YALLEY OP THE EVENLODB. 7 1 



The traveller by railway from Oxford to Worcester leaves 

 the broad meadows of the Isis about three miles above Oxford, 

 and after crossing a spur of higher land, strikes the little river 

 Evenlode at Handborough Station, not far from its junction 

 with the Isis at Cassington. This Evenlode is the next con- 

 siderable stream westward of the Cherwell, and just as the 

 line of the latter is followed by the Birmingham railway, so 

 the line to Worcester keeps closely to the Evenlode for nearly 

 twenty miles, only leaving it at last in its cradle in the uplands 

 of Worcestershire. Westward again of the Evenlode, the 

 Windrush comes down from the northern Cotswolds, to join 

 the Isis at Witney, and further still come Leach, and Coin, and 

 others, bringing the clear cold water in which trout delight, 

 from the abundant springs at Northleach and Andoversford. 

 But the Evenlode is not a Cotswold stream, though trout may 

 still be caught in it where it has not been polluted ; it skirts 

 for many miles the north-eastern slope of the Cotswolds, which 

 may be seen from the train-windows closing in the horizon all 

 the way from Shipton-under-Wychwood to Evesham and Wor- 

 cester, but it has the slow current and muddy bottom of a 

 lowland stream, and runs throughout its course among water- 

 meadows liable to flood. 



For the first few miles of its course it is little more than a 

 ditch; but shortly after passing the historic lawns of Daylesford, 

 it is joined by two other streams, one descending from the 

 slope of the Cotswolds, and the other from the high ground 

 of Chipping Norton eastwards. These two join the Evenlode 

 exactly at the point where it enters Oxfordshire, and the 



