9 
land to convey the Water away. But this Eylebourn 
also was gone by Michaelmas.” 
He also says: ‘* A famous Eylebourn which rises in 
this parish (Petham) which runs a little way before it 
falls into the ground; whence perhaps came the 
parish’s name Petham, the place of the Pit or Hole; 
But now and then it goes with a very strong stream, 
quite down into the Greater Stoure at Shanford 
Bridge.” 
In Aubrey’s “ Natural History and Antiquities of 
the County of Surrey,” published 1723, vol. ilii., 
page 17, he says, under the head of Caterham or 
Katerham : ‘‘ Between this place and Coulsdon, in the 
Bottom commonly called Stoneham Lane, issues out 
sometimes (as against any change in our English 
Government) a Bourn, which overflows, and runs 
down in Smitham Bottom to Croydon. This is held 
by the inhabitants and neighbourhood to be ominous, 
and prognosticating something remarkable approaching 
as it did before the happy Restoration of King Charles 
the Second of ever glorious memory in 1660. Before 
the Plague of London in 1665, and in 1688 the Aira of 
another change of the Constitution.” 
No doubt this Bourne refers to the Bourne which 
usually breaks out now from the Merstham Tunnel and 
disappears in the ground at Red Lion Green, Smitham 
Bottom. 
At page 47 he also refers to the Croydon Bourne as 
follows: ‘‘ A little below, in a grove of Ew-trees, within 
the Manor of Westhall in, the Parish of Warlingham as 
I have frequently heard, rises a Spring, upon the 
Approach of some remarkable alteration in Church or 
State, which runs in a direct Course hetween Little 
Hills, to a place called Foxley Hatch and there di:- 
Petham 
Bourne. 
Aubrey’s 
“ Surrey, 
1723, 
Croydon 
Bourne. 
” 
