It was
while floating in his boat under the Bisham beeches that Shelley, who was
then living at Marlow (you can see his house now, in West street),
composed THE REVOLT OF ISLAM.
By Hurley Weir, a little higher up, I have often thought that I could
stay a month without having sufficient time to drink in all the beauty of
the scene. The village of Hurley, five minutes' walk from the lock, is
as old a little spot as there is on the river, dating, as it does, to
quote the quaint phraseology of those dim days, "from the times of King
Sebert and King Offa." Just past the weir (going up) is Danes' Field,
where the invading Danes once encamped, during their march to
Gloucestershire; and a little further still, nestling by a sweet corner
of the stream, is what is left of Medmenham Abbey.
The famous Medmenham monks, or "Hell Fire Club," as they were commonly
called, and of whom the notorious Wilkes was a member, were a fraternity
whose motto was "Do as you please," and that invitation still stands over
the ruined doorway of the abbey. Many years before this bogus abbey,
with its congregation of irreverent jesters, was founded, there stood
upon this same spot a monastery of a sterner kind, whose monks were of a
somewhat different type to the revellers that were to follow them, five
hundred years afterwards.
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