u8 NATURE NEAR LONDON 



Long roots of willows and projecting branches cast 

 their shadow upon the shallow sandy bottom ; the shadow 

 of a branch can be traced slanting downwards with the 

 shelve of the sand till lost in the deeper water. Are those 

 little circlets of light enclosing a round umbra or slightly 

 darker spot, that move along the bottom as the bubbles 

 drift above on the surface, shadows or reflections ? 



In still, dark places of the stream, where there seems 

 no current, a dust gathers on the water, falling from the 

 trees, or borne thither by the wind and dropping where 

 its impulse ceases. Shadows of branches lie here upon 

 the surface itself, received by the greenish water dust. 

 Round the curve on the concave and lee side of the 

 river, where the wind drives the wavelets direct upon 

 the strand, there are little beaches formed by the under- 

 mining and fall of the bank. 



The tiny surge rolls up the incline ; each wave differ- 

 ing in the height to which it reaches, and none of them 

 alike, washing with it minute fragments of stone and 

 gravel, mere specks which vibrate to and fro with the 

 ripple and even drift with the current. Will these 

 fragments, after a process of trituration, ultimately be- 

 come sand? A groove runs athwart the bottom, left 

 recently by the keel of a skiff, recently only, for in a few 

 hours these specks of gravel, sand, and particles that 

 sweep along the bottom, fill up such depressions. The 

 motion of these atoms is not continuous, but intermittent ; 

 now they rise and are carried a few inches and there 

 sink, in a minute or two to rise again and proceed. 



Looking to windward there is a dark tint upon the 

 water; but down the stream, turning the other way, 

 intensely brilliant points of light appear and disappear. 

 Behind a boat rowed against the current two widening 

 .lines of wavelets, in the shape of an elongated V, stretch 



