The Naturalist on the Thames Part 7

COTTAGES AND CAMPING OUT

This is supposed to be a "business" country, but one wonders why new wants which accompany any change of daily habit are so slowly realised. Take, for instance, the annual migration to the Thames Valley, which has a.s.sumed proportions never reached before. Beyond the enlargement of the riverside inns, little has been done to meet this new taste of English families for rustic life in place of the seaside; and though the thousands of visitors to the "happy valley" of our largest river do contrive to enjoy a maximum of fresh air and outdoor life, this is often accompanied by a needless sacrifice of comfort. If any improvements in the conditions of life by the river can be suggested and put into practice, these will certainly benefit other districts. The profits accruing to intelligent provision for such a demand should also be considerable. But the first condition is that the wants and wishes of those who take their pleasure in this way should be properly understood.

The boating part of the river life is quite well organised; indeed, it would be difficult to improve upon it. Its convenience and elasticity is remarkable. The way in which the leading boatbuilders provide craft of all descriptions, which may be left by their hirers at any point on the river, to be brought back to Oxford or Reading by train, is beyond all praise. It is a triumph of good sense and management. But boating is only part of the amus.e.m.e.nt of the holiday, just as bathing is at the seaside. The real object with which an ever-growing number of visitors have adopted the river life is in order to spend the utmost length of time out of doors and in beautiful scenery. To this end they need accommodation of a special kind. The large hotel, with its inducements to spend much time over meals and indoors, is wholly out of place for such a purpose. What is needed is a cottage which can be rented either wholly or in part, or actual camp life under tents. The latter is now not confined to boating-men travelling up or down the river. It is enjoyed partly as an annexe to up-river houseboats; more often as "camping out" for its own sake, the tents being pitched near the river, but in complete detachment from any other habitation, fixed or floating. In these tents whole families of the well-to-do cla.s.ses now elect to live, sometimes for weeks; rising early, bathing in the river, sometimes cooking their own food, or more often employing a servant or local man-of-all-work to do this, taking their meals in the open, and using the tents only to sleep in, or as a shelter from rain. Even little children now share the delights of this _al fresco_ life, which realises their wildest dreams of adventure, and is by general consent as wholesome as it is entrancing. Whether their elders derive as much pleasure as they might from the same environment is doubtful. The business is not properly organised, and only half understood by the greater number of those who are nevertheless so well pleased by the experiment that they are anxious to repeat it. Sporadic camping out involves too much fetching and carrying. Tradesmen do not "call" at isolated tents in a riverside meadow, and all commodities have to be fetched by the campers. On the other hand, sociable camping out, when several groups set up their tents in proximity, needs proper arrangement.

Philosophers may see in it the evolution of the social life from its primitive elements, with the growth of division of labour and reciprocal good offices. English families would usually prefer the sporadic tent, if it were not for the hard work involved. But if camping out is to be a real success, such understandings and arrangements must be made. Where this is not done the result is a failure, obvious to the pa.s.ser-by. Separate and unsightly fires for cooking, and untidiness, because there are no "hours"

for performing the light but necessary domestic work, are common objects of individualism on the camping ground. Yachts, which are self-maintaining, never have clothes hanging in the rigging after 8 a.m.

when in harbour, and the self-respecting camp must not fall behind this example.

The camp in the country should have its communal kitchen in a wooden movable house, in which meals can be cooked, and from which it should be possible to purchase food as required. Here is an opening for commercial enterprise. The tourist agencies might rent camping grounds and supply tents on hire, with kitchens and all proper necessaries for living under canvas. They do this with great success for travellers in the East, and at a moderate cost. In England tents, if not so luxurious as those provided from Egypt for life in Palestine, are very cheap, and need no transport animals. But such a firm could easily make them removable by arranging for them to be called for and taken up river a few stages, as the boats are.

