AN INLAND VOYAGE

Contents: Preface Antwerp to Boom On the Willebroek Canal The Royal Sport Nautique At Maubeuge On the Sambre Canalised: to Quartes Pont-sur-Sambre: We are Pedlars The Travelling Merchant On the Sambre Canalised: to Landrecies At Landrecies Sambre and Oise Canal: Canal boats The Oise in Flood Origny Sainte-Benoite A By-day The Company at Table Down the Oise: to Moy La Fere of Cursed Memory Down the Oise: Through the Golden Valley Noyon Cathedral Down the Oise: to Compiegne At Compiegne Changed Times Down the Oise: Church interiors Precy and the Marionnettes Back to the world

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

To equip so small a book with a preface is, I am half afraid, tosin against proportion. But a preface is more than an author canresist, for it is the reward of his labours. When the foundationstone is laid, the architect appears with his plans, and struts foran hour before the public eye. So with the writer in his preface:he may have never a word to say, but he must show himself for amoment in the portico, hat in hand, and with an urbane demeanour. 

It is best, in such circumstances, to represent a delicate shade ofmanner between humility and superiority: as if the book had beenwritten by some one else, and you had merely run over it andinserted what was good. But for my part I have not yet learned thetrick to that perfection; I am not yet able to dissemble the warmthof my sentiments towards a reader; and if I meet him on thethreshold, it is to invite him in with country cordiality. 

To say truth, I had no sooner finished reading this little book inproof, than I was seized upon by a distressing apprehension. Itoccurred to me that I might not only be the first to read thesepages, but the last as well; that I might have pioneered this verysmiling tract of country all in vain, and find not a soul to followin my steps. The more I thought, the more I disliked the notion;until the distaste grew into a sort of panic terror, and I rushedinto this Preface, which is no more than an advertisement forreaders. 

What am I to say for my book? Caleb and Joshua brought back fromPalestine a formidable bunch of grapes; alas! my book producesnaught so nourishing; and for the matter of that, we live in an agewhen people prefer a definition to any quantity of fruit. 

I wonder, would a negative be found enticing? for, from thenegative point of view, I flatter myself this volume has a certainstamp. Although it runs to considerably upwards of two hundredpages, it contains not a single reference to the imbecility ofGod's universe, nor so much as a single hint that I could have madea better one myself. --I really do not know where my head can havebeen. I seem to have forgotten all that makes it glorious to beman. --'Tis an omission that renders the book philosophicallyunimportant; but I am in hopes the eccentricity may please infrivolous circles. 

To the friend who accompanied me I owe many thanks already, indeedI wish I owed him nothing else; but at this moment I feel towardshim an almost exaggerated tenderness. He, at least, will become myreader: --if it were only to follow his own travels alongside ofmine. 

R. L. S. 

ANTWERP TO BOOM

We made a great stir in Antwerp Docks. A stevedore and a lot ofdock porters took up the two canoes, and ran with them for theslip. A crowd of children followed cheering. The Cigarette wentoff in a splash and a bubble of small breaking water. Next momentthe Arethusa was after her. A steamer was coming down, men on thepaddle-box shouted hoarse warnings, the stevedore and his porterswere bawling from the quay. But in a stroke or two the canoes wereaway out in the middle of the Scheldt, and all steamers, andstevedores, and other 'long-shore vanities were left behind. 

The sun shone brightly; the tide was making--four jolly miles anhour; the wind blew steadily, with occasional squalls. For mypart, I had never been in a canoe under sail in my life; and myfirst experiment out in the middle of this big river was not madewithout some trepidation. What would happen when the wind firstcaught my little canvas? I suppose it was almost as trying aventure into the regions of the unknown as to publish a first book, or to marry. But my doubts were not of long duration; and in fiveminutes you will not be surprised to learn that I had tied mysheet. 

