III

In time I did discover a skiff moored in a little-visited creek, which

the boatman got out for me. The sculls were rough and shapeless--it is

a remarkable fact that sculls always are, unless you have them made and

keep them for your own use. I paddled up the river; I paused by an

osier-grown islet; I slipped past the barges, and avoided an unskilful

party; it was the morning, and none of the uproarious as yet were

about. Certainly, it was very pleasant. The sunshine gleamed on the

water, broad shadows of trees fell across; swans floated in the

by-channels. A peacefulness which peculiarly belongs to water hovered

above the river. A house-boat was moored near the willow-grown shore,

and it was evidently inhabited, for there was a fire smouldering on the

bank, and some linen that had been washed spread on the bushes to

bleach. All the windows of this gipsy-van of the river were wide open,

and the air and light entered freely into every part of the

dwelling-house under which flowed the stream. A lady was dressing

herself before one of these open windows, twining up large braids of

dark hair, her large arms bare to the shoulder, and somewhat farther. I

immediately steered out into the channel to avoid intrusion; but I felt

that she was regarding me with all a matron's contempt for an unknown

man--a mere member of the opposite sex, not introduced, or of her

"set." I was merely a man--no more than a horse on the bank,--and had

she been in her smock she would have been just as indifferent.

Certainly it was a lovely morning; the old red palace of the Cardinal

seemed to slumber amid its trees, as if the passage of the centuries

had stroked and soothed it into indolent peace. The meadows rested;

even the swallows, the restless swallows, glided in an effortless way

through the busy air. I could see this, and yet I did not quite enjoy

it; something drew me away from perfect contentment, and gradually it

dawned upon me that it was the current causing an unsuspected amount of

labour in sculling. The forceless particles of water, so yielding to

the touch, which slipped aside at the motion of the oar, in their

countless myriads ceaselessly flowing grew to be almost a solid

obstruction to the boat. I had not noticed it for a mile or so; now the

pressure of the stream was becoming evident. I persuaded myself that it

was nothing. I held on by the boathook to a root and rested, and so

went on again. Another mile or more; another rest: decidedly sculling

against a swift current is work--downright work. You have no energy to

spare over and above that needed for the labour of rowing, not enough

even to look round and admire the green loveliness of the shore. I

began to think that I should not get as far as Oxford after all.

By-and-by, I began to question if rowing on a river is as pleasant as

rowing on a lake, where you can rest on your oars without losing

ground, where no current opposes progress, and after the stroke the

boat slips ahead some distance of its own impetus. On the river the

boat only travels as far as you actually pull it at each stroke; there

is no life in it after the scull is lifted, the impetus dies, and the

craft first pauses and then drifts backward. I crept along the shore,

so near that one scull occasionally grounded, to avoid the main force

of the water, which is in the middle of the river. I slipped behind

eyots and tried all I knew. In vain, the river was stronger than I, and

my arms could not for many hours contend with the Thames. So faded

another part of my dream. The idea of rowing from one town to

another--of expeditions and travelling across the country, so pleasant

to think of--in practice became impossible. An athlete bent on nothing

but athleticism--a canoeist thinking of nothing but his canoe--could

accomplish it, setting himself daily so much work to do, and resolutely

performing it. A dreamer, who wanted to enjoy his passing moment, and

not to keep regular time with his strokes, who wanted to gather

flowers, and indulge his luxurious eyes with effects of light and

shadow and colour, could not succeed. The river is for the man of might.

