‘And around the bows and along the side
The heavy hammers and mallets plied,
Till after many a week, at length,
Wonderful for form and strength,
Sublime in its enormous bulk,
Loomed aloft the shadowy hulk!’
When the match-lining was finished we covered most of it with
three-ply wood in panels. We panelled the owner’s cabin and the spare
cabin with birch. We made the spare cabin to serve also as a
drying-room, letting the back of the saloon fireplace into this cabin
through the bulkhead. The fireplace, a handsome brass yacht stove, was
bought second-hand from a yacht-breaker. Round the walls of the
dining-cabin we placed a dado of varnished wood, and enamelled the
cabin white everywhere else except on the ceiling (our furniture
hatch), which we panelled. We panelled the saloon walls and ceiling
with oak, and enamelled the window-frames and the uprights between
them white. Throughout the ship where there was no panelling we put
white enamel, making the whole interior very light. In every
available place we built cupboards and shelves; not an inch of space
was wasted.
We arranged the bath like the baths in a liner. It is supplied with
hot salt water, and the fresh water is used in a huge basin. The sea
water is heated in a closed-in copper by a six-headed Primus oilstove,
and a hot bath can be had in half an hour. From the copper, which is
opposite the bathroom across the passage, the water is siphoned into
the bath, and if the siphon be ‘broken’ it can be started again by the
pump which empties the bath. Cold sea water from a tank on deck (when
we are high and dry we must have this) is supplied to the bathroom by
a hose which can be diverted to the copper when that has to be filled.
It may seem complicated, but it is not really, for the children
understand the system perfectly, and thoroughly enjoy playing with the
waterworks. Sam Prawle never grasped it, and bestowed on it his
customary formula about any device he could not understand: ‘That fare
to me to be a kind of a patent.’ It may be added here, in anticipation
of events, that an appeal for help has sometimes reached us from a
guest in the bathroom. On the first appeal the Skipper or the Mate
goes to the rescue; but if a second appeal comes from the same person
one of the children is sent as a protest on behalf of the simplicity
of the waterworks.
The keelson is the backbone of the ship. Ours is about sixty-five feet
long, roughly a foot square, and studded with boltheads. Right aft in
the boys’ cabin it is under the floor, but it is above the floor
everywhere else. In the lobby it forms the bottom of the shelves; in
the saloon it is covered with narrow polished maple planks; in the
dining-cabin it becomes a seat; farther forward it is a platform for
the copper; in the doorway into the owner’s cabin it is a nuisance; in
the kitchen it forms the bottom shelf for crockery; right forward it
is useful as a seat under the forehatch or as a first step up to the
hatch. In the saloon it is most useful to stand on for looking out of
the windows.
We lost almost a day’s work over a wedding. Harry’s brother married
the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. E. Pegrom. Mr. Pegrom, a platelayer on
the line, asked me to give him a cheque in exchange for twenty-five
shillings. And in the list of presents published in the local paper
the twenty-five shillings duly appeared in the form of ‘Mr. and Mrs.
E. Pegrom: cheque.’ In our part of the world a banking account is
regarded as a sign of wealth and also as something mysterious
requiring a high degree of financial intelligence for its management.
I tried hard one day to persuade Sam Prawle to open an account. I met
him on his way to the post-office to buy a money order for six pounds
to pay for varnish and paint. I pointed out that a cheque would cost
a penny instead of sixpence, and was also a safer medium. I explained
that keeping a banking account was perfectly simple, as all he had to
do was to keep paying in cheques as he received them and paying out
cheques to the people from whom he bought his goods, always keeping
something in the bank. After describing the process several times, I
asked him if he understood.
‘Well, sir, that fare to me as haow that’s like a water-breaker. Yaou
keep a paourin’ of the water in and a drawin’ of it off agin.’
I thought I had gained my point, as he understood so well, and
referred to the subject again a few days later.
