June 19, 1915 
LAND AND WATER 
THE LAKE 
By J. D. SYMON 
SOMEWHERE in the home counties it lies, sparkhng 
in the June sunshine, the very eye of the landscape 
and an everlasting refreshment to the sight of the 
wayfarer. To the obvious charms of every pleasant 
expanse of water it adds one more, of curious and 
even whimsical suggestion, for this lake is not as other lakes. 
Although it falls into the picture with perfect harmony, so 
perfect as to proclaim it immemorial, this lake of ours is none 
of Nature's making. Two years ago it was not. A gently 
rolling countryside, sufficiently beautiful in itself, still lacked 
the relief of water, save for one or two streams, too slender 
to give any marked accent to the vaUey as viewed from the 
neighbouring heights. It was the one thing wanting ; but 
some genius of the Urban District Council — a body not usually 
associated with genius, except in the practice of refined and 
cumulative extortion — saw what the landscape required and 
how it lent itself to this adaptation, worthy for once in a way 
of the name " improvement." A wide marshy basin at the 
confluence of several little rivers lay handily inviting. Per- 
haps, although local tradition is silent on the point, a lake 
may have shimmered here long ago. Probability hes that 
■way, for the appropriateness of the lake to its surroundings 
makes it appear rather a skUful restoration than an arbitrary 
device. Artificial waters, styled " ornamental " in guide- 
books, seldom conquer their original sin of artificiahty. Be 
they never so venerable, they bear their characters on their 
faces ; but this little inland sea flings no challenge to the critical 
observer. He takes it for granted as a proper natural feature. 
If it lies, it lies splendidly. 
The engineer's task was simple. It sufficed merely to 
remove some low barriers, and the waters of the neighbouring 
streams overflowed the basin just to the right depth. A 
little skilful embanking here and there did the rest. But 
the new embankment left no scar. The oozy ground already 
held clumps and hues of osiers in plenty. Up to their roots 
the flood lapped and paused, knowing its duty. Shy wdllow- 
screened backwaters, tempting as those by Isis and by Cherwell 
of happy memory, formed themselves without guidance; 
and the lake added to its seductions the sweetest attribute 
of boating rivers. Its charm became twofold. And there in 
peaceful days, dwellers among the Chiltern uplands, far 
removed from " Thames' broode backe," as Spenser sings, 
recovered with new zest an ancient sport too long denied. 
For the District Council aforesaid, ever thrifty amid its 
enlightenment, did not omit to furnish the lake with toler- 
able craft, wherein for a modest fee, on sunny afternoons 
or moonlit eves, you might " ply the oar with lusty limb " 
and with small stretch of the imagination fancy yourself at 
Pangbourne. The illusion is less fanciful than might appear, 
for the waters creep up almost to the base of wooded heights, 
very suggestive of Father Thames, and the configuration of 
the lake, irregular and deeply indented, yields many a pleasant 
surprise of vista. Here the oarsman is bound to no monotonous 
course as on the Serpentine (not that we have ever condescended 
to that rather dreary grind) and other less venerable " boating 
lakes " ; he finds endless twists and turns, every one of which 
affords some new grouping of hill and wood or meadowland, 
i\nd always there is welcome retreat, when a bout of strenuous 
practice has earned an hour with book and pipe under the 
willows. 
But these are of the things that were. The mood of 
flannels has small place to-day in our scheme of hfe. So 
sensitive have we become on that head that some, it is whis- 
pered, are afraid even to be seen beneath that oriflamme of 
jubilant summer, the straw hat. Hence in these bright hours 
the lake is lonelier than it was this time last year. Civilians 
who put out upon its waters no longer seek after dolce 
Jar niente, the willows whisper their enchantments to deaf 
ears. Those who row, row in the strict meaning of the term, 
and the exercise is made contributory to one end, physical 
fitness. Otherwise it would not be approved or undertaken. 
The drowsy charm of moored craft, rocking lightly in the 
breeze, is pre-eminently an indulgence of peace. To-day it is 
grotesque, unseemly, a scandal in the able-bodied. Yet a 
little " slacking " still lingers by the lake-side — do not make 
haste to cry "shame!" it is perfectly lawful. For the 
slackers have earned their little hour of ease, of undisiciplincd 
paddling, of tea, tobacco, and chaff under the willows. They 
are not in flannels, no gaudy blazer proclaims them butterflies. 
they would be none the worse of the abandoned straw hat. 
