On a summer day, when waking dreams softly wave before the fancy, it is
pleasant to walk in the noon-stillness along the Thames, for then we pass
a series of pictures forming a gallery which I would not exchange for
that of the Louvre, could I impress them as indelibly upon the eye-memory
as its works are fixed on canvas. There exists in all of us a spiritual
photographic apparatus, by means of which we might retain accurately all
we have ever seen, and bring out, at will, the pictures from the
pigeon-holes of the memory, or make new ones as vivid as aught we see in
dreams, but the faculty must be developed in childhood. So surely as I
am now writing this will become, at some future day, a branch of
education, to be developed into results of which the wildest imagination
can form no conception, and I put the prediction on record. As it is, I
am sorry that I was never trained to this half-thinking, half-painting
art, since, if I had been, I should have left for distant days to come
some charming views of Surrey as it appears in this decade.
The reedy eyots and the rising hills; the level meadows and the little
villes, with their antique perpendicular Gothic churches, which form the
points around which they have clustered for centuries, even as groups of
boats in the river are tied around their mooring-posts; the bridges and
trim cottages or elegant mansions with their flower-bordered grounds
sweeping down to the water's edge, looking like rich carpets with new
baize over the centre, make the pictures of which I speak, varying with
every turn of the Thames; while the river itself is, at this season, like
a continual regatta, with many kinds of boats, propelled by stalwart
young Englishmen or healthy, handsome damsels, of every rank, the better
class by far predominating. There is a disposition among the English to
don quaint holiday attire, to put on the picturesque, and go to the very
limits which custom permits, which would astonish an American. Of late
years this is becoming the case, too, in Trans-Atlantis, but it has
always been usual in England, to mark the fete day with a festive dress,
to wear gay ribbons, and to indulge the very harmless instinct of youth
to be gallant and gay.
I had started one morning on a walk by the Thames, when I met a friend,
who asked,--
"Aren't you going to-day to the Hampton races?"
"How far is it?"
"Just six miles. On Molesy Hurst."
Six miles, and I had only six shillings in my pocket. I had some
curiosity to see this race, which is run on the Molesy Hurst, famous as
the great place for prize-fighting in the olden time, and which has never
been able to raise itself to respectability, inasmuch as the local
chronicler says that "the course attracts considerable and not very
reputable gatherings." In fact, it is generally spoken of as the
Costermonger's race, at which a mere welsher is a comparatively
respectable character, and every man in a good coat a swell. I was
nicely attired, by chance, for the occasion, for I had come out, thinking
of a ride, in a white hat, new corduroy pantaloons and waistcoat, and a
velveteen coat, which dress is so greatly admired by the gypsies that it
may almost be regarded as their "national costume."
There was certainly, to say the least, a rather _bourgeois_ tone at the
race, and gentility was conspicuous by its absence; but I did not find it
so outrageously low as I had been led to expect. I confess that I was
not encouraged to attempt to increase my little hoard of silver by
betting, and the certainty that if I lost I could not lunch made me
timid. But the good are never alone in this world, and I found friends
whom I dreamed not of. Leaving the crowd, I sought the gypsy vans, and
by one of these was old Liz Buckland.
"_Sarishan rye_! And glad I am to see you. Why didn't you come down
into Kent to see the hoppin'? Many a time the Romanys says they expected
to see their _rye_ there. Just the other night, your Coopers was a-lyin'
round their fire, every one of 'em in a new red blanket, lookin' so
beautiful as the light shone on 'em, and I says, 'If our _rye_ was to see
you, he'd just have that book of his out, and take all your pictures.'"