BREYDON 5 



breaks through at Horsey, or thereabouts, which I feel con- 

 vinced must some day befall. 



I am strongly inclined to think that it must have been 

 about the time of the cutting of the first Haven, in the 

 fourteenth century, that the enclosing of these waterways was 

 begun. (The history of the Six Havens, which were afterwards 

 constructed, is one of intense interest, the record of the straits 

 the inhabitants were put to, their great sacrifices, and their 

 indomitable energies, makes most entertaining reading.) 

 Whoever raised these mounds made them well, although 

 breakages and consequent floods have happened from time to 

 time, and even in my own recollection two or three inunda- 

 tions, one of them of a very extensive character, have 

 occurred, through the banks having been broken by stress 

 of heavy tides. Continual vigilance has to be exercised by 

 the marshmen who attend to the drainage mills, and whose 

 place it is to see that weak places are strengthened and the 

 necessary elevation maintained. 



The processes of reclamation must have been slow ; but 

 they have been exceedingly simple. At one time the low 

 level, now forming the marshes and Breydon, must have been 

 an immense area of "saltings." An extensive series of 

 walls continuous, zigzagging mounds, following the 

 trend of the tides were thrown up above the level of high 

 water, the soil that formed them being dug out of what forth- 

 with became deep, parallel ditches. Here two birds were 

 killed with one stone, for the ditches (locally " decks " or 

 dykes) formed natural drains or channels, into which the 

 surplus water from the newly made marshes naturally 

 drained. In connection with these a great number of smaller 

 drains were cut in various directions, extending for miles. 

 Windmills were erected at intervals near the banks of the 

 rivers and of Breydon, each of which pumped up the water 

 with a huge wheel, that lifted it from the levels to a high- 

 built sluice opening into the waterways. At low tide the 

 sluice gates were opened, and the water escaped. These old 

 mills date back many years ; one of them, still in excellent 

 condition, dates, I believe, from 1732. 



But many of the tower mills have fallen out of use of late 

 years, and only two or three remain to cast their shadows into 

 Breydon. Dan Banham's mill, standing a mile beyond my 



