The River's Tale by Rudyard Kipling

 The River's Tale (Prehistoric)

TWENTY bridges from Tower to Kew -
Wanted to know what the River knew,
 Twenty Bridges or twenty-two,
For they were young, and the Thames was old
And this is the tale that River told:-


 "I walk my beat before London Town,
Five hours up and seven down.
Up I go till I end my run
At Tide-end-town, which is Teddington.
Down I come with the mud in my hands
And plaster it over the Maplin Sands.
But I'd have you know that these waters of mine
Were once a branch of the River Rhine,
When hundreds of miles to the East I went
And England was joined to the Continent.

 "I remember the bat-winged lizard-birds,
The Age of Ice and the mammoth herds,
And the giant tigers that stalked them down
Through Regent's Park into Camden Town.
And I remember like yesterday
The earliest Cockney who came my way,
When he pushed through the forest that lined the Strand,
With paint on his face and a club in his hand.
He was death to feather and fin and fur.
He trapped my beavers at Westminster.
He netted my salmon, he hunted my deer,
He killed my heron off Lambeth Pier.
He fought his neighbour with axes and swords,
Flint or bronze, at my upper fords,
While down at Greenwich, for slaves and tin,
The tall Phoenician ships stole in,
And North Sea war-boats, painted and gay,
Flashed like dragon-flies, Erith way;
And Norseman and Negro and Gaul and Greek
Drank with the Britons in Barking Creek,
And life was gay, and the world was new,
And I was a mile across at Kew!
But the Roman came with a heavy hand,
And bridged and roaded and ruled the land,
And the Roman left and the Danes blew in -
And that's where your history-books begin!"

A potted pre-history of the river Thames by Rudyard Kipling.

Blissful animal

Found in a small village in the south of France. What more could any cat want, than to lie peacefully in the sun.  This particular cat probably doesn't even require a food source.

A two-in-one post for the Photo Hunts.

The joy of circles

Most of these photos seem to come from in and around churches or cathedrals and that probably reflects the joy I find in visiting these very often ancient buildings.

The bishop's gardens, le Jardin de la Berbie, in Albi with circular patterns described in boxwood hedges.  This is how it would have looked from 1678.  Everything is tended by hand, watering, pruning, weeding.

A circular window above an ancient door in an equally ancient church in the south of France.

A small gravestone behind a small church in England.

Circular panels in this stained glass window in a church in central France.  The colours are so rich and vibrant.

The final picture possibly brings me most joy because I made the effort to go out very early on an autumn morning to catch this reflection while the mists were rising from the river and before any breezes ruffled the water.

A two-in-one post for the Photo Hunts.

Saint Omer

On our regular route south, somewhere on the autoroute there is a large sign to "Historial de la Grande Guerre, Péronne, a museum devoted to the First World War.  Every time we rush past I mention that we should really stop and visit one day.  Eventually we decided we'd make a special trip and see some of the area, starting with St Omer because it has a cathedral, and I do like cathedrals.  So off we set in the pouring rain...

When you reach the outskirts of a town there is invariably a sign welcoming you.  Some are more decorative than others but they almost always tell you the names of any twin towns.  I pay little attention unless I'm visiting somewhere new and then I do try to gauge what sort of a town it may be like.  It doesn't always work.  I know Burley in the New Forest is twinned with Beurlay in France presumably just because it sounds the same.  As we approached St Omer I read out the twin towns:

Ypres (Belgium)
Detmold (Germany
Deal (United Kingdom)

Well that distracted me from the rain.  I pass the sign going into Deal, possibly every week.  How had I not noticed it was twinned with St Omer?  And why were these two towns twinned? 

This was the first time I'd visited rather than rushed through a town in the north of France and I was surprised at the difference in architecture.  There is a noticeable Flemish influence.  I shouldn't have been surprised because St Omer was once part of Spanish Flanders and the river that passes through is called the Aa, Old Dutch for water.

The town hall, rebuilt in the 1830s because the previous medieval building was falling down.  We parked in this huge square and the rain stopped long enough for a walk around.  A large proportion of the other cars were British and English speaking voices were all around.  Maybe they were all from Deal.

Almost certainly the first World War is the connection.  The Royal Flying Corps set up headquarters in St Omer in 1914.  Practically every pilot will have known St Omer. 

I suppose this place was taking advantage of the large numbers of British tourists, or maybe it was owned by British people.  It's a shame they were allowed put in those modern dormer windows.  The plaque on the wall says 1689.

Another lovely building, dating from 1786.  This was once the bailiwick, the base for the bailiff who represented the king, in those days Louis XVI.

By the time we worked our way down to the river, the rain had re-started so I didn't take any photos, but this postcard does it justice.  It is a very attractive part of town and very Dutch-looking.  It just looked an awful lot greyer when I saw it.

Note the colour of the clouds.  This was a junction of the Aa - two branches join together to continue as one towards the coast at Gravelines.  The whole area is very flat and at one time very marshy.  A malaria area.  I took this picture thinking I was looking back at St Omer but I wasn't.  According to a nearby notice, it was where the Canal d'Aire meets the River Lys.   I wasn't entirely sure where that was ...

... but not too far from Belgium. 

Branches of trees

My second Photo Hunt post for this week because I failed to find a way to tie the themes together.

I love trees in the winter when you can see the shape of their branches clearly against the sky, especially beautiful at sunset..

Covered in snow they look beautiful too though - fairly fortunately for me - I haven't seen any like this at all this winter.

Sadly we've seen a lot of branches where they shouldn't be, in the river which has burst its banks and stayed high for the last month or so.  Maybe the snow is preferable.

Bling

I couldn't tie the two themes together this week so they each have a separate entry.  My bling comes from the Czech Republic.  It was everywhere!  These pictures were taken nearly two years ago now, in Prague.