Again there comes a season of increase, in which the river gains, from this source and that, a considerable addition to its volume. At Broughton Gifford a brook by that name surrenders to the brimming river from the west, whilst from the east enters the Whaddon streamlet. Then, again, near Staverton the little Biss joineth the great Avon. So our river swells with importance as it approaches romantic Bradford-on-Avon. The name of this town—from the “broad ford” over the river—is by no means its only indebtedness to the Avon, for the highly picturesque situation of Leland’s “clooth-making” centre is entirely the outcome of Nature’s handiwork. Immediately on the north side of the river a hill abruptly rises, and it is on the brow and along the sloping declivity of this eminence that most of the tastefully-designed dwellings have been erected. The deep and hollow valley of the Avon now extends between two ranges, the hills here and there richly wooded to their summits; and pretty villages have scattered themselves along these bold acclivities.
Bradford-on-Avon Church is of considerable interest, and is remarkable for the success of its highly sympathetic restoration by Canon Jones, the vicar, a distinguished archæologist. Two bridges here cross the Avon; the most ancient, in the centre of the town, being described by Aubrey, two centuries since, as “a strong handsome bridge, in the midst of which is a chapel for Mass.” Bradford gained its original eminence in the woollen trade mainly from the introduction of “spinners” from Holland in the seventeenth century, and lost it with the development of the greater Bradford of the North, in the midst of the coalfields.
Before, following the more impetuous course of the now considerable river, we quit Bradford and its seductive scenes, the peculiar loveliness of the valley of the Avon in the vicinity of the town, and more particularly at such fascinating spots as Freshfield, Limpley Stoke—just where the river leaves Wiltshire and enters Somerset—and Claverton, to name but a few, must be remarked upon. Then Bladud’s creation, “Queen of all the Spas in the World,” “City of the Waters of the Sun,” “Queen of the West,” “King of the Spas,” gives greeting to the noble river that plays so great a part in the beautification of the historic city lying at the foot of the valley of the Avon, whence it has grown up its steep banks. Below Bradford the Frome has become a tributary of the Avon, bringing, besides its goodly stream, many most interesting reminiscences of its course. After flowing through the lower part of the agreeably situated town to which it gives its name, the Frome adds its charms to the manifold attractions of the scenery of Vallis Bottom. Just half a mile beyond the time-worn Priory of Hinton, which rears its ivy-clad tower amidst a grove of venerable oaks, Frome merges itself in the Avon.
As if Nature were here conspiring to make the river worthy of the city of “Bladud, eighth in descent from Brutus,” at Bathford the Avon receives the Box brook, from the vale of that name in Wiltshire, and, after a loop to the west, is joined at Batheaston by another small stream, the Midford, which has enhanced the romantic interest of the Vale of Claverton; whilst a third brook descends from the heights of Lansdowne, the fatal battlefield of Sir Basil Grenville and his Cornish friends, who lost their lives for the Parliamentary cause under the ill-starred leadership of Sir William Waller.
Approaching the city of “Beau Nash” from the east, and passing between Bathwick and Bath proper, the Avon washes “Aqua Solis” (or “Sulis”) of the Romans on the south, and plays its part in the fair scene which, “viewed under the influence of a meridian sun, and through the medium of an unclouded atmosphere, presents to sight and imagination everything that is united with the idea of perfect beauty.” And yet, with all the natural advantages of its situation, Bath long awaited the touch of the wand of the modern magician—the man of enterprise and speculation. There lay the deep romantic valley, gloriously encircled by the triple band of splendid hills—towering Lansdowne to the north, 813 feet above the sea; Claverton and Bathwick to the east, some 600 and 400 feet in height respectively; with Beechen Cliff, Sham Castle, Camden Crescent, and Lansdowne Crescent, all fine natural view-points, below. Compare with the Bath of to-day the overgrown village to the practical government of which the famous Beau Nash succeeded in 1704, when he followed the notorious gambler, Captain Webster, as Master of the Ceremonies, and you have some idea of the miracle of change and growth which has been performed. It was after the death of Beau Nash that the city, waxing great, extended its borders to Bathwick, on the country side of the river. Towards the close of the seventeenth century, private munificence caused a bridge to be thrown across the river, and Bathwick itself, from being a daisied meadowland, became a thickly populated suburb. And even the bridge thus built was shortly occupied with rows of dwelling houses and shops, so that the connection between Bath and Bathwick was complete. Long prior to the building of this, the Poulteney bridge—nearly five centuries before, in point of fact—the Avon was crossed by the St. Lawrence’s, or the Old Bridge, as it is now usually called. Originally built in 1304, it became a prey to the fever of building speculation which had marked the career of the elder Wood, of the famous family of Bath architects. Out of date, and, we may presume, somewhat out of repair also, it was rebuilt in 1754. The Poulteney Bridge, crossing to Bathwick, followed in 1769; and half a century’s growth of the popular lower suburb revealing the need for further means of communication that would relieve the congested traffic, the Bathwick, or Cleveland, Bridge was added in 1827. Some years later the North Parade Bridge was built. With the advent of the iron horse there had, by this time, arisen a newer necessity still. In comparatively rapid succession the Midland Railway and the Skew Bridge—which justifies its name by the remarkable angle at which it crosses the Avon—with three suspension bridges and a foot-passengers’ bridge near the station, have followed.
Photo: J. Dugdale & Co., Bath.
THE AVON AT BATH.
Bath boasts at least one ecclesiastical structure of great interest, in the “Lantern of England,” as the tower of the Abbey Church has been styled, because of the unusual number and size of its windows. In the exceptional height of the clerestory and the oblong shape of the tower, the church is also distinguished from the general.