THE STRIPLING THAMES by Fred S Thacker (1909)
King's weir lies in the northeastern bend of the top of the River's loop that sweeps so grandly between Northmoor and Abingdon. One speaks and reads of his windings, but when the land distance of five miles between these two places is compared with their twenty miles' separation by water, one is unshakeably convinced. The charming reach from King's weir lies east and west, after which the valley trends upstream southwest and south for nearly ten miles, to Northmoor and beyond.
Dr. Plot, who published his folio in 1677, wrote of the fishing in this stretch of River "In 1674 it gave so ample testimony of its great plenty that in the two days appointed for the fishing of Mr Mayor and the Bayliffe of the City it afforded betwixt Swithin's-Wear [probably Swinford] and Woolvercot Bridge (which I guess may be about three miles distant) fifteen hundred Jacks beside other fish. "
The stream a little higher, particularly near Eynsham, was within living memory choked with the notorious" American weed," which grows without roots upon the surface of the water, being extremely swift and prolific in its self-propagation; and which, within ten years of its first appearance in England, spread over all the waterways in the kingdom, so that small ponds and streams had their entire beds filled with it and their waters displaced. The weed was still in existence here in 1889.
A mile and a half above King's weir the river Evenlode curves into the Thames on the left bank, the first above Oxford of all those romantic little twenty or thirty mile tributaries which one day it may be my fortune, as it would assuredly be my delight, thoroughly to explore. It runs a very tortuous course of about thirty miles from a Worcestershire village of its own name; and has, says Plot, nitrous waters like the Windrush. Half a mile along Thames beyond its mouth, on the same bank, a now disused canal called Cassington Cut enters at "Cassington lock. " The spot is marked in my memory by heaps of sun bleached reeds. This canal joins the Evenlode about three miles up the course of the latter.
Yarnton tower and Cassington spire alternately hide and reappear amongst the trees all along this reach, which right up to Eynsham is very sweet to the memory, bordering as it does the northern slopes of Wytham Hill. As you float along it is borne upon the mind that of this scene, or of some other very similar, Robert Bridges wrote his delightful verses beginning:
There is a hill beside the silver Thames,
Shady with birch and beech and odorous pine
And brilliant underfoot with thousand gems
Steeply the thickets to his floods decline.
Straight trees in every place
Their thick tops interlace,
And pendant branches trail their foliage fine
Upon his watery face.
For the hill gradually closes in upon the River, composing a lovely scene of flowing water, of wooded hill and grassland. The stream demands its full share of attention here, flowing swift and clear along its gravel bed, where not so deep down you may see the darting fish and the undulating weed. Suddenly the course bends and widens out, and here is the cause of the swift sweet water; here is the glad open weir of Eynsham, once called also Bolde's and Swithin's, the very sight of which "doeth good like a medicine. " Here all day is the music of caressing winds and tumbling waters; here swimmers plunge into the eddying pool-off the centre pier if you've the heart! Bracing the spot is, at more than two hundred feet above the sea; and all round the hill-born breath from off the Cotswolds refreshes hearts long "scrumped for air" within four walls.
When you have pulled over the rollers you come, round a sharp bend southwestwards, full upon the splendid bridge named of Eynsham, or officially of Swinford; one of the noblest and most impressive bridges on the whole River, seven and a half miles from Folly Bridge. The Earl of Abingdon of the time erected it in 1777; and his successor still maintains the tollhouse at its northern end. Ireland drily comments that the builder's "liberality and public spirit have, I am credibly informed, been amply repaid by the revenue derived from this undertaking. " He also mentions a building at one end of the bridge, intended, but never actually used, as an inn. Boydell says it was a "spacious and handsome mansion," against the Berkshire end of the bridge; and there you will still find it. It found a use as a posting house in the coaching days; and is now divided up into cottages, but still a handsome old building; constituting, with its clustering cots and barns, that "tithing of Cumner" called Swinford from which the bridge derives its official title. Whenever you come downstream, notice how delightfully the spire of Cassington frames itself in one of the arches.
