134 A. GILES PTJLLEE — Olf THE EIVEE EIB 



into a country house, which was pulled down in the year 1811. 

 One chimney, believed to be the kitchen-chimney, was left standing 

 at the time, and still exists. Many traces of the country house, 

 called Thundridge Bury, still remain — the lawn, on which stand 

 two wide-spreading hickory trt^es ; the gardens, now used as a 

 nursery for forest trees and shrubs ; the coach-house, converted 

 into a cottage ; the chimney before referred to ; and the well. Of 

 old Thundridge church, pulled down in the year 1853, only the 

 tower remains standing. From the principal entrance to the 

 churchyard one avenue leads up the hill to a farmhouse called 

 Thundridge Hill Farm ; whilst another avenue of elms, 600 yards 

 in length, leads along the valley in the direction of Wadesmill. 

 There are many points of interest connected with Wadesmill and 

 its neighbourhood, of which a complete account is given in Cussans' 

 ' History of Hertfordshire.' 



On a hill on the left bank of the river, immediately above the 

 village, stands the new parish church of Thundridge, and less than 

 one mile distant is Poles, the seat of Eobert Hanbury, Esq. At 

 "Wadesmill stands the Feathers Inn, which previous to the year 

 1849 was the halfway house between London and Cambridge, and 

 just beyond it stood the turnpike-gate, which was one of the first 

 three gates erected in England, in the year 1662. A short distance 

 up the hill stands an obelisk, which was unveiled on October 9th, 

 1879, and which was placed there to commemorate the spot on 

 which Thomas Clarkson, in the month of June, 1785, resolved to 

 devote his life to bringing about the abolition of the slave trade. 

 At the summit of the hill, which is said to be the steepest between 

 London and Cambridge, stands the village of High Cross, and about 

 half a mile beyond High Cross, a stone, with an inscription upon 

 it, marks the spot where the aeronaut Yincent Lunardi made his 

 descent on the occasion of the first balloon voyage in England, on 

 the 15th of September, 1784. The bridge over the river at 

 Wadesmill was built in the year 1825. Previous to that year the 

 stage coaches were accustomed to ford the river when the water 

 was not too high. 



A little above Westmill the boundary of Thundridge parish is 

 reached, and from that point the river, after passing the Herts 

 Reformatory, built in the year 1857, for the remainder of its course 

 continues to divide the parishes of Ware and Bengeo, until, after 

 running round the border of Ware Park, the seat of Commander 

 J. H. Parker, K.N., it falls into the River Lea, turning as it does 

 so the water-wheel of Ware Park Mill, which stands at the con- 

 fluence of the Lea — the chief river of the county — and its tributary 

 the llib, whose course from Staudon-bridge to this, its termination 

 as a separate stream, I have thus succeeded in tracing. 



And here I might bring this paper to a close, but before doing so 

 I should like to add a few remarks on certain subjects especially 

 connected with the purpose and object of the Natural History 

 Society of Hertfordshire. Any geologist who might ascend this 

 valley for the first time would be struck by finding in the first mile 



