The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Historic Thames, by Hilaire Belloc

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Title: The Historic Thames

Author: Hilaire Belloc

Release Date: July 29, 2004 [EBook #13046]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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THE WAYFARER'S LIBRARY

THE HISTORIC THAMES

Hilaire Belloc

O.M. DENT & SONS Ltd.

LONDON

THE HISTORIC THAMES

England has been built up upon the framework of her rivers, and, in
that pattern, the principal line has been the line of the Thames.

Partly because it was the main highway of Southern England, partly
because it looked eastward towards the Continent from which the
national life has been drawn, partly because it was better served by
the tide than any other channel, but mainly because it was the chief
among a great number of closely connected river basins, the Thames
Valley has in the past supported the government and the wealth of
England.

Among the most favoured of our rivals some one river system has
developed a province or a series of provinces; the Rhine has done so,
the Seine and the Garonne. But the great Continental river systems--at
least the navigable ones--stand far apart from one another: in this
small, and especially narrow, country of Britain navigable river
systems are not only numerous, but packed close together. It is
perhaps on this account that we have been under less necessity in the
past to develop our canals; and anyone who has explored the English
rivers in a light boat knows how short are the portages between one
basin and another.

Now not only are we favoured with a multitude of navigable
waterways--the tide makes even our small coastal rivers navigable
right inland--but also we are quite exceptionally favoured in them
when we consider that the country is an island.

If an island, especially an island in a tidal sea, has a good river
system, that system is bound to be of more benefit to it than would be
a similar system to a Continental country. For it must mean that the
tide