With a weary back at last I gave up the struggle at the foot of a weir,

almost in the splash of the cascade. My best friend, the boathook, kept

me stationary without effort, and in time rest restored the strained

muscles to physical equanimity. The roar of the river falling over the

dam soothed the mind--the sense of an immense power at hand, working

with all its might while you are at ease, has a strangely soothing

influence. It makes me sleepy to see the vast beam of an engine

regularly rise and fall in ponderous irresistible labour. Now at last

some fragment of my fancy was realised--a myriad myriad rushing bubbles

whitening the stream burst, and were instantly succeeded by myriads

more; the boat faintly vibrated as the wild waters shot beneath it; the

green cascade, smooth at its first curve, dashed itself into the depth

beneath, broken to a million million particles; the eddies whirled, and

sucked, and sent tiny whirlpools rotating along the surface; the roar

rose or lessened in intensity as the velocity of the wind varied;

sunlight sparkled--the warmth inclined the senses to a drowsy idleness.

Yonder was the trout fisherman, just as I had imagined him, casting and

casting again with that transcendental patience which is genius; his

line and the top of his rod formed momentary curves pleasant to look

at. The kingfisher did not come--no doubt he had been shot--but a

reed-sparrow did, in velvet black cap and dainty brown, pottering about

the willow near me. This was really like the beautiful river I had

dreamed of. If only we could persuade ourselves to remain quiescent

when we are happy! If only we would remain still in the armchair as the

last curl of vapour rises from a cigar that has been enjoyed! If only

we would sit still in the shadow and not go indoors to write that

letter! Let happiness alone. Stir not an inch; speak not a word:

happiness is a coy maiden--hold her hand and be still.

In an evil moment I spied the corner of a newspaper projecting from the

pocket of my coat in the stern-sheets. Folly led me to open that

newspaper, and in it I saw and read a ghastly paragraph. Two ladies and

a gentleman while boating had been carried by the current against the

piles of a weir. The boat upset; the ladies were rescued, but the

unfortunate gentleman was borne over the fall and drowned. His body had

not been recovered; men were watching the pool day and night till some

chance eddy should bring it to the surface. So perished my dream, and

the coy-maiden happiness left me because I could not be content to be

silent and still. The accident had not happened at this weir, but it

made no difference; I could see all as plainly. A white face, blurred

and indistinct, seemed to rise up from beneath the rushing bubbles

till, just as it was about to jump to the surface, as things do that

come up, down it was drawn again by that terrible underpull which has

been fatal to so many good swimmers.

Who can keep afloat with a force underneath dragging at the feet? Who

can swim when the water--all bubbles, that is air--gives no resistance

to the hands? Hands and feet slip through the bubbles. You might as

well spring from the parapet of a house and think to float by striking

out as to swim in such a medium. Sinking under, a hundred tons of water

drive the body to the bottom; there it rotates, it rises, it is forced

down again, a hundred tons of water beat upon it; the foot, perhaps,

catches among stones or woodwork, and what was once a living being is

imprisoned in death. Enough of this. I unloosed the boathook, and

drifted down with the stream, anxious to get away from the horrible

weir.

These accidents, which are entirely preventable, happen year after year

with lamentable monotony. Each weir is a little Niagara, and a boat

once within its influence is certain to be driven to destruction. The

current carries it against the piles, where it is either broken or

upset, the natural and reasonable alarm of the occupants increasing the

risk. In descending the river every boat must approach the weir, and

must pass within a few yards of the dangerous current. If there is a

press of boats one is often forced out of the proper course into the

rapid part of the stream without any negligence on the part of those in

it. There is nothing to prevent this--no fence, or boom; no mark, even,

between what is dangerous and what is not; no division whatever.

Persons ignorant of the river may just as likely as not row right into

danger. A vague caution on a notice-board may or may not be seen; in

either case it gives no directions, and is certainly no protection. Let

the matter be argued from whatever point of view, the fact remains that

these accidents occur from the want of an efficient division between

the dangerous and the safe part of the approach to a weir. A boom or

some kind of fence is required, and how extraordinary it seems that

nothing of the kind is done! It is not done because there is no

authority, no control, no one responsible. Two or three gentlemen

acquainted with aquatics could manage the river from end to end, to the

safety and satisfaction of all, if they were entrusted with

discretionary powers. Stiff rules and rigid control are not needed;

what is wanted is a rational power freely using its discretion. I do

not mean a Board with its attendant follies; I mean a small committee,

unfettered, untrammelled by "legal advisers" and so forth, merely using

their own good sense.

