18 TIIK <;i?K.\T LFYKL OF THE FENS. PART I. 



In the first place, water had to l>e contended against 

 as a fierce enemy. Tins was the case at Romney Marsh 

 and along the banks of the Thames, as we have already 

 described. But perhaps the most interesting district of 

 the kind in England, where for centuries the struggle has 

 been persistently maintained by ingenuity and industry 

 against the powers of water both within and without 

 the land, is the extensive low-lying tract of country, 

 situated at the junction of the counties of Lincoln, 

 Huntingdon, Cambridge, and Norfolk, common Iv known 

 as the Great Level of the Fens. The area of this dis- 

 trict presents almost the dimensions of a province, being 

 from sixty to seventy miles from north to south, ami 

 from twenty to thirty miles broad, the high lands of the 

 interior bounding it somewhat in the form of a horse- 

 shoe. It contains about 680,000 acres of the richest 

 land in England, and is as much the product of art as 

 the kingdom of Holland, opposite to which it lies. It 

 has been reclaimed and drained by the labour of succes- 

 sive generations of engineers, and it is only preserved 

 for purposes of human habitation and culture by con- 

 tinuous watchfulness from day to day. As presenting a 

 series of some of the finest works which energy and 

 perseverance have ever achieved, we regard these great 

 Fen districts flat and unattractive though they be to 

 the lovers of the picturesque as among the most in- 

 teresting parts of England. 



Not many centuries ago, this vast tract of about two 

 thousand square miles of land was entirely abandoned 

 to the waters, forming an immense estuary of the Wash, 

 into which the rivers Witham, Welland, Glen, Nene, 

 and Ouse discharged the rainfall of the central counties 

 of England. It was an inland sea in winter, and a 

 noxious swamp in summer, the waters expanding in 

 many places into settled seas or meres, swarming wiili 

 fish and screaming with wild-fowl. The more elevated 

 parts were overgrown with tall reeds, which appeared 