‘Well, yaou see, sir, I ’ave to work ’ard for my money, and I reckon a
drawin’ of cheques makes that too easy to git riddy of it agin.’
When the decks had been cleared and the lines rigged on the stanchions
round the bulwarks and the outside of the window-frames painted, there
was some outward and visible sign of the transformation that had taken
place below. The Mate was satisfied that the lines would prevent all
but exceptionally unnautical children from falling overboard; and as
she was quick to assent to the proposition that our children were not
unnautical, there were no further doubts about the matter.
During the discussion of this subject a friend told us of the engaging
argument about lifelines which had been addressed to him by a smack
builder at Leigh. He was having a small bawley yacht built there, and
when the finishing touches were being put on her the builder asked
whether the owner would have lifelines on the bulwarks right forward.
‘Yaou’d better ’ave ’em, sir.’
‘No, I don’t want them.’
‘Now look at here, sir. Yaou ’ave ’em. All the bawleys ’as ’em.’
‘I know. It’s all right for knocking about trawling, but this is a
yacht.’
‘Yes, yes, sir. I knaow she’s a yacht. But what I says is this: them
lines ’as saved ’undreds of lives. And if they was only a goin’ to
save _one_ I’d ’ave em.’
We had now reached the stage of bringing the furniture on board. I
hired a tumbril, and with Harry’s help began the ‘move.’ The Mate and
the children went away for a few days to stay with friends. I had to
drive down seventeen tumbril loads from the cottage, although we did
not want all our furniture for the barge. As there was generally no
room for me even to perch on the tumbril when it was loaded, I walked
a good many miles in the course of moving.
A tumbril is a poor cart for such a job. The jolting was excessive,
and trotting meant ruin to the cargo. When the back was up the cart
held little, and when it was down things were shed along the road.
If I walked at the pony’s head I could not keep an eye on things at
the back, and if I walked behind the pony would slow down to a crawl.
I partly solved the last difficulty by walking behind and throwing
pebbles off the road at the pony.
[Illustration: THE SALOON]
At the end of the first day of this ignoble process of transportation
I had enough things on board to be able to sleep there in comparative
comfort. And at the end of the few days during which the Mate stayed
away with the children I was able to tell myself that the barge at
last looked like a home. The cabins were all furnished and habitable;
the pictures were hung; even the china and books were arranged
provisionally.
When for the first time I lit the fifty-candle-power lamp which hung
from the ceiling of the saloon and looked down the long radiant room I
said that I never wanted to live in a better place.
I cannot forget the pride of those first few evenings on board. Here
was a dream come true. Wherever I cared to go my home would go with me
and carry everything I owned; and the barge was not only my home, but
my yacht and my motorcar. Every evening I held a kind of _levée_ in
the saloon. Tom had more sailor friends, and Harry more landsmen
relations, than I had suspected. As for Sam Prawle, as critic-in-chief
and privy councillor, he was licensed to bring on board as many people
as he pleased. I learned that the race of bargees had all along known
the best use to which a barge could be put, and I myself figured as a
tardy practitioner in ideas which had been immemorially in their
possession. Yet it gratified me to notice that they gaped a good deal
at the transformed _Will Arding_, particularly at night, when candles
as well as the lamp showered a thousand points of light on silver and
glass and china.
Sam Prawle at one of my _levées_ explained to the assembled guests
that the simplest way of going to London was by barge. It was evident
to him that I had done well to make myself independent of trains,
which in his view were the confusion of all confusions. One of the
most baffling experiences of his life, apparently, had been a journey
by train from Fleetwick to Whitstable.
‘That may be right enough for same as them what fare to understand
these things,’ he said, ‘but I don’t hould with them. Well, naow look
at here, sir. When yaou get to Wickford ye’ve got to shift aout o’ one
train into t’other, ain’t ye, sir? And there’s two docks where them
trains baound up to Lunnon berth. Five years ago we was in one dock,
and year afore last it was t’other. Well, ye daon’t knaow where ye
are, sir, do ye? I niver knaow one of they blessed trains from
another; that’s the truth, that is; they all fare to me the spit o’
one another. Then there’s everyone a bustlin’ abaout, and them
railway chaps a shaoutin’ aout afore the train come, and when she do
come most everyone’s in such a hurry to git aboard that there ain’t no
time to ask, and ye don’t knaow where ye are, sir.