The hire could be fixed at so much per tent, and a camp servant could also be provided. Commissionaires and ex-soldiers with good characters could be found employment in the early autumn, when they now find it difficult to earn a wage. They thoroughly understand not only the management of tents, but the duties of a camp. Rain-proof tents with movable board floors would be provided from London in uncertain weather on the receipt of a wire, for life under canvas is quite pleasant even if the hours are not all serene, if the interior is kept dry.

Though a new departure in this country camping out is part of the ordinary and well-understood amus.e.m.e.nts of the eastern cities of the United States.

The whole State of Maine is practically a State reserve for this, the most popular form of holiday-making in America. Its forests, rivers, and lakes are one vast playground and public sporting domain, which is enjoyed almost entirely by means of camping out and boating. The rivers teem with State-reared trout, of which as many are allowed to be caught as can possibly be consumed by the party. The woods are free to shoot in, with a limit for deer and caribou; State-provided guides are employed at a fixed wage. At regular intervals along the rivers are the camping grounds, each under the control of a camp agent, who arranges for the comfort and convenience of the travelling host of tent-dwellers. Each "base" is properly organised and supplied, and visitors can purchase necessaries, in addition to the fish and birds which fall to rod and gun. Ladies and children are among those who enjoy the pastime most keenly, amusing themselves by the river and among the woods while the husbands hunt or fish.

The "residential cottage" is perhaps the safer basis for the complete outdoor life, though it tends to reduce the number of hours spent in the open. Habit is too strong when once we are under a roof. It is evidence of the habitable nature of many of our much-abused cottages that in the Thames-side villages a great proportion are now occupied for several months in the year by people who, though willing to pay for simple accommodation, will not tolerate dirt, squalor, or want of sanitation. To their surprise they have found hundreds of cottages, homely, but not uncomfortable, kept with scrupulous neatness, and furnished by no means badly. Nearly all have ample kitchen accommodation, fair beds, and an equipment of gla.s.s, china, and crockery, which shows how cheap and good are the necessaries of life in England. The well-to-do agricultural labourer and his wife, whose children are out in the world, the village artisans, small tradesfolk, and "retired" couples are the owners or occupiers, and now let their rooms at from 1 to 1 10s. per week, from June till the middle of September. The results are good in every way.

Visitors are pleased at what seems a cheap holiday, and the letters of the rooms save money for the winter, and realise in a pleasant way that their later years have fallen on good times. It is also an encouragement to landowners to build good and picturesque cottages. For the first time they see their way to charging a fair rent on their outlay. The town comes to help the country, and the country sees in the movement a hopeful future.

NETTING STAGS IN RICHMOND PARK

About the opening of the year I went to see the big stags netted in Richmond Park for transfer to Windsor. Last season this unique and ancient hunting had to be put off till February. There was too much "bone" in the ground to make riding safe. When the frost gave, the stags were more than usually cunning, and were helped by more than their usual share of luck.

One fine stag charged the toils at best pace, and, happening to hit a rotten net, burst through, and went off shaking his antlers as proudly as if he had upset a rival in a charge. Another took to the lake, and after playing Robinson Crusoe on the island for some time, swam across to the wood, took a standing leap out of the shallow water on the brink over the paling, and laid up in Penn Wood.

It was on a lovely mellow January morning, after just a touch of frost, with haze and mist veiling the distant woods, a winter sun struggling to make itself seen, and all the birds, from the mallards on the lakes to the jackdaws in the old oaks, beginning to talk, but with their minds not quite made up as to whether they should take a morning flight or stop where they were, when the business of setting up the toils began.

This, which is probably managed in exactly the same way as when Queen Dido arranged to give a day's sport to good Aeneas, is carried out according to the ancient and unvarying tradition of this royal and ancient park. Nor were we allowed to forget that in this case, too, the stags were being taken by the servants of a queen. Everything was ready for the transport of the stags to Windsor, and in the foreground was a good strong wooden cart, painted red and blue, and inscribed in the largest capitals with the words, "Her Majesty's cart."

