“But when sultry suns are high,
Underneath the oak I lie,
As it shades the water’s edge,
And I mark my line, away
In the wheeling eddy play,
Tangling with the river sedge.”
The Thames describes a sharp horseshoe curve round the base of the hill. From the bank a fine view across the flat is obtained of Cassington Church spire, and of the last mill on the River Evenlode, making for the Thames midway between the bridge and Hagley Pool. The paucity of pleasure-boats on the river between Lechlade and Bablock Hythe may be attributed to the great weediness of the river, rendering it sometimes almost impassable; also to the prevalence of shallows, and the absence of anything particular to see, and the all-important consideration that there are few hotels to stop at. There is not a riverside house of call between the little cottage inn at Bablock Hythe and Godstow. An occasional steam-launch finds its way from Oxford up the Canal and into the Thames, by way of the Wolvercott Paper Mill; but this unpleasant type of vessel is very rarely seen so far up, since the forests of aquatic undergrowth are the reverse of favourable for the working of the screw.
OXFORD, FROM GODSTOW.