he walked under their shadow. A marble slab to the memory of the mother of Milton is the only inscription that reminds the visitor of the connexion of our great poet with the place. The church itself is a very good specimen of a village church, but it has suffered somewhat from recent repairs.

After quitting Horton the Colne flows past no place of consequence. It falls into the Thames by several channels, but as they wind through flat meadows, none of them have any thing striking in character. The little that was pleasing formerly about them, is pretty well destroyed by the straight hard line of the Windsor railway, which now traverses these meadows.

Through the greater part of its course the scenery of the Colne is eminently beautiful, and its beauty is considerably varied. A very pleasant 'River Ramble' might be made up it, to the source of the Verlam branch, by which all the places that have been mentioned would be passed. And then a courageous pedestrian might strike across to the source of the Ousel, one of the head streams of the Ouse, which is only five or six miles distant. The Ousel would lead him to the Ouse at Newport Pagnell, where he would at once enter upon the scenes which have been immortalized by Cowper:

"Where Ouse, slow winding through a level plain
Of spacious meads with cattle sprinkled o'er,
Conducts the eye along his sinuous course
Delighted."

From Newton to below Olney every step is Cowper's own property. Lower down the river Cromwell and others put in a claim. I will not venture to say much for the scenery of the lower

part, but there will, perhaps, be found sufficient to interest one who is not too exacting in his requirements, till Ouse is lost in the Wash below King's Lynn. Two rivers especially associated with two of our best poets would thus be explored; and the slow and "sedgy Ouse" would form a good contrast to the livelier and bolder Colne.

CHAPTER XVIII.

CHERTSEY.

IN a broad green meadow on the bank of the Thames, by one of the smaller arms of the Colne, stands a stone inscribed "God preserve the City of London. A.D. 1285." It is known as London Stone, and serves to mark the western limit of the jurisdiction of the Corporation of the City of London over the Thames. From this place to a similar stone which is placed near its embouchure, the city possesses the almost uncontrolled authority in all matters connected with the conservancy of the river, and the regulation of the navigation and fishing.

He who steps aside to read the inscription, will, perhaps, respond to its prayer, but, if he be at all of an antiquarian turn, he will demur to the date. The city in very early times had jurisdiction embracing about the same extent as that it now possesses, but there is no evidence, I believe, that the time was as early as the date on the stone would imply. The inscription itself is recent, but you are further informed by it that "the ancient stone (from which it was copied) is raised upon this pedestal, exactly over the spot where it formerly stood." My Lord Mayor and aldermen occasionally make official visits to the stone, as is duly recorded upon it. The last of their high mightinesses whose

name and dignity is thus sculptured was Johnson, Lord Mayor, 1846."

"John

London Stone stands at a short distance from Staines bridge, and Staines itself is said to owe its name to it, Stana being the Saxon word for a stone; but the chronology of the derivation seems a little at fault. Staines is a place too well known to need description; and if it were not, there is nothing in it to describe but a long street of ordinary looking houses, a market-place of the usual kind, and a patch-work sort of church. By the best modern authorities Staines is thought to be the Pontes of Antoninus; and here the great Roman road crossed the Thames, being still distinctly traceable by way of Wickham Bushes in Windsor Forest to Silchester, whence three branches passed off, to Winchester and the coast, to Salisbury, and to Bath; other lesser branches diverging at various points from these principal ones.

Staines bridge is a handsome structure consisting of three main arches of granite, with several side arches of brick, to permit the flow of water during floods. The bridge was built a few years back, after the failure of several attempts to construct one of iron. It was designed by Rennie, and was opened with considerable ceremony in 1832, by King William and Queen Adelaide.

Crossing the river by Staines bridge we come to Egham, once a busy town, owing to the number of long stages that passed through it. Of the eighty that once passed daily, not half a dozen run now, and the posting trade is almost gone. This great change is owing to the construction of the South-Western Railway on one side of it, and the Great Western on the other. Egham consists of

a street, above a mile in length, but without anything in it to call for record. The old church was

burnt down about thirty years back; several of the curious monuments it contained are preserved in the present church. One to the memory of Sir John Denham, and another to his two wives, are perhaps the most remarkable, as well as the showiest. Sir John was a Baron of the Irish Exchequer, and father of the poet Denham.

A little lower down the river, on the Middlesex side, is the pleasant retired village of Laleham, where Dr. Arnold spent the early years of his manhood. The neighbourhood is flat and not particularly attractive to a stranger, but it may be seen in his letters how much of beauty may be found in such a place by one who resides there, and is willing to look after what is lovely in it. On Greenfield, a common in the parish, are the remains of a Roman encampment. Dr. Stukeley says that it is the spot where Cæsar halted the day after he crossed the Thames, but that, as Lysons remarks, is of course a mere conjecture. Some parts of Laleham church are of the Norman period.

About Laleham there are a good many large trees, and a few are scattered along the opposite meadows; St. Anne's Hill, on the Surrey side of the river, stands out very prominently, clad in light foliage, from amidst which a glimpse is caught of a quiet looking mansion; the roofs of part of Chertsey rise in the distance, and over them hangs the gray smoky haze that always marks the site of a good-sized town; while the river at our feet makes some bold curvatures; so that this part of our journey is both cheerful and picturesque