The art and practice of taking the stags in the toils is carried out in this wise. A body of mounted men, under the orders of the superintendent of the park, ride out to find the herds of red deer. They then ride in and "cut" out the finest stags, and, spreading out in a broad line, chase them at the utmost speed of horse towards that quarter of the park where the nets are spread. Some two hundred yards in front of the nets two deerhounds are held, and slipped as the stag gallops past--not to injure or distress him, but to hurry him up and distract his attention from the long lines of nets in front.

The stags were known to be full of running, and resourceful; consequently the number of riders who had been asked to help was rather larger than usual. Even so they had to make a wide sweep of the Southern Park before they found their deer, and had a racing burst of more than a mile and a half before they brought them round. Meantime, while they are away on their quest, let us inspect the ancient contrivance of the toils. They are heavy nets of rope, thick as a finger, and with meshes not more than ten inches square--very strong, and to our eyes almost too solid and visible.

Partly to render them less conspicuous, the line--at least one hundred yards long--is set in a long, narrow depression or shallow drain, running from a wood on the Richmond side of Penn Pond down to a small pool. Just in the centre of this line is a most ancient pollard oak, the crown of which will hold eight men easily, ready to spring down to earth and seize the deer as the nets fall on him. In this most appropriate watch-tower the keeper in command at the toils, and several of his helpers, ensconced themselves. The Richmond stags, though so constantly in the sight of the crowds of visitors to the park, are among the boldest and gamest of all park stags. One, who was more especially the object of the day's chase, jumped a paling 6 ft. 3 in. high the day before, merely for amus.e.m.e.nt.

Those sometimes transferred to the paddocks at Ascot for hunting with the Royal Buckhounds were noted for their courage and straight running.

Perhaps the most famous was old Volunteer, whose latest exploit was to give a run of nearly thirty miles, at the end of which he was not taken.

Having had his day out, and not being taken up in the cart as usual, he made his way home by night, jumped into his paddock, and was found there next morning!

Holloaing, long and loud, was now heard from the east. Keen was the keeper's glance as he looked, not to the sound, but along his line of nets, the top at least eight feet from the ground, lightly hitched on thick saplings, while an ample fold of some four feet more lay upon the ground. Before and behind, the dead and tangled bracken broke the line; the props were of natural wood, and the tawny nets themselves made no break in the general colour of the hillside. Then the shouting came louder down the wind. Where were they? Not coming "up the straight" certainly, for no stags were visible and the hounds were not slipped. Suddenly from above us three big red stags came galloping obliquely down the hill, not as they are represented in pictures with muzzles up and horns back, but at high speed for all that; and though they carried their horns erect, their sides were heaving and the smoke coming out of their nostrils. They saw the nets, but determined to push through them. One charged them gallantly head first, and as the thick meshes fell tumultuously over his head and back, the second jumped the falling toils twenty yards to his left, taking them most gracefully, as if he were doing a circus trick. Down from the tree sprang the keeper and his men, and seized the helpless stag, while the second, which had jumped and won, stood panting and looking over his shoulder to see what curious game this was. The third broke back and disappeared.

Perhaps the most strange thing was the calm self-possession of the netted stag. The astonishing catching power of a net held him enmeshed at all points. His muzzle was held by one mesh, his horns by three or four; all four feet were caught also. In addition, about eight men kindly caught hold of his horns, legs, and back, to prevent him hurting himself. This he was far too clever to do. He just lay quiet, calmly regarding the fun with his upper eye, and wondering when the deuce they were going to take him "out of that." In a very few minutes his feet were buckled together by soft straps, and a saw trimmed off his antler tops, for which we felt sorry, but there was not room for them in the "compartment" he was to travel in. It is only when a stag lies close before you on the ground that you realise that he is not a "slab-sided," flat-ribbed animal, but a bulky, well-rounded beast. It took six men to lift him on to the bed of fern in "Her Majesty's cart," and when there he quickly twisted round, and lay couched, bound but not subdued, calmly regarding the scene over the side of his cart. A nice lot of chopped mangold root had been put in his box, and we hope he enjoyed his lunch in the train on his way to Windsor.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A NETTED STAG. _From a drawing by Lancelot Speed_.]

