And all the meads adorned with dainty gems
Fit to deck maidens' bowers.
Sweet Thames! run softly till I end my song.
—Spenser.
Shiplake stands high above the flat meadows by the river bank. The little flint church, in which Tennyson was married, has a prettily buttressed tower, and around it grow many tall evergreens and waving trees. There are also some interesting old frescoes on the walls, two representing St. Christopher, who seems particularly appropriate in a river church. From the porch, down between two rows of shrubs, one can look on to the top of a mass of trees, which shuts out a bend of the silver river, and beyond them see the blue distance, miles and miles away. Mrs. Climenson, whose book on Shiplake was privately printed, suggests that the name originated in schiff-laacken, for the story goes that when the Danes got so far, their boats stuck on the shoals, and their commander ordered them to be burnt, to prevent a possibility of retreat.
CHAPTER X
HENLEY REGATTA
Who can ever think of Henley without its regatta? And yet Henley is very well worth thinking of at all times of the year. It is a pleasantly-built, middle-aged, red-brick town. Its history does not reach back so far as that of Abingdon or Reading. It boasts neither abbey nor cathedral. Near the esplanade above the bridge, there are one or two of the tumble-down, out-of-perpendicular style of cottages, which invariably add so much to a river scene; but the main part of the town, which is, of course, of red brick, has a homely air of the seventeenth century about it. The solid and stately Red Lion Hotel, close to the bridge, is one of the most historic houses in the place. Charles I. stayed here in 1632, when, after severe dissensions, he was trying the method of ruling England without a Parliament, and when the terrible fate that was to befall him had not yet "cast its shadow before." It is doubtful if he paid his bills, for he was in chronic want of money; but he left a memento behind him which has more than repaid the hotel, for it forms a perennial source of interest. This is a large fresco painting of the royal monogram and coat of arms over one of the mantelpieces, and from the date it is evident it was done at the time of this visit. It was not discovered till 1889, having probably been hastily concealed during the troublous days of Cromwell's ascendency. Being on one of the principal coaching roads, Henley received more than its share of celebrated visitors. On July the 12th, 1788, George III., with the Queen and three of his daughters, had breakfast at the Red Lion; George IV. once dined here; and the celebrated Duke of Marlborough regularly kept a room here that he might use it in his journeys from Blenheim; his bed is still preserved. After these associations, that of Shenstone, who wrote a poem with a diamond on a window-pane, comes as an anticlimax. The poem begins: