in summer, bright with flowers. Standing on the end of t...

Magna Charta Island is something of a shock at first sight; it is so exceptionally well cared for and so pretty. One pictures a tangle of wild trees, a mass of rushes, osiers pe...

Penton Hook is quite peculiar. To a select little coterie of people it is _the_ place on the river, but to hundreds of others it is not known at all. To its own manifest advanta...

The Abbot of Reading was, like the Abbot of Abingdon, mitred, and bore powerful rule. Reading ranked third among the abbeys of England, and held the great privilege of coining....

Wallingford boasts of having the oldest corporation in England, preceding that of London by a hundred years, and its record certainly reaches very far back. In 1006 it was destr...

1. Punting _Frontispiece_ PAGE 2. Thames Ditton v 3. Sutton Courtney, Culham Bridge 1 4. Pangbourne _Facing_ 4 5. Dorchester Abbey " 8 6. Day's Lock " 12 7. Near the Bridge, Sut...