The river, after leaving Wallingford, widens a little, and there is a continuation of the park-like meadows. A short distance down stream is Wallingford Lock, which is a lock only in name. Here the towing-path deserts the Oxford for the Berkshire shore, and the long and lovely reach which ends at Moulsford Bridge begins. This spot marks the commencement of the stretch of meadow, hills, and woodland, which makes the delight of Goring and Pangbourne. The Oxfordshire bank is not merely studded, but is thickly overhung, with trees and undergrowth, beneath whose shade many a boat is moored for those aquatic flirtations which are among the most enchanting of summer diversions. Directly one gets clear of Wallingford the wooded heights about Streatley come in view, with a glowing "scarf of sunshine athwart their breast." On the Oxford bank, halfway to North Stoke, more or less, is Mongewell House, a delicate bit of white in a setting of green lawns and venerable trees. Once Mongewell was an episcopal retirement, to which the Bishops of Durham resorted for relief from the fatigues of administration. It was admirably suited to such a purpose, since it is a silent and contemplative spot--the more peaceful, perhaps, from the contiguity of the little Church of Newton Murren, a marvel of the miniature, with a tiny chancel, and a belfry no bigger than a dovecote. Any monotony there may be from this spot to the ferry at North Stoke is relieved by the Streatley Hills, looming ever larger as the boat swings down the reach, and by the fine clumps of timber which line the river bank on each side. Many a sweet rural picture is passed on the oarsman's highway between Newton Murren and Moulsford Bridge, and in such a country all seasons of the year, and all times of the day, have their charm. The early-morning hours upon the riverside provide unending delight to the real lover of nature. Everything is fresh, crisp, and blithe, for the life of the fields and hedgerows is busy and bustling long before the earliest man's breakfast-time. The ideal climate, cool but not cold, exhilarating, buoyant, redolent of the delight of life, would be a perpetual summer morning, such as it is from five until nine. Every sight gratifies the eye. Then the dew is still heavy upon the hedgerows and the tall aquatic grasses, and where there is a bit of furzy country, there is a tear in every golden flower of gorse. The atmosphere is clearer and more elastic than later in the day. The far-distant rush of trains, the only reminder that there is a world beyond the horizon, and that its daily fret has begun, which at noon is a mere rumble, in this crisp air is sharp and almost shrill. The ring of the scythe under the whetstone many fields away sounds but a few yards off, and the metallic clang of the stable clock at some country house, hidden behind the belts of woodland, half-an-hour's walk as the crow flies, is distinct as the raspy cry of the corn-crake in the yellowing wheat near by.