OUT OF BOUNDS 373 



garden by blotting it out, while it leaves the herb 

 garden high and dry. 



Some of the pleasantest gardens up the Thames 

 are those open to every wanderer, the river-side church- 

 yards. You may lean on the low wall under weeping- 

 willows and watch the clear water passing regretfully 

 to the sea. But now it has come to the coping of 

 the wall, and stands waist-deep on the inner side of it. 

 Scarcely a yard more and it will enter the church, as 

 it just did in the memorable flood of sixteen years 

 ago. But a yard rise now means ten times as much 

 water as it did when the river was in its bed. It is 

 but a stone's throw to the towing-path on the other 

 side. A tributary entered there under a high-backed 

 bridge, and all that remains of the towing-path runs 

 over that bridge, which, instead of spanning a stream, 

 joins its two ends in the midst of the sea. The tribu- 

 tary is wiped out for half a mile. The running of its 

 water is, undoubtedly, stopped by the incumbent lake. 

 The fields have vanished in every direction, and far 

 out two men in a punt are working at what looks like 

 an islet of osiers, but is, really, the last high ark of 

 refuge for a thousand acres of land. While they are 

 getting on board their last cargo of sheep, the water 

 licks up the wall a space that looks like another inch. 

 Two or three hurdles come down the stream, turning 

 from broadside to endwise, racing one another as 

 though in the glee that a novel experience gives. 

 They pass over the weir with scarcely a kick, for 

 the six-foot fall has been converted into a mere rapid 

 by the swelling of the backwater. 



The rain has ceased, that is to say, we have had 

 more consecutive hours of dry than at any time since 



