n, has stayed young men from
becoming topers and drunkards. A brank certainly in one recorded case
cured a woman from coarse invective and abuse. But what effect had the
sight of the infliction of cruel punishments upon those who took part
in them or witnessed them? It could only have tended to make cruel
natures more brutal. Barbarous punishments, public hangings, cruel
sports such as bull-baiting, dog-fighting, bear-baiting,
prize-fighting and the like could not fail to exercise a bad influence
on the populace; and where one was deterred from vice, thousands were
brutalized and their hearts and natures hardened, wherein vicious
pleasures, crime, and lust found a congenial soil. But we can still
see our stocks on the village greens, our branks, ducking-stools, and
pillories in museums, and remind ourselves of the customs of former
days which have not so very long ago passed away.

[56] Act of Parliament 25 George II.

CHAPTER XIV

OLD BRIDGES

The passing away of the old bridges is a deplorable feature of
vanishing England. Since the introduction of those terrible
traction-engines, monstrous machines that drag behind them a whole
train of heavily laden trucks, few of these old structures that have
survived centuries of ordinary use are safe from destruction. The
immense weight of these road-trains are enough to break the back of
any of the old-fashioned bridges. Constantly notices have to be set up
stating: "This bridge is only sufficient to carry the ordinary traffic
of the district, and traction-engines are not allowed to proceed over
it." Then comes an outcry from the proprietors of locomotives
demanding bridges suitable for their convenience. County councils and
district councils are worried by their importunities, and soon the
venerable structures are doomed, and an iron-girder bridge hideous in
every particular replaces one of the most beautiful features of our
village.

When the Sonning bridges that span the Thames were threatened a few
years ago, English artists, such as Mr. Leslie and Mr. Holman-Hunt,
strove manfully for their defence. The latter wrote:--

"The nation, without doubt, is in serious danger of losing faith
in the testimony of our poets and painters to the exceptional
beauty of the land which has inspired them. The poets, from
Chaucer to the last of his true British successors, with one voice
enlarge on the overflowing sweetness of England, her hills and
dales, her p