250 FISHING GOSSIP. 



" Chichester is watered by the river Lavant, 

 whose course is entirely unaccountable, being some- 

 times quite dry, and at other times runs with a violent 

 stream even in the middle of summer." 



But this eccentricity of behaviour is attributed to 

 many rivers as in the case of the Lambourne, 

 for instance, a tributaiy of the Kennet, which has 

 been handed down, even to the present day, as being 

 a stream "almost dry in winter and most full in 

 summers of great drought." We are accustomed to 

 judge for ourselves where it is possible in such cases, 

 and regret to have to dispel the poetry of history, by 

 stating that after carefully watching this and other 

 rivers for a series of years, we have not been able to 

 detect the slightest evidence in favour of the fact in 

 any one instance. 



Then we come to waters which, like the hero of 

 Thackeray's Revolution ballad, seem to fulfil only one, 

 and that a somewhat abnormal purpose in life viz. 

 drumming ; thus 



" Oundle, on the river Nyne, in Northampton- 

 shire, is noted for its drumming well, generally 

 thought to foretell war, or the death of some eminent 

 person, as appears by a late printed account of this 

 prodigy." Taking, we presume, a hint from the boy 

 who cut open the drum to see where the sound came 

 from ; " It has been once emptied to find out the 

 cause of the noise ; but the man that went down to 



