CHAPTER I.

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      ONLY a little tributary to the Thames, the River Fleet, generally, and ignominiously, called the Fleet Ditch, yet it is historically interesting, not only on account of the different places through which its murmuring stream meandered, almost all of which have some story of their own to tell, but the reminiscences of its Prison stand by themselves—pages of history, not to be blotted out, but to be recorded as valuable in illustration of the habits, and customs, of our forefathers.

The City of London, in its early days, was well supplied with water, not only by the wells dug near houses, or by the public springs, some of which still exist, as Aldgate Pump, &c., and the River Thames; but, when its borders increased, the Walbrook was utilized, as well as the Fleet, and, later on, the Tye-bourne, or twin brook, which fell into the Thames at Westminster. In the course of time these rivulets became polluted, land was valuable; they were covered over, and are now sewers. The course of the Fleet being clearly traceable in the depression of Farringdon Street, and the windings of the Tye-bourne in the somewhat tortuous Marylebone Lane (so called from the Chapel of St. Mary, which was on the banks of "le bourne," or the brook[1]). Its further course is kept in our memory by Brook Street, Hanover Square.

The name of this little river has exercised many minds, and has been the cause of spoiling much good paper. My own opinion, backed by many antiquaries, is that a Fleet means a brook, or tributary to a larger river, which is so wide, and deep, at its junction with the greater stream as to be navigable for the small craft then in use, for some little distance. Thus, we have the names on the Thames of Purfleet, Northfleet, and Southfleet, and the same obtains in other places. Its derivation seems to be Saxon—at least, for our language. Thus, in Bosworth's "Dictionary of the Anglo-Saxon Language," we find, "Flede-Fledu: part. Flooded; overflowed: tumidus[2] : Tiber fledu wearð[3]—the Tiber was flooded (Ors. 4. 7)."

Again, the same author gives: "Fleot (Plat fleet, m. a small river; Ger. flethe. f. a channel). A place where vessels float, a bay, gulf, an arm of the sea, the mouth of a river, a river; hence the names of places, as Northfleet, Southfleet, Kent; and in London, Fleet ditch; sinus.[4] Sœs Fleot, a bay of the sea.[5] Bd. 1. 34."

Another great Anglo-Saxon scholar—Professor Skeat, in "An Etymological Dictionary of the English Language": "Fleet, a creek, bay. In the names North-fleet, Fleet Street, &c. Fleet Street was so named from the Fleet Ditch; and fleet was given to any shallow creek, or stream, or channel of water. See Halliwell. M.E. fleet (Promptorium Parvulorum, &c., p. 166). A.S. fleót, a bay of the sea, as in Sœs Fleot, bay of the sea. Ælfred's tr. of Beda, i. 34.[5] Afterwards applied to any channel or stream, especially if shallow. The original sense was 'a place where vessels float,' and the derivation is from the old verb fleet, to float, &c."

      The French, too, have a cognate term, especially in Norman towns, as Barfleur, Honfleur, Harfleur, &c., which were originally written Barbeflot, Huneflot, and Hareflot: and these were sometimes written Hareflou, Huneflou, and Barfleu, which latter comes very near to the Latin flevus, called by Ptolemy fleus, and by Mela fletio. Again, in Brittany many names end in pleu, or plou, which seems to be very much like the Greek πλεω: full, swollen, which corresponds to our Anglo-Saxon Flede; Dutch Vliet.

      But it has another, and a very pretty name, "The River of Wells," from the number of small tributaries that helped to swell its stream, and from the wells which bordered its course; such as Sadler's Wells, Bagnigge Wells, White Conduit, Coldbath, Lamb's Conduit, Clerkenwell—all of which (although all were not known by those names in Stow's times) were in existence.

      Stow, in his "Survey of London" (ed. 1603, his last edition, and which consequently has his best corrections), says—

"That