I drifted away from the weir--now grown hideous--and out of hearing of

its wailing dirge for the unfortunate. I drifted past more barges

coming up, and more steam-tugs; past river lawns, where gay parties

were now sipping claret-cup or playing tennis. By-and-by, I began to

meet pleasure-boats and to admire their manner of progress. First there

came a gentleman in white flannels, walking on the tow-path, with a

rope round his waist, towing a boat in which two ladies were

comfortably seated. In a while came two more gentlemen in striped

flannels, one streaked with gold the other with scarlet, striding side

by side and towing a boat in which sat one lady. They were very

earnestly at work, pacing in step, their bodies slightly leaning

forwards, and every now and then they mopped their faces with

handkerchiefs which they carried in their girdles. Something in their

slightly-bowed attitude reminded me of the captives depicted on

Egyptian monuments, with cords about their necks. How curious is that

instinct which makes each sex, in different ways, the willing slave of

the other! These human steam-tugs paced and pulled, and drew the

varnished craft swiftly against the stream, evidently determined to do

a certain distance by a certain hour. As I drifted by without labour, I

admired them very much. An interval, and still more gentlemen in

flannel, labouring like galley-slaves at the tow-rope, hot, perspiring,

and happy after their kind, and ladies under parasols, comfortably

seated, cool, and happy after their kind.

Considering upon these things, I began to discern the true and only

manner in which the modern Thames is to be enjoyed. Above all

things--nothing heroic. Don't scull--don't row--don't haul at

tow-ropes--don't swim--don't flourish a fishing-rod. Set your mind at

ease. Make friends with two or more athletes, thorough good fellows,

good-natured, delighting in their thews and sinews. Explain to them

that somehow, don't you see, nature did not bless you with such

superabundant muscularity, although there is nothing under the sun you

admire so much. Forthwith these good fellows will pet you, and your

Thames fortune is made. You take your place in the stern-sheets,

happily protected on either side by feminine human nature, and the

parasols meeting above shield you from the sun. The tow-rope is

adjusted, and the tugs start. The gliding motion soothes the soul.

Feminine boating nature has no antipathy to the cigarette. A delicious

odour, soft as new-mown hay, a hint of spices and distant

flowers--sunshine dried and preserved, sunshine you can handle--rises

from the smouldering fibres. This is smoking summer itself. Yonder in

the fore part of the craft I espy certain vessels of glass on which is

the label of Epernay. And of such is peace.

Drifting ever downwards, I approached the creek where my skiff had to

be left; but before I reached it a "beach-comber," with a coil of cord

over his shoulder, asked me if he should tow me "up to 'Ampton." I

shook my head, whereupon he abused me in such choice terms that I

listened abashed at my ignorance. It had never occurred to me that

swearing could be done like that. It is true we have been swearing now,

generation after generation, these eight thousand years for certain,

and language expands with use. It is also true that we are all educated

now. Shakespeare is credited with knowing everything, past or future,

but I doubt if he knew how a Thames "beach-comber" can curse in these

days.

The Thames is swearing free. You must moderate your curses on the

Queen's highway; you must not be even profane in the streets, lest you

be taken before the magistrates; but on the Thames you may swear as the

wind blows--howsoever you list. You may begin at the mouth, off the

Nore, and curse your way up to Cricklade. A hundred miles for swearing

is a fine preserve. It is one of the marvels of our civilisation.

Aided by scarce a touch of the sculls the stream drifted me up into the

creek, and the boatman took charge of his skiff. "Shall I keep her

handy for you, sir?" he said, thinking to get me down every day as a

newcomer. I begged him not to put himself to any trouble, still he

repeated that he would keep her ready. But in the road I shook off the

dust of my feet against the river, and earnestly resolved never, never

again to have anything to do with it (in the heroic way) lower down

than Henley.