Or bridges, when broken, to build up anew.
MAIDENHEAD
The main road between London and Bath, a well-known coaching road, runs this way, and a very good road it is. The railway bridge crosses below the road, but it is of brick with wide arches, and is by no means unsightly. Between the two is the River-side club, where a band plays on the smooth green lawn in the season, and the smartest of smart costumes are the rule. Near here also is Bond's boat-house and a willow-grown islet. There are numbers of steps and railings and landing stages, all painted white, and these give a certain lightness to the scene. Close by the bridge are several hotels, of which the oldest established is Skindle's, low-lying and creeper-covered, on the Taplow side. Boats for hire line the banks everywhere, for many cater for the wants of the butterfly visitor, out of whom enough must be taken in the season to carry the establishments on through the winter; and the river visitor is essentially a butterfly. Few know the charms of the Thames in the winter, when, in an east and west stretch, the glowing red ball of the sun sinks behind dun banks of mist; when the trees are leafless, and the skeleton branches are outlined against a pale clear sky; when a touch of frost is in the air, and the river glides so stilly that it almost seems asleep.
A bitter day, that early sank
Behind a purple frosty bank
Of vapour, leaving night forlorn.
—Tennyson.
The visitor goes to the river in the summer because of its coolness, and though the coolness is ofttimes delusive, being in appearance rather than reality, lying in the sight of the sparkles and the sound of the ripples, yet it is a fine make-believe. Such river-side hotels as cater for the season are content to lie dormant all the chill long winter, until, with the breath of early spring, the celandines raise their polished golden faces and the lords and ladies stud the hedgerows. Then a few adventurous beings come down on the first fine days, like the early swallows, a portent that summer is at hand; and these lucky people have the river largely to themselves, and do not find lovers in every attractive backwater; and if they have to row to keep themselves warm, they gain an increase of vigour that no burning summer sun can give.