1 88 The Draining of the Fens 



Other evidence bears out the impression of desolation.' As one traveller 

 of 1 83 3 could write : ' ' We are now in the very perfection of the fen-country, 

 being several feet below the level of the great running streams, upon land 

 subject to frequent intmdation." 



In addition to land that had deteriorated, some patches of original fen 

 remained; in the west, for example, were the large reed-bordered lakes of 

 Whitdesea Mere and Ramsey Mere. The great copper butterfly was not 

 yet extinct; nor were all the species of fen birds; nor yet was the ague 

 against which the fenmen took their opium pills. Indeed, many people 

 were stUl "fearful of entering the fens of Cambridgeshire lest the Marsh 

 Miasma should shorten their Hves". That was in 1827. By 1858, the 

 complaint had become "infrequent". The improvement was generally 

 ascribed to better drainage. 



Not only malaria, but many other distinctive features of the Fens 

 disappeared before the changes of the nineteenth century. The time came 

 when "sportsmen from the University" were no longer able to indulge 

 a passion for shooting in the fens of Teversham, Quy, Bottisham, and 

 Swaffham. And, in 1854, Henry Gtmning was "happy to say that these 

 incentives to idleness no longer exist. Thousands and tens of thousands of 

 acres of land, which at the time I speak of produced to the owners only 

 turf and sedge, are now bearing most luxuriant crops of com." 



The important factor that was giving the fen country of the nineteenth 

 century this more stable economy was the advent of the steam-engine. 

 The possibUity of steam-driven pumps for draining had been discussed 

 before 1800, but the idea was slow in gaining support. At length, John 

 Rennie induced the proprietors of Bottisham Fen to erect a small engine 

 to help their windmills.^ There, in 1820, the first Watt engine was applied 

 to work a scoop-wheel. Despite predictions of failure, other steam-engines 

 followed and soon justified their introduction. An inscription on a 

 pumping station along the New Bedford River is dated 1830, and reads: 



These fens have oftimes been by water drowned, 



Science a remedy in water foimd, 

 The power of steam she said shall be employed, 



And the Destroyer by Itself destroyed. 



It was a premature claim, but by 1838 Joseph Glynn, one of the pioneers 

 of steam pumping, certainly had "the pleasure to see abtmdant crops of 

 wheat take the place of the sedge and the bulrush". The "swamp of 

 marsh, exhaling malaria, disease and death" had been converted into 



' See p. 117 above. * See p. 120 above. 