The next drive was far more rapid, and its results more exciting. The stags were again brought round from above Penn Pond, then through the oak grove below White Lodge, and came galloping up the long side of the slope, straight for the nets. Then the brace of deerhounds, which, like the keeper, seemed to know the game thoroughly, were slipped, and most beautiful they looked, one laying out, lithe and low, just parallel with the haunch of one stag, the other driving the brace below. The single stag charged the nets and was enveloped as before, but the other brace broke back and escaped.

Four in all were taken during the day, without accident or mishap. One of the keepers did have an accident of a rather curious kind, when a.s.sisting to catch stags at Buckhurst Park in Kent. He was galloping as hard as he could, driving a stag, when his horse cannoned up against another deer which was lying crouched in the fern, as deer sometimes do. The horse went a complete somersault, and its rider was badly bruised and hurt, though no bones were broken.

RICHMOND OLD DEER PARK

If Henry VII.'s palace at Richmond still stood by the riverside, we should have a second Hampton Court at half the distance from London. It was almost the first of the fine Tudor palaces in this country, built very stately, with a prodigious number of towers, turrets, cupolas, and gilded vanes, on a site as fine as that of Wolsey's competing pile higher up the river. But though the palace has gone, the park is left. It is the precinct now called the Old Deer Park, in which not one in ten thousand of those who visit and enjoy the park on the hill which we call Richmond Park has ever set foot, except in the corner furthest from the river to see a horse-show or a cricket-match. Old it certainly is. The park on the hill, venerable as it looks now, is only a thing of yesterday in comparison with it. Charles I. made the latter, and the Penn Ponds were dug by the Princess Amelia. The Old Deer Park was a Royal demesne when the Saxon Kings had their palace at Sheen, before it was given its new name of Richmond by the first Tudor, after the Castle in Yorkshire from which he took his t.i.tle when a subject. In the middle of this ancient and forgotten park, forgotten because it is neither reserved for the pleasure of the Sovereign nor thrown open for the enjoyment of his subjects, it was lately proposed to build a scientific laboratory, to supplement the work of the observatory, which is mainly employed in magnetic observations and in testing thermometers and chronometers. The proposal is an instance of the mischief which may be done by precedent, and of the way in which Royal favour may be misused quite unconsciously by persons who forget that the circ.u.mstances which lent grace and propriety to a concession at one time may be so altered later that to presume on it is an error of judgment.

George III. instructed Chambers, the architect, who had been doing work for him at Kew, to erect an observatory in the Old Park. It was a thoughtful act, at a time when there were no public funds for the encouragement of science, and when the study of astronomy was still regarded partly as something peculiarly under Royal patronage because its practical use was to keep and make records to ensure the safe navigation of his Majesty's ships.

The application to erect new buildings was refused, for a place like the Old Deer Park, if kept open and wild, and not built upon, has a present and future value to the health and happiness of millions of people beyond any calculation or power of words.

It does not need much imagination to make this forecast. But as few people have ever made what, in the old words of forest law, was called a "perambulation" of the park, some description of its present condition and appearance may help to form an opinion. It is the largest and finest riverside park in England. It covers nearly four hundred acres, but this great area, as large as Hyde Park, is shaped and placed so as to gain the maximum of beauty and convenience from its surroundings. On the London side it has for neighbour the whole depth of Kew Gardens, from the road at the back to the river at the front--two hundred and eighty acres of garden and wood. But whoever first acquired the land for the park, whether Norman or Saxon, very rightly thought that the feature to be desired was to make the most of the river-front, where the Thames, pushing into Middles.e.x, cuts "a huge half-moon, a monstrous cantle, out." Whether by accident or design, the park is like a half-open fan, narrowest at the back, which is the ugly or plain side, near the road, and with its widest part unbosoming on the Thames. From back to front it is some half-mile deep; but the Thames front extends for a mile along one of the most beautiful river scenes in England.

