140 THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB. 



Henry VIII. when at this place, pursuing his favourite private amusement 

 (please interpret lightly), respecting which latter Fuller, the last Abbot of 

 Waltham, and Church historian, sneeringly refers to the monarch to whom 

 he surrendered his estates, saying, ' Waltham bells told no tales when the 

 king came there.' " 



Waltham Abbey was reached a few minutes after 7 o'clock, and there a 

 number of the party went ashore for the train ; the remainder continued the 

 journey in the barge to Enfield Lock, where carriages awaited them, and they 

 closed an exceedingly delightful day by driving towards the Forest 

 villages, dropping members at cross roads convenient to their homes. 

 Our chatty author, Mr. Bramley, continued his narrative to include the Lower 

 Lea, which the Club ascended on a previous voyage ; and having quoted so 

 largely from his paper, we may allow him to finish the story : — 



" Below Waltham, most places on the Lea are familiar in your mouths 

 as household words — Rammey Marsh, Newman s Weir, Enfield Lock, 

 Enefelde (so named from its being situated among fields) ; Tottenham, one of 

 the places where the corpse of Queen Eleanor rested, and in memory of which 

 a cross was erected. s The famous cross of wood, covered with lej.d, as it 

 existed in the time of our great master — Izaak Walton -and at which he at 

 times rested when journeying to the River Lea in pursuit of his favourite 

 pleasure, is described by him as a ' sweet shad> arbour, interwoven of wood- 

 bine, sweetbriar, jessamine, and myrtle,' where he used to refresh himself, and 

 drink ' sack, milk, oranges and sugar, which, all put together, make a drink 

 like nectar ; indeed, too good for any but us anglers.' Some anglers have 

 enlarged upon this practice, and added other sweets. The river runs on by 

 Clapton, Bow, Hackney, and Stratford (the old river), to discharge, via Bow 

 Creek, into the Thames near the Isle of Dogs— so named from the dog 

 kennels of Henry VIII. being placed on that small isle, north of the river 

 opposite the King's palace at Greenwich, from which palace the barking of 

 the dogs was sometimes audible. The other entrance to the Thames is at 

 Limehouse, by the New Cut made in 1767. 



•' We have traversed a great portion of the stream at those parts which 

 our great master so frequently visited and referred to with so much tender- 

 nes,=. However interesting may be the events connected with past history in 

 relation to this river, there are none which appeal to our hearts with greater 

 force than the fact that Izaak Walton's classic work. The Compleat Angler, 

 records in charmingly simple language numerous visits to its waters made by 

 that dear old fellow, who trudged many weary miles to its banks before s:eam 

 engines or steamboats were known, and when even the means of being helped 

 partly on the road by horse or any kind of vehicle must have been practically 

 non-existent. This is a paper, not on Walton, but on the stream frequeuted 

 by him. That the prince of anglers, and the greatest of angling authors, 

 should have fished the Lea so persistently, and described it so affectionately 

 in his happy dialogues, has given fame to the stream, and justifies, I submit, 

 the choice of title to this paper — ' Walton's Favourite River." " 



5 This is a popular error ; Tottenham Cross was one of the wayside crosses once so 

 common in England. See J. E. Harting, " Izaak Walton's ."Association with the River Lea," 

 n Essicx Naturalist, viii., pp. 186-198, where a picture of the Cross is given. 



[The fiblication of several Retorts of Meetings is unavoidably deferred 

 until the next part.] 



