A SURREY RIVER. 135 



public can know little about them. In times past 

 this used to be one of my favourite hunting-grounds ; 

 I had permission to wander about there as I chose. 

 Day after day, and night after night, I used to ex- 

 plore along the banks. At some of the bends the 

 river runs swiftly over the shallows into a broad pool ; 

 then again there is a shallow where masses of weeds, 

 showing emerald-green, wave to and fro in the water. 

 One or two good trout can be got at such places at 

 times, and fine silver-bellied eels. One of the swal- 

 lows of the river is close to a stretch of this sort. It 

 is merely a pit, the sides of it covered with rank river- 

 growth. The inlet, at the time I knew it, was about 

 three feet wide, and two inches in depth. The pit 

 was some ten or twelve feet deep, and it held many 

 tons of water ; more than once I have emptied this 

 swallow by simply keeping the water back with a turf 

 dam. 



All that could be seen was a deep pit, covered 

 above water-mark with herbage ; and two holes not 

 quite large enough to get your hand into, which went 

 down somewhere or other. I noticed the fish never 

 entered that place. 



One wild spot in the side of the hill, close to the 