On the Kew Gardens border it lies against what was, until a few years ago, the wild and private part of Kew. To this it served as an open park, where all the birds drew out to sun themselves and feed. So they do still. Along the margin are scattered old beech trees, and a wilderness of long gra.s.s and flowers, where wood-pigeons, thrushes, pheasants, crows, jays, and all the smaller birds of the gardens may be seen sunning themselves. The narrow end or "stick" of the "fan," near the road, is leased to a cricket club, and cut off from the greater area by a belt of young plantation. In this a brood of partridges hatches nearly every year, though what becomes of the birds later is only conjectured. Beyond this cross-belt the whole area of the park stretches out, ever widening, and with an imperceptible fall, to the Thames. It is studded here and there with very large and very ancient trees, and is one of the largest and least broken areas of ancient pasture, whether for deer or cattle, in England. Until lately the old observatory was the only building upon it, and the turf was unbroken. But recent years have added two disfigurements. One is a large red building with skylights, connected with the games and athletic sports, which have found a more or less permanent home in the upper part of the park, where the annual horse-shows are held, uses for which that part of the ground is well suited. The other is a permanent and very deplorable blemish, made purposely, in the interests of the popular game of the hour. The greater part of this fine park has been leased to a private golf club. Golf, as every one knows, originally flourished on sand dunes, which are about as completely the natural opposite of an old flat park of ancient pasture as can be found in this country. The golf club have been allowed to do what they can to remedy this defect of Nature by converting the Old Park into a sand dune, and this they have done by digging holes and throwing up dozens, or scores, of bunkers. But the margins of the park are quite unspoilt, and the river-front is the wildest and the freest piece of Nature left near London. It is completely bounded by an ancient moat, beyond which lies the towing-path, and beyond that the river and the ancient and picturesque front of Isleworth. The path between the moat and the river is set with ancient trees, mostly horse-chestnuts and beech, in continuous line. Under their branches and between their stems the visitor in the park sees a series of pictures, framed by trees and branches, of the Queen Anne houses and rose-gardens of Isleworth, the old church with its tower and huge sun-dial, the ferry and the old inn of the "London Apprentice," the poplars and willows of the Isleworth eyots, the granaries and mills where the little Hounslow stream falls in, and further Twickenham way the gardens of the fine villas there, while towards London the pavilions and park of Syon House begin. At the present moment the margin of the Old Deer Park and its moat give a mile of beauty and refreshment. No one has troubled to mow the gra.s.s or cut the weeds, or clear the moat, or meddle with the hedge beyond it. So the moat, which is filled from the river when necessary, and is not stagnant, is full of water-flowers, and quite clear, and fringed with a deep bed of reeds and sedges. In it are shoals of dace, and minnow, and gudgeon, and sticklebacks, and plenty of small pike basking in the sun. The largest and bluest forget-me-nots, and water-mints, and big water-docks and burdocks flourish in the water, and the hedge beyond is full of sweet elder in flower, and covered with wild hops. Huge elms, partly decaying, and a dark grove of tall beeches line the park near the moat, and besides water and flowers there is shade and the motion of leaves. If the proposal to build on such a site leads to a better knowledge of what this ancient park really is, and its value to the amenities of the capital, it will have done good, not harm. The late Queen recently presented the cottage in the reserved part of Kew Gardens and its precincts for the use of the public.

It would seem that a similar sacrifice has been made by Royalty in the case of the Old Deer Park, but that the public are excluded by the Office of Woods and Forests, which has charge of it, and the park neglected and disfigured. If it were put on the same footing as Richmond Park upon the hill, and communication were open between the park and Kew Gardens at proper hours, an unequalled domain, still the property of the Crown, but enjoyed within reasonable limitations by every subject, would be open from Kew Green practically to Kingston. The line from the boundary of the Old Deer Park is taken on by Richmond Green, and the towing-path to the Terrace Gardens, formerly the property of the Duke of Buccleuch, and now of the Richmond Corporation, thence by the terrace and the open slope under it to Richmond Park, through Sudbrook Park to Ham Common, a series of varied scenery unrivalled even in the valley of the Thames.

