in. THE DICKLER. THE EVEN LODE. 35 



scending by natural passages -joints and fissures very many gathers 

 into channels, and flows (not stagnating in pools) along these to the 

 most easy points of efflux. The repeated flow widens the channels, 

 and the deeper ones become perennial, perpetual, and nearly of 

 uniform discharge. Thus, in the course of long time, the spring- 

 heads may have been transferred lower and lower down the valleys ; 

 there may have been rivulets in ancient periods shining in the now- 

 dry upland valleys of the Cotswold, and thus in some degree the 

 difficulty of accounting for these valleys may be lessened. 



The plain, rather than vale, in which the Diekler yields itself 

 to the Windrush is connected by a very low summit, cut across 

 the high oolitic ridge between Stow and Iccomb, with the valley 

 of the Evenlode, a remarkable feature of local geography. 



The Evenlode. Not much more than a mile from the confluence 

 of the Windrush, the Evenlode joins the Thames. Except in the 

 length of their course, there is little of resemblance in these two 

 rivers. The Evenlode runs in a winding sweep for almost thirty 

 miles parallel to the straight-flowing Windrush, and its sources are 

 near to those of that stream ; but its head waters gather in a wide 

 tract of lias, and are divided from those of the Stour, a branch 

 of the Avon, not by a high crest of oolite, like Broadway Hill, 

 but by an obscure low summit of drainage, hardly recognisable 

 by the traveller, between 400 and 500 feet above the sea. The 

 Windrush is a bright, rapid, and picturesque river, with life and 

 activity on its banks ; the Evenlode is a somewhat sluggish and 

 often rather unclear brook, which betrays traces of its humbler 

 origin. But it is not void of interest to the geologist and archaeo- 

 logist ; for it springs on the line of the ' Fosse Way/ passes in 

 sight of the old c mercat town' of Stow, and Churchill, the birth- 

 place of William Smith ; washes the antique mounds of Foscot, 

 and Bruern Abbey, and glides under Wychwood Forest and the 

 quarries of Stonesfield \ 



i The name Even-lode, Even-load, Even-lad, seems not to be ancient ; we must not 

 suppose Even to be a variety of Avon, and therefore of British origin. Lad, Lead, 

 Lode, appear to be employed in the sense of cursus, current, direction ; as a mill- 

 lead, a mineral lode. 



The river is called Bladaen, Bladen, or Bladene in charters of early date, which 

 record gifts to Evesham [Eovesham] Abbey and Bruern [Breclon] Abbey. ^Ethil- 

 bald, in A. D. 71 8, grants lands ' juxta fluvium cui nomen est Bladaen, prope vaduin 

 cui vocabulum cst Dseglesford.' [Ch. Anglo-Sax., i. p. 82.] Offa, in A.*>. 772, grants 



D 2 



