She brought a few pamphlets about the trees and about pond life, nameless to her until now. Then one about Waltham Abbey, so she could rattle off information about what had been created there—guncotton in the 1860s, then bolt-action rifles, carbines, submachine guns, flare pistols, mortar shells, all of them made only miles north of the Thames at that monastery. Agnes was a dry sponge for information, and after one or two trips knew more about what had gone on at the abbey than the lock keepers we passed. It was a monk, she told us, a monk! in the thirteenth century who wrote about the
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