The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries did little to disturb this equilibrium or to destroy this even tradition. The opening up of the waterways and the great improvement of the highroads, and the building of bridges, and the expansion of wealth at the end of the eighteenth century had indeed some considerable effect in increasing the population of England as a whole, but the smaller country towns, in the south at least, and in the Thames Valley, seem to have benefited fairly equally from the general change. The new canals, entering at Oxford and at Reading, gave a certain lead to both those centres, and even the Severn Canal, entering at Lechlade, did a little for that up-river town. The new fashion of the public schools (which had now long been captured by the wealthier classes) also increased the importance of Eton, and towards the close of the period the now rapidly expanding capital had overfed the villages within reach of London with a considerable accession of population. But it is remarkable how evenly spread was even this industrial development. The twin towns of Abingdon and Reading, for instance, twin monasteries, twin corporations, had for all these centuries preserved their ratio of the up-country town and the larger centre that was the neighbour of London and Windsor. In the beginning of the nineteenth century, in spite of the general increase of population, that ratio was still well preserved: it is about three to one. But the Railway found one and left the other. The Railway came, and in our own generation that ratio began to change out of all knowledge. It grows from four, five, six, to _seven_ to one. After a short halt you have eight, nine and at last--after eighty years--more than _ten_ to one. The last census (that of 1901) is still more significant: Abingdon positively declines, and the last ratio is _twelve_. It is through the Railway, and even then long after its first effect might have been expected, that the Valley of the Thames, later than any other wealthy district in England, loses, as all at last are doomed to lose, its historic tradition, and suffers the social revolution which has made modern England the unique and perilous thing it is among the nations of the world. INDEX Abbots. See under separate monasteries. Aben, legend of, at Abingdon, 98. Abingdon, 9, 23, 37, 87, 88, 93, 97-99, 102, 139. Abingdon and Reading, change in ratio of population of, 198. Ad Pontes, Roman name of Staines, 33. Alfred, his boundary neglects the Thames, 34. Andersey Island, opposite Abingdon, 99. Ankerwike, nunnery of, 109, 168. Anne of Cleves obtains Bisham, 163. Barbarian invasions, 90, 91, 94, 95. Barlow, Prior of Bisham, becomes Bishop of St. Asaphs, 163. Barons give Tower to Archbishop in trust for Magna Charta, 84. Barwell obtains Chertsey, 165. Benedictine Order, 89-100. Bermondsey, Cluniac Abbey of, 104, 105. Berties obtain Hinksey, 166. Birinus receives Cynegil into the Church, 52.