3iune 



XIX 



Strictly speaking, a city of one water only; but so in- 

 . geniously has this compliant river been dammed 



many here, sluiced there, coaxed into a new channel 

 on that side, and wheedled into a dozen conduits 

 on this, that one cannot go far in the streets without hear- 

 ing a gurgle or a rush, and, peering over the brick parapet 

 beside the way, beholding a limpid current, wherein great, 

 pale trout lie fanning themselves among the waving 

 water-weeds the livelong summer day. It is well for 

 Winchester that the Itchen has its reservoirs so deep in 

 the chalk ridges that the rain falling on them in winter 

 does not find its way into the channel till the following 

 summer. The destructive floods which scarify the land 

 and scare the dwellers therein only come after reckless, 

 greedy man has stripped the uplands of wood, placed 

 there to arrest the sudden glut of water. The mighty 

 sponges of the chalk he cannot spoil — only nibble them 

 into pits here and there, or scratch them with railway 

 cuttings. So the Itchen flows on now with much the 

 same current, libera] through all summer drought and 

 committing no excesses in winter, as it did when the 

 Roman galleys first swarmed into its estuary. 



Advancing up the river, the practised eye of the 



lU 



