The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-04-07
LOND0N'S LOST RIVERS.
STREAMS IND LAKES THAT ONCE
 BEA UYIFIED THE CI7l.
How They Are Made to Perform Use-
 full Service.


 companies'i supply It has the Thames. which is sufficiently noble river; but beyond this there is little water to be seen. There are pools in the parks;
 there is especially the invaluable Ser pentine; but the district is not well wa tered in the sense of lakes rivers and fountains. It was different once. A great part of Londons site was mere swamp and marsh before the coming of the ROmans-So much so that some have asserted that the Celtic name of London signified the ''city on lake. " The history of the city has been rec ord of continual draining
 Gradually lakes and swamps became modified into mere tributaries to the Thomas, and at this day most of these have disappeared. Surrounded by for ests, which always attract moisture, the young city was an oasis in a watery desert.
 The rivers Lea, Brent, Wandle and Ravensbourne survive to suggest the past on the Middlesex side, while the Pool and other streams survive in Sur rey; but there were innumerable other brooks and courses flowing between all these, many of which are now utterly forgotten though they have affected To- cal nomenclature Thus what has be- come of the Langbourne? It is said to have risen on the present site of Fen church street. the name of which is reminiscent of moisture, and passed down Lombard street, by Sherbourne lane, to the Thames. It had been quite drained away or buried in Slows time. The Wallbrook was a still more inpor- tant river which entered the city from Moorgate through cavity in the wall near the present Moorgate street. It reached the Thames by a devious course. Remains of landing stages and bridges, dating even from Roman times, have been discovered. It is possible to trace with q fair amount of detail the career of the Wallbrook, as it passed from a considerable river to mere foul ditch and cesspool. It gradually be- came an unsavory nuisance, in spite of many edcts and contracts for keeping it clear, so that, as Stow says it "waa vaulted over with brick and paved level with the streets and lanes; and since that houses have been built thereon, so that the course of Wallbrook is now hidden underground and thereby hardly known" Many buildings of consequence had stood upon it's banks, and by these it's course has been accurately traced If its latter state was one of refuse and filth it must at once time have been a pleasant water side, in those of Lon don which is now buried from sight It had it's day of supremacy, when its floods were powerful and destructive; it's day of utility when it flowed peace ably and cleansingly within banks; it's day of abjectness when it became use less and pestilent. Its history is much the same as that of other lost rivers of London There was the Fleet, once ac- tually navigable and certainly not cov- cred in until late in the eighteenth cen- tury. Pope makes his Ounces go
 ITO where Fleet ditch, with disem-
 boguing streams,
 Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to
 Thames; ,a
 The king of dykes, than whom no sluice
 of mud
 With deeper sable blots the silver
 flood"
 Barges used to bring coal to the banks at Sea Coal Lane Rising just below Hampstead, the Fleet flowed through Kentish Town to meet endorsements at Clerkenwell, but it does not seem to have assumed its present name until it had passed Holborn bridge Various bridges crossed the stream in it's course, and of these Holborn bridge is supposed to have been at least contemporary in it's building with London bridge, since 1t is on the same great highway. There was also the Fleet bridge, leading from Fleet street to Ludgate Hill; and the Bridewell bridge crossing the stream just before it's junction with the Thames, was erected as late as the six teenth century Though it gradually fell into the same unsanitary state as the Wallbrook the Fleet in it's healthier days had been liable to flood. One of 1 the worst features of these smaller riv- l CTS was their frequent flooding after heavy rains. Every little drain and tributary watercourse poured it's con- tents into them, with the natural result | that banks were overflowed and streets and houses invaded Even after being | covered in the Fleet has shown the same tendency, and it gave considerable trouble to the authorities of the Metro politan railway. But its fate was inev- 1table; rom a peasant rIVef IL mas De- come mere sewer.
 Another river to be mentioned is the Tyburn, the name of which has been explained, perhaps wrongly, as meaning "twy- burn" or two streams. It rose not far from the Fleet and when cross ing Regents park received a small trib utary, which may perhaps have given 1t it's name. Passing across Piccadilly, it branched into three divisions, one of which reached the Thames by way of St. James park; another went to turn the old Westminster mills and the third ran to the Thames a little below the present Vauxhall bridge. Even of com- paratively recent years St. James has been marshy and damp enough; in old times it was an actual swamp and largely rendered so by the overflowings of the Tyburn. Once an attractive riv- ar with elms along it's banks the Ty burn is now debased to the condition of its fellow-streams, besides having the of giving it's name to spot of most disagreeable memories.
 Less dismall associations attach to which takes it's name from another of London's old rivers. This llso sprang from the Hampstead dis ,rict. Hampstead, being London'S high ,ct Snot-it ic aotya111y fp11r hur6rp6 feet