FISH IN THE LONDON RIVER

The capture of a 4-lb. grilse in the Thames estuary in December, 1901, raised some hopes that we might in course of time see salmon at London Bridge. Mr. R. Marston, a great authority, in an article on "The Thames a Salmon River," in the _Nineteenth Century_, has given many reasons why he fears that this will not be realised. The question is not so much whether the salmon can come up, as whether the smolts, or young salmon, could get down through the polluted water. But the experiments made are interesting and deserve every encouragement, and it may be hoped that money will be forthcoming to make more.

As regards other fish than salmon, their return has been going on steadily since 1890; and their advance has covered a distance of some twenty miles--from Gravesend to Teddington. The first evidence was the reappearance of whitebait, small crabs, and jelly-fish at Gravesend in 1892. In 1893 the whitebait fishermen and shrimp-boats were busy ten miles higher than they had been seen at work for many years. The condenser tubes of torpedo-boats running their trials down the river were found to be choked with "bait," and buckets of the fish were shown at the offices of the London County Council in Spring Gardens. It was claimed that this evidence of the increased purity of the water was mainly due to the efforts of the Main Drainage Committee of the London County Council. There is abundant evidence that this claim was correct, for instead of allowing the whole of the London sewage to fall into the Thames at Barking and Crossness, the County Council used a process to separate all the solid matter, and carried it out to sea. The results of the first year's efforts were that over two million tons were shipped beyond the Nore, ten thousand tons of floating refuse were cleared away, and the liquid effluent was largely purified. It was predicted at the time that if this process was continued on the same scale it would not be long before the commoner estuary fishes appeared above London Bridge, even if the migratory salmon and sea-trout still held aloof. Unfortunately there has been some deviation from the methods of dealing with the sewage, a change from which we believe that some of the officials concerned with the early improvements very strongly dissented, that has to some extent r.e.t.a.r.ded the advance of the fish. But in 1895 a sudden "spurt" took place in their return. Whitebait became so plentiful that during the whole of the winter and spring the results were obvious, not only to naturalists, but on the London market. Whitebait shoals swarmed in the Lower Thames and the Medway, and became a cheap luxury even in February and March. They were even so suicidally reckless as to appear off Greenwich. Supplies of fresh fish came into the market twice daily, and were sold retail at sixpence per quart. The Thames flounders once more reappeared off their old haunt at the head of the Bishop of London's fishery near Chiswick Eyot. Only one good catch was made, and none have been taken since; but this had not been done for twelve years, and there is a prospect of their increase, for, in the words of old Robert Binnell, Water Bailiff of the City of London in 1757, we may "venture to affirm that there is no river in all Europe that is a better nourisher of its fish, and a more speedy breeder, particularly of the flounder, than is the Thames." Eels were also taken in considerable numbers between Hammersmith and Kew; but the main supply of London eels came from Holland even in the days of London salmon. In a very old print of the City, with traitors' heads by the dozen on London Bridge, "Eale Schippes," exactly like the Dutch boats lying at this moment off Billingsgate, are shown anch.o.r.ed in the river. Besides the estuary fish which naturally come _up_ river, dace and roach began to come _down_ into the tideway, and during the whole summer the lively little bleak swarmed round Chiswick Eyot. Later in the year the roach and dace were seen off Westminster, and several were caught below London Bridge, and in 1900 roach were seen and caught at Woolwich, but were soon poisoned and died. In August the delicate smelts suddenly reappeared at Putney, where they had not been seen in any number for many years. Later, in September, another migration of smelts pa.s.sed right up the river. Many were caught at Isleworth and Kew, and finally they penetrated to the limit of the tideway at Teddington, and good baskets were made at Teddington Lock.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BREAM AND ROACH. _From a photograph by E. Seeley_.]

