140 PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 



notwithstanding the vast and close aggregation of people 

 that lives upon its limited area was less than in 10 out of 

 14 other great English towns which are supplied with 

 water to which no such pollution as that which finds its 

 way into the Thames has access. This surely ought to be 

 sufficient to prove to the satisfaction of most people that 

 the production of Typhoid Fever is no more connected 

 with the filtered Thames water than with any other water 

 wherever supplied and of whatever origin. 



II. The Severn and its Tributaries 



Let me now direct your attention to our own river, the 

 Severn. It rises as you know on the sides of Plinlimmon 

 by several small streams. These have united at the town 

 of Llanidloes, somewhere about 160 miles above Glou- 

 cester, to form a stream quite worthy of the name of river 

 and which contains a f.iir volume of water at all times of 

 the year. It flows on with many winds past Newtown, 

 and within 2 or 3 miles of Montgomery, to Welshpool 

 receiving additions to its volume by small tributaries 

 from the hill country on either side. Ten miles from 

 Welshpool as the crow flies it is joined by a most impor- 

 tant branch the Vyrnwy which is hardly second to the main 

 stream at this point. The river has so far flowed in a 

 North Easterly direction, or in a direction opposite to its 

 mouth. It now turns due East and after a very wide 

 detour reaches Shrewsbury whence its general direction 

 is Southerly. The next town it passes is Ironbridge, and 

 afterwards Bridgnorth, Bewdley, and Stourport, and so it 

 flows to Worcester, Tewkesbury, and Gloucester. 



The great head waters of the river come chiefly out 

 of Montgomeryshire, almost the whole face of that hilly 

 county being drained by innumerable small streams east- 

 wards. Between the junction of the Severn and Vyrnwy 

 and Shrewsbury the river receives the Perry which drains 



