The Bath-London road that we have travelled from Marlborough now approaches the most beautiful stretches of the Kennet, lined with fine parklands on the gentle northern slopes of the valley.  The high hedges and fences are in places very jealous of the beauties they encircle, but there are charming glimpses here and there of this pleasant countryside.  Woolhampton, with a modern church of no particular interest, is passed four miles from Thatcham, and two miles farther comes Aldermaston Station, where we leave the great highway and turn south to Aldermaston Wharf on the Kennet Canal.  This is a most pleasant spot, and to enhance the charm of the surroundings a large sheet of ornamental water has been formed, close to, and fed by, the channel.  Aldermaston village is nearly two miles to the south-west and well-placed among the wooded hills that march with the Hampshire border.  The aspect of the village is as unspoilt as any in the old Berkshire by-ways.  At the southern end of the street are the gates of Aldermaston Park; a picturesque expanse of broken ground with several fine avenues, and populated by herds of deer.  The old Jacobean mansion was burnt down in 1843, although a few of the ancient features were saved and incorporated in the new house.  Close to the park is the church, the foundations of which are Norman, as are also the very fine and uncommon west door and two blocked-up doors in the chancel and nave.  In the chapel on the south side is the tomb of Sir George Forster and his lady (1526) with their twenty attendant children.  The knight’s feet rest against his favourite hound and a lap dog is pulling at the lady’s dress.  There are also brasses to some other members of the Forster family which owned the manor during Elizabethan days.  The pulpit and sounding board belong to this period.  The lancet windows of the chancel date this portion of the church as about 1270.  There are some ancient frescoes, faint and dim by contrast with the modern scheme of decoration; they represent St. Christopher carrying our Lord, and, below, a mermaid and fish.

Silchester is about four miles to the south-east by winding ways that lead over the hills of the Hampshire border.  The traveller who comes prepared to find the actual ruins of the Roman Calleva spread before him will be grievously disappointed.  The economic necessities of to-day have rendered the surrender of the site to the agriculturist as necessary as it is appropriate.  The sandy soil of North Hants is a better protection to these remnants of a former civilization than all the tarpaulins or sheds that would otherwise have to be used.  Minute and accurate plans of the foundations, that include those of a small Christian Basilica, were made in sections, as they were uncovered, over a period extending from 1864 to 1910.  For a detailed study of the surveys, and of the many antiquities capable of removal, those interested must visit the Reading Museum.  It has been found that the walls of Calleva followed the irregular outline of a former British stronghold, and instead of the usual square plan the outline of the city was seven-sided.  The remnants of the flint walls are nearly one and three-quarter miles round and contain within their circumference about 100 acres.  Within the east gate is an old farmhouse and the interesting parish church of Silchester, dating mostly from the thirteenth century.