This additional evidence of the satisfaction of the fish with the County Council does not quite satisfy us that the London river is yet clean enough to give pa.s.sage to the migratory salmon. It is encouraging to the County Council, who deserve all the credit they can get; but there is little doubt that the best evidence that the river is fit for the salmon would be the spontaneous appearance of the salmon themselves.

Since the middle of June, 1890, large shoals of dace, bleak, roach, and small fry have appeared in all the reaches, from Putney upwards. A few years ago hardly any fish were to be seen below Kew during the summer, and these were sickly and diseased. Last year they were in fine condition, and dace eagerly took the fly even on the lower reaches. Every flood-tide hundreds of "rises" of dace, bleak, and roach were seen as the tide began to flow, or rather as the sea-water below pushed the land-water before it up the river. At high water little creeks, draw-docks, and boat-landings were crowded with healthy, hungry fish, and old riverside anglers, whose rods had been put away for years, caught them by dozens with the fly.

Sixty dozen dace were taken, mainly with the fly, in a single creek, which for some years has produced little in the way of living creatures but waterside rats. I counted twenty-two "rises" in a minute in a length of twenty yards inside the eyot at Chiswick. During one high tide in July a sight commonly seen in a summer flood on the Isis or Cherwell was witnessed not sixty yards from the boundary stone of the county of London.

The tide rose so far as to fringe several lawns by the river with a yard or two of shallow water, and the fish at once left the river and crowded into this shallow overflow, their backs occasionally showing above it, to escape the muddy clouds in the tidal water. There were hundreds of fish in the shoals, of all kinds and sizes, from dace nine inches long, with a few roach, to sticklebacks. These fish are probably the descendants of sp.a.w.n laid in the _tidal_ parts of the river, on the gravel-beds and weeds.

Doubtless the quant.i.ty of fresh water from the spring rains contributed something to the result, but the sp.a.w.n must have hatched far more successfully than usual.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A GRAMPUS AT CHISWICK. _From a drawing by Lancelot Speed_.]

Rivermen on the tidal Thames always distinguish between eels and "fish."

The former are also increasing greatly. The sole survivor of the "Peter boats" left on the river is saved from disappearing like the rest of the race by eel-fishing. Formerly these boats, whose owners lived and slept on board them for six months in the year, were quite successful in catching eels and flounders. In the Chiswick parish registers a number of those married or buried are entered as being "fishermen," which clearly means that that was their business in life. The number of professed eel catchers' boats gradually dwindled to one, and the owner of this catches a fair quant.i.ty of most excellent eels, those taken off Mortlake, opposite the finish of the University boat-race, being especially fine in flavour.

Another eel-like fish, formerly taken in great numbers, and of the finest quality, but now almost forgotten, is also returning. This is the lampern.

Lamperns, unlike eels, come into the rivers to sp.a.w.n, and go back to the sea later or to the brackish waters. Men employed in scooping gravel out of the river at Hammersmith, lately noticed numbers of lamperns coming up on to the gravel-beds at low-water, and moving the gravel into little hollows, previously to dropping their sp.a.w.n. Twelve years ago the great body of the migrating lamperns were all poisoned by the river, and lay in tens of thousands in the mud at Blackwall Point. As they have now succeeded in getting up to sp.a.w.n, the shoals may be seen next year in something like their old numbers. The flounders have not yet reappeared to stay. Porpoises come up above London nearly every year. The first I saw were two above Hammersmith Bridge early on that momentous May morning in 1886, when Mr. Gladstone's first Home Rule Bill was thrown out. I had been up with a friend to hear the result of the division, and had seen the wild joy which followed its announcement in the lobby, and then walked home at dawn, and so met the early porpoises. A few years later a fine grampus was found one night lying half dead by the bows of one of the torpedo-boat destroyers at Chiswick. Its "lines" struck the expert minds there as so good that it was carefully measured, and the results were found to correspond almost exactly with a mathematical curve--I think called a curve of sines. The hollow over the blow-hole was filled up with mud and measured over, and here there was a little discrepancy. The mud was removed, and the measurement taken over the surface of the hollow, and the figures found to be what were expected.

CHISWICK EYOT