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18. — TnE BuLBOEIfE AND GadE, WITH NoTES ON THE FlSH OF THE 

 TWO RiVEES. 



By John E. Littleboy. 

 [Read 14th November, 1878.] 



"Rivers," says a Spanish proverb, " were made for wise men to 

 contemplate, and for fools to pass by without consideration." I 

 am inclined to think that there is even more than a substratum of 

 truth in the words I have quoted, and I hope that I need not apolo- 

 gise if I venture to detain you for a few minutes with a short 

 description of the rivers Bulborne and Gadc, before I attempt to 

 enumerate the tish that frequent theii' waters. 



That portion of the Chiltern Hills which extends from AYendover 

 to Dunstable, and which becomes the north-western boundary of 

 the county of Hertford, is remarkable as forming the watershed 

 from which four distinct rivers — the Thame, the Ouzel, the I'ul- 

 borne, and the Gade — take their rise. "With the Thame, which 

 rises on the opposite, side of the hills, only a few miles distant from 

 what was once the source of the Bulborne, and which, after 

 watering the Vale of Aylesbury and passing the town of Thame, 

 discharges itself into the Isis a few miles above Wallingford ; and 

 with the Ouzel, which rises, in similar fashion, a few miles north 

 of the source of the Gade, and, after passing Leighton Buzzard, 

 falls into the Great Ouse at Newport Pagnell, we, as a Hertford- 

 shire Field Club, have but little or nothing to do. 



The Bulborne and the Gade are essentially Hertfordshire 

 streams ; they rise in Hertfordshire, throughout their entire course 

 they Avash the soil of our county, and the latter effects a confluence 

 with the waters of the Colne just within its limits. The Bulborne 

 is thus described by Chauncy : * " The Bulbourne ; rising in the 

 Parish of Tring, and running by the Frith called Parkhill, thro' 

 Pendley Wyer and Penley Moore, goes to a place named Dagnalls " 

 (which name I believe to be a mistake) ; " thence hastening thro' 

 Albury Meads and Dudswell Bottom, falls away by jSTorth-Church, 

 and washing the North East Side of Berkhamsted, is encreased by 

 the assistance of two Springs; " etc. 



In the year 1700, which was, I believe, about the period at 

 which Chauncy wrote, this description was doubtless a correct one. 

 All the old maps which I have been able to consult describe the 

 Bulborne as rising as high or higher than Park Hill, the point 

 mentioned by Chauncy, and in most of them a branch is also shown 

 as rising somewhere near Aldbury, and joining the Bulborne 

 between New Ground and the Cow Roost. 



It is remarkable that at present there appears to be no trace of 

 the Bulborne above the Cow Roost, and, although it is still possible 

 to follow what was once a watercourse along some portion of the 



* ' Hist. Antiq. Herts,' vol. i, p. 4 (reprint, 1826). 

 VOL. II. — rx. IV. 9 



