Looking downstream from the bridge, we see on our left hand the Embankment, one of the biggest pieces of work that even London has ever done. Every day the river rises and falls with the tide, and sometimes when there has been much rain a great flood comes down from the country and makes it rise much higher still. Now, sometimes when the river rose very high it ran into houses and did a great deal of damage, so a great wall was built to keep Father Thames in his right place. "It was a wonderful piece of work. It is difficult to think of the number of cart-loads of solid earth and stone that had to be put down into the water to make a firm foundation, and when that was done the wall had to be built on the top, and made very strong. And after this was finished trees were planted. Thus there was made a splendid walk or drive for miles along the riverside." OLD FATHER THAMES--I. Famous above all English rivers is the Thames--"Old Father Thames," as the Londoners used to call it in days when its broad stream was their most familiar high-road. To-day the Londoner uses the motor-bus instead of a Thames wherry; but still the great river rolls through the great city, and on its tide a vast stream of trade flows to and from the capital. To write the story of the Thames would more than fill this little book, so that we can do no more than glance at a few of the famous places on this famous stream. Springing in the Cotswolds, the infant Thames, first known as the Isis, runs thirty miles eastwards to gain the meadows around Oxford. Here the river spreads into a beautiful sheet of water at the foot of Christchurch Meadow, and glides gently past "the City of the Dreaming Spires." In the summer term this stretch of the river presents a gay and busy scene. The rowing-men are out in racing boats, skiffs, canoes, punts, and almost every kind of boat that swims. Along the Christchurch bank are moored the college barges, great gaily-painted structures, whence the rowing-men put off, and where crowds of spectators gather on great race days. The chief boat-races at Oxford are rowed in the middle of the summer term--the May Eights. Then the colleges struggle with each other for the honour of being "Head of the River," the title held by the winning eight. The boats do not race side by side, for the river is not wide enough for that; they race in a long line, with an equal distance between each pair of boats. When the starting-gun fires, each crew pulls with all its might to catch the crew ahead. If one boat overlaps another and touches it, a "bump" is made, and the bumped boat has lost its place. Next day--for the races are held day after day for a week--the winning boat goes up one place, and tries to catch the next boat, and so on, until the races are over. Then the boat which has taken or kept the head of the line is hailed as "Head of the River." Here is an account of a bump: