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192 OXFORD: THE UPPER RIVER 



below and away from the town, and drains it of 

 boating men from every quarter. Men go on the. 

 lower river for business purposes, and not to look 

 about ; and this is just as well, as for a long way below 

 beautiful Iffley there is little to be seen. Even spires 

 and towers have disappeared, so high are the banks on 

 either side. Nuneham is very pretty, no doubt, but 

 with a prettiness of the tea-tray order — that is to say. 

 Nature here is prim and over-aided. Nuneham is 

 always quite tidy and in her company manners, she 

 requires red parasols and bright dresses, and without 

 them she is incomplete. 



One natural feature of interest there is indeed at 

 Nuneham. This is a pool sacred to the water-soldier. 

 Not a Royal Marine, but a plant* which you will not 

 find growing everywhere. This plant resembles in 

 general appearance the top of a pine-apple. During 

 the greater part of the year it lives under water, burying 

 its roots in the mud. But under a summer impulse it 

 weighs its anchors one by one, and, rising to the 

 surface, courts the sun. And now it sends out many 

 suckers, which bear young plants at their extremities 

 like the young plants of the strawberry. Each of these 

 gives rise to a stalk, from the middle of its whorl of 

 * Stratiotes aloides. 



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