For further stories about the Thames near Long Mead see:
Swinford Bridge
Thames Valley Villages by Charles G Harper
King's weir lies in the northeastern bend of the top of the River's loop that sweeps so grandly between Northmoor and Abingdon. One speaks and reads of his windings, but when the land distance of five miles between these two places is compared with their twenty miles' separation by water, one is unshakeably convinced. The charming reach from King's weir lies east and west, after which the valley trends upstream southwest and south for nearly ten miles, to Northmoor and beyond.
Dr. Plot, who published his folio in 1677, wrote of the fishing in this stretch of River "In 1674 it gave so ample testimony of its great plenty that in the two days appointed for the fishing of Mr Mayor and the Bayliffe of the City it afforded betwixt Swithin's-Wear [probably Swinford] and Woolvercot Bridge (which I guess may be about three miles distant) fifteen hundred Jacks beside other fish. "
The stream a little higher, particularly near Eynsham, was within living memory choked with the notorious" American weed," which grows without roots upon the surface of the water, being extremely swift and prolific in its self-propagation; and which, within ten years of its first appearance in England, spread over all the waterways in the kingdom, so that small ponds and streams had their entire beds filled with it and their waters displaced. The weed was still in existence here in 1889.
A mile and a half above King's weir the river Evenlode curves into the Thames on the left bank, the first above Oxford of all those romantic little twenty or thirty mile tributaries which one day it may be my fortune, as it would assuredly be my delight, thoroughly to explore. It runs a very tortuous course of about thirty miles from a Worcestershire village of its own name; and has, says Plot, nitrous waters like the Windrush. Half a mile along Thames beyond its mouth, on the same bank, a now disused canal called Cassington Cut enters at "Cassington lock. " The spot is marked in my memory by heaps of sun bleached reeds. This canal joins the Evenlode about three miles up the course of the latter.
Yarnton tower and Cassington spire alternately hide and reappear amongst the trees all along this reach, which right up to Eynsham is very sweet to the memory, bordering as it does the northern slopes of Wytham Hill. As you float along it is borne upon the mind that of this scene, or of some other very similar, Robert Bridges wrote his delightful verses beginning:
There is a hill beside the silver Thames,
Shady with birch and beech and odorous pine
And brilliant underfoot with thousand gems
Steeply the thickets to his floods decline.
Straight trees in every place
Their thick tops interlace,
And pendant branches trail their foliage fine
Upon his watery face.
For the hill gradually closes in upon the River, composing a lovely scene of flowing water, of wooded hill and grassland. The stream demands its full share of attention here, flowing swift and clear along its gravel bed, where not so deep down you may see the darting fish and the undulating weed. Suddenly the course bends and widens out, and here is the cause of the swift sweet water; here is the glad open weir of Eynsham, once called also Bolde's and Swithin's, the very sight of which "doeth good like a medicine. " Here all day is the music of caressing winds and tumbling waters; here swimmers plunge into the eddying pool-off the centre pier if you've the heart! Bracing the spot is, at more than two hundred feet above the sea; and all round the hill-born breath from off the Cotswolds refreshes hearts long "scrumped for air" within four walls.
When you have pulled over the rollers you come, round a sharp bend southwestwards, full upon the splendid bridge named of Eynsham, or officially of Swinford; one of the noblest and most impressive bridges on the whole River, seven and a half miles from Folly Bridge. The Earl of Abingdon of the time erected it in 1777; and his successor still maintains the tollhouse at its northern end. Ireland drily comments that the builder's "liberality and public spirit have, I am credibly informed, been amply repaid by the revenue derived from this undertaking. " He also mentions a building at one end of the bridge, intended, but never actually used, as an inn. Boydell says it was a "spacious and handsome mansion," against the Berkshire end of the bridge; and there you will still find it. It found a use as a posting house in the coaching days; and is now divided up into cottages, but still a handsome old building; constituting, with its clustering cots and barns, that "tithing of Cumner" called Swinford from which the bridge derives its official title. Whenever you come downstream, notice how delightfully the spire of Cassington frames itself in one of the arches.
For further stories about the Thames near Long Mead see:
Swinford Bridge
Thames Valley Villages by Charles G Harper