But is not this prettier than a tunnel?
Oh, what hanging-woods, and churches; and such great houses, and pretty cottages and gardens--all in this narrow crack of a valley! Ay.

Old Father Thames is a good landscape gardener, as I said.

There is Basildon--and Hurley--and Pangbourne, with its roaring lasher.

Father Thames has had to work hard for many an age before he could cut this trench right through the chalk, and drain the water out of the flat vale behind us.

But I suspect the sea helped him somewhat, or perhaps a great deal, just where we are now.
The sea?
Yes.