The Magic of the Fens page 2

Almost every great engineer during the first half of the nineteenth century studied the problem of the Fens. Some of them, their imagination captured, devised bold schemes for draining and cultivating a large part of the country now covered by the waters of the Wash. Sir John Rennie was one of these. People who know the land best say that, despite the experience of Holland, which has done and is doing just such things successfully, here it would be practically impossible.

The visitor who travels over the Fenlands to-day, enjoying the rich sport it still offers, boating and fishing in summer, skating in winter, may sometimes regret that progress has meant the passing away of the old Fens and their strange life. But as he looks around at the prosperous, busy, healthy countryside, and recalls the miasmatic swamps that were, his regrets may well cease.