as much by road, which runs through
East Molesey. There is little of interest in either of the Moleseys,
East or West, but it is worth walking a dull mile or two to look down
stream from the Bridge over Henry VIII's palace, with its yews and elms,
dark and stately, in the garden beyond the imposing walls. There is a
far more comprehensive view of Hampton Court to be had from the railway
or the river, but it is still a fine pile of brick seen down stream from
the Bridge. Up stream, Hampton Church stands a mile away at the bend of
the river, grey in the sunshine; between the church and the bridge is
the lock, bright with boats in summer, and the weir, tumbling down a
roar of green water to make roach-swims and barbel-swims for patient
fishermen. In the road to the left you may catch sight or sound of one
of the London coaches, with its white-hatted driver and painted panels,
well named the Vivid. Molesey's roads carry away many of the motor cars
that run to Hampton Court; but the old Vivid still jangles hopefully
after them.

North and west of Molesey runs the ugliest road in Surrey. It begins
with the paling running round the Hurst Park racecourse, and it goes on
between the ramparts of enormous reservoirs. To stand on the edge of one
of these great basins of water (it is strictly forbidden to do so) is
to get a new meaning of desolation. They are horribly deep--you can see
how deep if you stand above one which is half empty; the sides slope so
steeply that if you fell in you could never climb out again, and they
are the loneliest stretches of water conceivable. No bird has any need
that brings him to water that has no shelter and no food. Once I watched
a sunset in November across one of these reservoirs. When the sun sank
low the water blackened; the wind drove little waves slapping with foam
against the stone bank; a single sea-gull swept up out of the dark and
fled away down wind like a scrap of torn paper; it was the most solitary
ending a day could have.

The reservoirs by Molesey stretch far back from the river. Nearer the
river the birds find them more hospitable. I remember a day in October
when I stood watching the martins making one of their last halts on the
way south over the reservoirs on the river bank at Surbiton. It was a
pouring wet afternoon, there was a high wind, and the rain drove bubbles
in the ruffled water and half blotted the greens and greys of blown
willows and the russet of thorn berries on