FROM WEIR TO MILL. 79 



of this world, as well as many a poor pilgrim, 

 have walked by the roads and paths that led by 

 devious ways over the hills and under the hills, 

 through woods and over heaths, at last to the ford 

 of the Pilgrims' Way, on right away into Kent. 



Even the mills have records of their own. Some 

 of the millers will certainly not be forgotten yet 

 awhile. I can recollect so many that have gone 

 before, that it makes me feel very old. Good men 

 and true were some of these old millers, but fiercely 

 conservative and cantankerous in all that pertained 

 to fish, — the pike, perch, carp, bream, roach, dace, 

 and trout, to say nothing about the fine silver eels 

 that the river was and is still noted for. Eels of 3, 

 4, and 6 lb. weight I have known to be taken from 

 the weir and the trap of the mill below. If you had 

 work to do at the mill-houses, you were hospitably 

 treated ; but if the miller or his men knew you had 

 a fishing-line in your pocket, woe betide you ! The 

 fish were for the miller or for his landlord's sport, if 

 he wanted a day's fishing, but for no one else. 

 Some of them at that time were called " men of 

 their inches," which meant that if in the settlement 

 of a matter they did not require any one to help 