All the same they are hall-marked by their clothes, hall- 
marked and thereby enfranchised. You will have guessed 
who tliey arc. 
It is their hour of relief from the work that most of all 
matters in these critical days, when the nation's fortunes 
tremble on the razor's edge. All day these amateur water- 
men have toiled on land under the strict eye of the instructor. 
They are of that arm of the service with which in the first 
instance victory rests ; it is theirs to lay the gun and direct 
the puissant shell to the battering down of defences too long 
opposed at fearful cost. They are, by the chief paradox of 
this strange war, the life-saving corps, in very truth the hfe- 
guards of the army. By the lake-side nestles the pretty vUlage, 
where for the moment these artillerymen have their home ; 
the thin shaft of its church spire rises white against the 
wooded hillsj lending the last touch of the picturesque to a 
landscape typically English and rural. The township took 
on a new beauty when its spire and red roofs found their 
reflection in these quiet waters. Over all broods the very 
spirit of peace. Yet here, too, there is war, urgent and 
imperious, emergent at certain hours upon those rural ways, 
.^t early morn the guns and the ammunition column thread 
the lanes, moving with a brisk jolt and jingle, very different 
from the leisurely progress of the farm waggon, hitherto the 
usual disturber of the fields. And by the woodside above the 
lake, a sudden turn may bring you on a halted troop of horse, 
intent on map-reading. They pore upon their charts, com- 
pare the ground, dispute a httle perhaps, and then it is " files 
about," and they are gone, phantoms of the summer afternoon, 
left once more to its rightful owners, the questing bee and the 
clamorous cuckoo, whose voice is now grown a trifle languid. 
" In June he changes tune." Next June will he shout to a 
valley restored to its ancestral peace, himself, rude bird, the 
only peace-breaker ? Perchance, by the grace of God and the 
gunner, it will be peace. So mote it be. 
Leave the lake-side now (for none of us is in any mood ' 
for boating, and the boats are of right our artillerymen's7 
and come with me to the hill-side, to that very break in the 
coppice where the other day I surprised my map-reading 
troopers at their vi^ork. The view rewards the climb. It is 
one of the fairest and perhaps the least known in all the 
twenty miles around London, for the path that leads to this 
precious coign of vantage is labeUed " Private." It is very 
wrong, no doubt, to commit trespass, but so you keep the path 
and do not stray into the coverts on either hand, the keeper 
winks at your iniquity and even condescends to a pleasant 
" good-day " as he passes on his lawful occasions. The view, 
with the happy trick of its kind, breaks upon the wayfarer as 
a surprise. 'The screening coppice ends suddenly, the ground 
falls away, and the eye ranges unfettered over many miles 
of delicious hill and dale. On the left twinkle the extreme 
northern heights of greater London, then from the spur of the 
Hill par excellence, rolling woodland sweeps encircling until 
it fades into the distance that holds Windsor undescried. 
Midway hes the wide valley where three rivers, flowing from 
diverse uplands, at length make common cause. And for 
centre and focus to the picture rises, embowered in foUage, 
that keen shaft of village spire, warden of the little town, 
whose name, if you are a curious student of Anglo-Saxon, will 
record for you the meeting of the waters. Up through the still 
air float chimes that mimic the very intervals and cadences 
of Magdalen bells, whose lazy notes to-day have sounded the 
tocsin for so many of her sons, .^mid this rural peace the 
suggestion of war will not be denied. Even this English valley 
is a perpetual reminder of the strife, for it resembles, with a 
likeness more than fanciful, the valley of the Aisne. Line 
for line, from this view-point, it reproduces the contours of that 
hard-contested ground. The river, perhaps, is less insistent 
here, but its thin silver thread, fitfully seen through fringing 
pollards, is reinforced, right in the middle distance by what 
might well be the arm of a noble stream. For yonder beneath 
the spire glitters, long and irregular, a broader belt of water, 
the very jewel of the landscape, the last touch of its perfection, 
so harmonious in its repose, so well-accordant with the scene, 
that only the informed may know, and knowing gladly forget, 
that it is none of Nature's handiwork, but the gracious 
artifice of rate-gathering men, to whom much shall be 
forgiven for their lovely lake. 
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