When two villages stand facing one another across a bridge, it is inevitable that comparisons, however impertinent, will be made. And it may be said at once that Streatley, for all its old church, its pretty hotel, and its mill, cannot dispute the palm with Goring, which has an older church and a more charming mill, and many other advantages. Streatley church is singularly vivid in colouring. Rarely is there to be seen a deeper green-gold than that made by the lichen on the red roof, and when the sunshine flashes out upon it the effect is positively startling.
Not less attractive in its way is the red-roofed hotel with its backing of thick, green foliage, its tiny grass plots on the river's edge, and its gay flowers. The flour mill would be a valuable asset in the beauty items of any place not eclipsed by so near a neighbour.
There are islands in the stream, and the bridge which runs across them is singularly picturesque. This is one of the few old wooden bridges remaining, and it is doubtless destined soon to be replaced by one of iron, as has been done at Pangbourne. At this one can hardly cavil, for delightful as are the long slender wooden piles to look at, they do seem as if they might give way unexpectedly at any minute.
STREATLEY
If we stand down by the lock there are numberless views in all directions, each good in itself. It is a hot day in summer, and the vivid scarlet and the deep carmine of the lock-keeper's geraniums literally strike one's eyeballs with their colour. We do not, alas! hear the wash of the water tumbling over the weir, for weirs in summer often run dry, or give only a small trickle, though it is just the time when their gay music would most appeal to the heart of man. The lock-keeper has stories to tell of the days before the "pound" locks, as they used to be called, were made. What we call the weirs were then the "locks." The great barges had to be towed up the weirs by means of rope and capstan; and sometimes, when the water ran low, they had to wait for weeks for a freshet that would enable them to get up. The lock here is only five-eighths of a mile below that at Cleeve, and these two are the nearest together on the river, except those of Temple and Hurley. Beyond Cleeve there is a long stretch of six and a-half miles before the next, Benson Lock. It almost seems as if the powers that deal with locks had in their justice tried to make things even by multiplying them in the beauty spots, so that those who want only the best have to pay for it by the worry of passing locks; while those who are content with something less can have it without bother. Some locks, however, have been done away with as unnecessary. There used to be one between those of Cleeve and Benson, and another at Hartslock Wood, below Goring; but these have disappeared.
The ancient road known as the Icknield Street crosses the river at Streatley; it was used by the Romans, but made long before their time.
High beyond the bridge, and, rising above it, as we stand at the lock, is the grand sweep of hill locally known as Greenhill, in distinction from Whitehill on the Goring side.
To the right, on the top of the heights, are the golf links, and the small white road winds steeply up, carrying with it a touch of melancholy, which the sight of a far-away and steep road always gives, a suggestion of a journey that winds "uphill all the way."