‘Then, happen yaou’ll have to shift again halfway up to Lunnon, and
happen not; that fare to be all accordin’. And same as when ye git to
Lunnon, yaou’ve got to git acrost it, ain’t ye, and when ye asks haow
to do it, some on ’em says, “Yaou go under-ground,” and some on ’em
sez, “Yaou take a green bus with Wictoria writ on it.” I ain’t over
and above quick at readin’, and I daon’t never fare to git as far as
where she’s a goin’ to afore she gits under way. Last time I got
someone from here to put me aboard and speak the conductor for me. But
then agin, when ye git to t’other station and git your ticket, ye
ain’t found the blessed ould train, for that’s a masterous great
station full o’ trains. No, sir, ye don’t knaow where ye are, and
that’s the truth, that is. Then mebbe yaou’ve got to shift agin on the
Whitstable line, same as I did time I went arter them oysters.
‘But same as goin’ in a little ould barge or a smack with the wind the
way it is naow. If ye muster an hour afore low water ye can take the
last o’ the ebb daown raound the Whitaker spit. Then ye just hauls yer
wind and takes the flood up Swin till ye come to the West Burrows Gas
Buoy. Accordin’ to haow the tide is ye may have to make a short hitch
to wind’ard to make sure o’ clearin’ that ould wreck on the upper part
o’ the sand. Arter that ye can keep she a good full till ye find the
tail o’ the Mouse Sand with yer lead; then, soon as ye git more water
agin, bear away abaout south an’ by west and keep her head straight on
Whitstable. Ye knaow where ye are, sir, the whole time, don’t ye? A
course, if ye’re a bit early on the tide ye may have to keep away a
bit to clear the east end o’ the Red Sand, but yaou must have come
wonnerful quick if there ain’t water over the Oaze, and Spaniard, and
Gilman, and Columbine. That’s easy same as night-time, too, for when
ye’re clear o’ the Mouse Sand ye can go from the Gas Buoy on the lower
end of the Oaze across the Shiverin’ Sand to the Girdler Lightship
that is, if yaou can’t go overland. Yes, yes; that’s much better; ye
knaow where ye are the whole time, don’t ye?
‘I ain’t on’y took a barge above Lunnon once’t, and I remember that
well, as I larned suthen I den’t know afore and that ’ad to do with
trains, too. We ’ad just berthed at Twickenham with coals, and as I
’ad to goo to Lunnon to see the guvnor I goos off to the railway
station and buys a ticket, and says to the fust porter I sees, “Whin’s
the next daown train, mate?”
‘“In abaout twenty minutes,” ’e says.
‘So I slips acrost the road and was just in the middle of my ’alf-pint
when I ’ears a train comin’, so I peaks out o’ the window and sees it
come in from the westward. “That fare to be my train,” I says to
myself, and drinks my beer as quick as I can and goos acrost to the
station again. But they shet the door just as I come in.
‘“Where’s that train a goin’, mate?” I says to the porter what I seed
afore.
‘“Lunnon,” says ’e.
‘“Yaou tould me there warn’t no daown train for twenty minutes,” I
says.
‘“No more there ain’t,” ’e says; “that’s an up train.”
‘Well, that warn’t no use a argyin’ with he, and from what I could
make of it that don’t fare to matter whether folks lives above Lunnon
or below ut. No one don’t take no notice o’ that, but allus says they
is a goin’ up to Lunnon.
‘They Lunnoners allus reckon to knaow more’n we country folk, but us
knaow better an that. Yes, yes; up on the flood, daown on the ebb; and
that ain’t a mite o’ use tryin’ to tell me different.’