[27] Speech on conciliation with America, Ibid., pp. 461-62. [28] The navigation had, however, been deepened in the interval for drainage purposes, largely at the expense of the Land Drainage Commissioners, which caused a considerable increase of traffic. CHAPTER II. ENGLISH RIVERS. “Rivers, arise; whether thou be the son Of utmost Tweed, or Ouse, or gulphy Don, Or Trent, who, like some earth-born giant, spreads His thirty arms along the indented meads; Or sullen Mole, that runneth underneath; Or Severn swift, guilty of maiden’s death; Or rocky Avon, or of sedgy Lee; Or coaly Tine, or ancient hallowed Dee; Or Humber loud, that keeps the Cythian’s name; Or Medway smooth, or royal-towered Thame.” —_Milton._ One of the earliest pioneers of inland navigation was Wm. Sandys, of Ombersley Court, in Worcestershire, who, in 1636, applied for Parliamentary powers to make the river Avon navigable for boats and barges, from the Severn at Tewkesbury to the city of Coventry. Part of the work which was executed in pursuance of the powers so obtained exists to the present time. In 1661 Sandys sought for Parliamentary authority to make the Salwarp navigable from the Severn to his own town of Droitwich, and to make navigable the rivers Wye and Lug, and the brooks running into the same in the counties of Hereford, Gloucester, and Monmouth. Our great rivers, the Thames, Severn, Trent, Ouse, &c., were the recognised means of transit long before the time of the Romans, who were so far advanced in inland navigation as to cut canals of forty miles in length, as instanced in the Caerdyke, between Peterborough and Lincoln (though now filled up), as also to build docks, as shown in the old dock walls, &c., still standing at the outfall of the Trym into the Avon below Bristol. The Fossdyke navigation from Lincoln to the Trent is also of Roman origin, and probably an extension of the Caerdyke, on their route to York. Torksey, at the junction with the Trent, was a Roman town and fort, and continued possessed of many privileges, down to the Norman period, on condition that the knights who held it should carry the King’s Ambassadors, as often as they came that way, down the Trent in their own barges, and conduct them to York. This is recorded in ‘Domesday Book.’ Itchin Dyke to Winchester was also cut by the Romans.