CHAPTER XXXV
THE FENS
Brothertoft or Goosetoft—In Holland Fen—John Taylor's Poem—Fen Skating.
Primitive peoples have been always rather prone to establishing
themselves on swampy ground, probably because they
felt secure from attack in such places. They passed in their
coracles easily from one little island of dry ground to another
and found plenty of employment in taking fish and waterfowl,
in cutting grass for fodder or hay, reeds for thatch and
bedding, willows to make their wattled huts, and peat for fuel,
all of which were close at hand and free to everyone. It was
not such a bad life after all.
The earliest inhabitants of the Lincolnshire fens came from the mouths of the Meuse, Rhine, and Scheldt, so they lived by choice in low land and knew how to make the most of the situation. They clung for habitation to the islands of higher ground, and the names of many villages in the low part of the county, though no longer surrounded by water, bear witness by their termination to their insular origin, e.g., Bardney, Gedney, Friskney, Stickney, Sibsey, ey, as in the word 'eyot' (pronounced ait, e.g., Chiswick Eyot), meaning island. In time the knots of houses grew to village settlements, and raised causeways were made from one to another, which served also as banks to keep out the sea at high tides. And we know that they did this effectually; hence we find the churches mostly placed for safety on that side of the causeway bank which is furthest from the sea. You will see this to be the case as you go along the road from Boston to Wainfleet, where the churches are all west of the road, or from Spalding to Long Sutton, where
