Netheravon is famous for its Cavalry School. Of its Norman and Early English church Sydney Smith was once a curate, to his great discomfort. The tower here is very old and some have called it Saxon. The student of _Rural Rides_ will remember that here Cobbett saw an "acre of hares!" Fittleton is another unspoilt little village, and Enford, or Avonford, the next, has a fine church unavoidably much restored after having been struck by lightning early in the nineteenth century; the Norman piers remain. All these villages gain in interest and charm to the pedestrian by being just off the high road that keeps to the west bank of the river. Upavon, however, is on a loop of this highway and sees more traffic. Here is a church with a Transitional chancel; it is said that the contemporary nave was of wood. The fine tower and present nave belong to the thirteenth century. The Norman font with its archaic carving and the fifteenth-century crucifix over the west door should be noticed. Upavon was the home of a kindred spirit to Cobbett, for here was born the once famous "Orator Hunt," farmer and demagogue--rare combination! He was chairman of the meeting in Manchester that had "Peterloo" as its sequel. Near Upavon, but down stream, is the small and ancient manor house of Chisenbury, until lately the property of the Groves, one of whose ancestors suffered death for his participation in the rising of Colonel Penruddock during the Commonwealth. At Rushall the narrow valley of the Avon, guarded by the opposing camps of Casterley and Chisenbury, is left for the transverse vale of Pewsey, on the farther side of which are the Marlborough Downs. A number of chalk streams drain the vale and go to make up the head-waters of the Avon; in fact two streams, both bearing the old British name for river, meet hereabouts; the one rising about two miles from Savernake station and the other about the same distance from Devizes. Along the northern slope of this vale the canal made to join the Kennet and Thames with yet another, the Bristol Avon, runs its lonely course. Five miles west of Rushall is the divide between the waters of the English Channel and the Severn Sea, and the Bristol Avon receives the stream that rises but a mile from its namesake of Christchurch Bay. High in one of the combes at this end of the valley is the small village of All Cannings, said to have been of much importance in the dark ages as a Saxon centre. All it has to show the visitor now is a cruciform church with Norman and Early English fragments and a good Perpendicular tower.