Three Men in A Boat by Jerome K. Jerome

There is an iron “scold’s bridle” in Walton Church.  They used these things in ancient days for curbing women’s tongues.  They have given up the attempt now.  I suppose iron was getting scarce, and nothing else would be strong enough.

There are also tombs of note in the church, and I was afraid I should never get Harris past them; but he didn’t seem to think of them, and we went on.  Above the bridge the river winds tremendously.  This makes it look picturesque; but it irritates you from a towing or sculling point of view, and causes argument between the man who is pulling and the man who is steering.

You pass Oatlands Park on the right bank here.  It is a famous old place.  Henry VIII. stole it from some one or the other, I forget whom now, and lived in it.  There is a grotto in the park which you can see for a fee, and which is supposed to be very wonderful; but I cannot see much in it myself.  The late Duchess of York, who lived at Oatlands, was very fond of dogs, and kept an immense number.  She had a special graveyard made, in which to bury them when they died, and there they lie, about fifty of them, with a tombstone over each, and an epitaph inscribed thereon.

Well, I dare say they deserve it quite as much as the average Christian does.

At “Corway Stakes”—the first bend above Walton Bridge—was fought a battle between Cæsar and Cassivelaunus.  Cassivelaunus had prepared the river for Cæsar, by planting it full of stakes (and had, no doubt, put up a notice-board).  But Cæsar crossed in spite of this.  You couldn’t choke Cæsar off that river.  He is the sort of man we want round the backwaters now.

Halliford and Shepperton are both pretty little spots where they touch the river; but there is nothing remarkable about either of them.  There is a tomb in Shepperton churchyard, however, with a poem on it, and I was nervous lest Harris should want to get out and fool round it.  I saw him fix a longing eye on the landing-stage as we drew near it, so I managed, by an adroit movement, to jerk his cap into the water, and in the excitement of recovering that, and his indignation at my clumsiness, he forgot all about his beloved graves.