PRINCIPAL RIVERS IN ENGLAND. 151 



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The second river of note is the Severn, which 

 has its beginning in PliniUnion-hill, inMontgo- 

 Ineryshire, and its end seven miles from Bristol ; 

 washing in that space the walls of Shrewsbury, 

 Worcester, Gloucester, and divers other places 

 and palaces of note. It receives greater rivers, 

 and is farther navigable than the Thames, but 

 does not equal it for the quantity and quality of 

 its fish. 



3. The Trent (so called on account of the 

 thirty different kinds of fish which are found in 

 it, or because it receives thirty small rivers) has 

 its fountain in Staffordshire, and gliding through 

 the counties of Nothingham, Lincoln, Leicester, 

 and York, augments the turbulent current of the 

 Humbcr, the most violent stream of all the isle. 

 The Humber is not a distinct river, because it 

 has not a spring head of its own, but is rather 

 the mouth ox cestuaiium of divers rivers meeting 

 together ; ainon«: which besides the Trent, are 

 the Darvent and Ouse. 



4. The Med way, a Kentish river, rises near 

 Tun bridge, passes by Maidstone, runs by Ro- 

 chester, and discharges itself into the mouth of the 

 Thames, by Sheerness; a river ciiiefly remarka- 

 ble for the dock at Chatham, where ships of the 

 first rate are built and repaired for the use of the 

 English navy. 



5. The Tweed, the north-east boundary of 

 England, on whose banks is seated the strong 

 and almost impregnable town of Berwick. 



c3. ThcTyne, famous for Newcastle and its in- 

 exhaustible coal-pits. These, and the rest of 

 principal note, are thus described in one of Mr^ 

 Drayton's sonnets ; 



