EVESHAM AND THE VALE
Great Evesham's fertile glebe what tongue hath not extolled.
As though to her alone belonged the crown of gold.
—MICHAEL DRAYTON.
Evesham stands on a kind of peninsula formed by a deep loop of the river Avon on its way from Stratford-on-Avon to Tewkesbury. The broad vale in which it lies is enclosed by a semicircle of hills, which provide a background to every varied landscape, and give a sense of homeliness and seclusion which those who are familiar with unbroken stretches of level country will at once recognise and appreciate. From the east to the south-west range the Cotswolds, not striking in outline but depending for their beauty in great part upon the play of light and shade and the variety given by atmospheric effects. To dwellers in the vale the appearance of the hills not only reflects the feeling of the day but foretells the coming weather. When a delicate, blue haze shrouds their forms, entirely obliterating the more distant heights, the pleasure-seeker rests content in the promise of a fair morn; but no pleasant expectations can be formed when, robed in deepest purple, they seem to draw in and crowd together, and with vastly increased bulk to frown upon the darkening vale.
At each end of the Cotswold range, as seen from Evesham, stands, sentinel like, an isolated elevation, and in early times, as present remains testify, both these were occupied as fortified posts. To the east is Meon Hill, and to the south-west stands Bredon, the nearest and most prominent of the group. In the south-east the position of Broadway is decisively marked by its pseudo-Norman tower, and due south the level outline ended by an abrupt escarpment to the eastward is Cleeve Cloud, carrying the range on towards Cheltenham and Bristol.
But the chief glory of the vale, so far as its background is concerned, is the truly mountainous outline of the Malvern Hills, the whole length of which is seen bounding the western horizon. The breadth of the valley here is more than twenty miles from hill to hill, and includes both the Severn and its tributary stream. To how many does the thought of sunrise not recall this undulating range illuminated and glorified by the clear beams of the early sun striking across the vale and thrown back in glittering fragments by the long line of houses at its base! And few more beautiful associations will gather round the sunset than those in which Malvern plays its part, the rocky skyline standing up sharp and clear against the ever-changing brilliance. As we recall the scene the dazzling effulgence fades into a glow, the glow diminishes almost imperceptibly into twilight, and, as we watch, a line of twinkling lights becomes visible beneath the hill, and one by one the stars appear in the deepening sky.
Northward there are no striking elevations, the ground sloping gradually upward by the Lench Hills and the Ridge Way towards the great central tableland; but opposite Malvern, continuing the horizon to the north of Meon, can be seen, when the air is clear, beyond the flat Stour valley, the outline of Edgehill, recalling as we gaze the years of civil strife, full of terror and bloodshed, yet round which Time has thrown his mantle of romance.
So far we have been able to dwell on the broad features of the country which it takes many ages to change or modify. From the earliest times we can record the settlers on this chosen spot must have looked out on the same hills and the same broad valley with its overarching sky. But then, instead of the "crown of gold" of which Drayton sings, or the silver sheen which in springtime now glorifies the gardens, the face of the country was, we are told, one vast thicket of brushwood and forest trees. In Blakenhurst, meaning black forest, the name of the hundred in which the town is situated, we have an indication of the former character of this region. Only here and there was a clearing with a few huts giving shelter to a scanty population of herdsmen and hunters. In those shadowy times the river was broad and shallow, unconfined to one course, here swift and clear, there sluggish and thick, feeding creeks and marshes by the way, and overgrown with rushes and water weeds; of no use probably as a water-way but prolific in fish and fowl.