In 1750, the customary approach to this earthly paradise was still along that silent highway of the Thames over which, nearly forty years before, Sir Roger de Coverley and Mr. Spectator had been rowed by the wooden-legged waterman who had fought at La Hogue. There was, indeed, a bridge built or being built at Westminster; but more than half a century was to elapse before there was another at Vauxhall. This little preliminary boating-party, especially to the accompaniment of French horns, must have been one of the delights of the journey, although, if we are to believe a Gallic poet who addressed a copy of verses upon 'Le Vauxhall de Londres' to M. de Fontenelle, '_le trajet du fleuve fatal_' was not without its terrors to would-be visitors. Goldsmith's Mrs. Tibbs, at all events, had 'a natural aversion to the water,' and when Mr. Matthew Bramble went, he went by coach for fear of cold, while the younger and bolder spirits of his party took ship from Ranelagh in 'a wherry, so light and slender' that, says poetical Miss Lydia Melford, they looked like 'fairies sailing in a nutshell.' They were four in the boat, she nevertheless adds, beside the oarsman; and if this paper were to be illustrated by fancy pictures the artist's attention might be particularly invited to that very fantastic fairy, Mrs. Tabitha Bramble, who, we are told, 'with her rumpt gown and petticoat, her scanty curls, her lappet-head, deep triple ruffles and high stays,' was (in Lady Griskin's opinion) 'twenty good years behind the fashion.' What the waterman charged, the fair Lydia does not tell us; but he probably asked more than usual for so exceptional a cargo. Meanwhile, the old rates shown in the 'Court and City Registers' of the time are moderate enough. From Whitehall Stairs, the favourite starting-place, the cost of a pair of oars was sixpence; from the Temple eightpence. For sculls you paid no more than half.