I own I was a little struck by this circumstance myself; of course, in company with the rest of my fellow-men, I had always tied thesheet in a sailing-boat; but in so little and crank a concern as acanoe, and with these charging squalls, I was not prepared to findmyself follow the same principle; and it inspired me with somecontemptuous views of our regard for life. It is certainly easierto smoke with the sheet fastened; but I had never before weighed acomfortable pipe of tobacco against an obvious risk, and gravelyelected for the comfortable pipe. It is a commonplace, that wecannot answer for ourselves before we have been tried. But it isnot so common a reflection, and surely more consoling, that weusually find ourselves a great deal braver and better than wethought. I believe this is every one's experience: but anapprehension that they may belie themselves in the future preventsmankind from trumpeting this cheerful sentiment abroad. I wishsincerely, for it would have saved me much trouble, there had beensome one to put me in a good heart about life when I was younger;to tell me how dangers are most portentous on a distant sight; andhow the good in a man's spirit will not suffer itself to beoverlaid, and rarely or never deserts him in the hour of need. Butwe are all for tootling on the sentimental flute in literature; andnot a man among us will go to the head of the march to sound theheady drums. 

It was agreeable upon the river. A barge or two went past ladenwith hay. Reeds and willows bordered the stream; and cattle andgrey venerable horses came and hung their mild heads over theembankment. Here and there was a pleasant village among trees, with a noisy shipping-yard; here and there a villa in a lawn. Thewind served us well up the Scheldt and thereafter up the Rupel; andwe were running pretty free when we began to sight the brickyardsof Boom, lying for a long way on the right bank of the river. Theleft bank was still green and pastoral, with alleys of trees alongthe embankment, and here and there a flight of steps to serve aferry, where perhaps there sat a woman with her elbows on herknees, or an old gentleman with a staff and silver spectacles. ButBoom and its brickyards grew smokier and shabbier with everyminute; until a great church with a clock, and a wooden bridge overthe river, indicated the central quarters of the town. 

Boom is not a nice place, and is only remarkable for one thing:that the majority of the inhabitants have a private opinion thatthey can speak English, which is not justified by fact. This gavea kind of haziness to our intercourse. As for the Hotel de laNavigation, I think it is the worst feature of the place. Itboasts of a sanded parlour, with a bar at one end, looking on thestreet; and another sanded parlour, darker and colder, with anempty bird-cage and a tricolour subscription box by way of soleadornment, where we made shift to dine in the company of threeuncommunicative engineer apprentices and a silent bagman. Thefood, as usual in Belgium, was of a nondescript occasionalcharacter; indeed I have never been able to detect anything in thenature of a meal among this pleasing people; they seem to peck andtrifle with viands all day long in an amateur spirit: tentativelyFrench, truly German, and somehow falling between the two. 

The empty bird-cage, swept and garnished, and with no trace of theold piping favourite, save where two wires had been pushed apart tohold its lump of sugar, carried with it a sort of graveyard cheer. The engineer apprentices would have nothing to say to us, norindeed to the bagman; but talked low and sparingly to one another, or raked us in the gaslight with a gleam of spectacles. For thoughhandsome lads, they were all (in the Scots phrase) barnacled. 

There was an English maid in the hotel, who had been long enoughout of England to pick up all sorts of funny foreign idioms, andall sorts of curious foreign ways, which need not here bespecified. She spoke to us very fluently in her jargon, asked usinformation as to the manners of the present day in England, andobligingly corrected us when we attempted to answer. But as wewere dealing with a woman, perhaps our information was not so muchthrown away as it appeared. The sex likes to pick up knowledge andyet preserve its superiority. It is good policy, and almostnecessary in the circumstances. If a man finds a woman admire him, were it only for his acquaintance with geography, he will begin atonce to build upon the admiration. It is only by unintermittentsnubbing that the pretty ones can keep us in our place. Men, asMiss Howe or Miss Harlowe would have said, 'are such ENCROACHERS. 'For my part, I am body and soul with the women; and after a well-married couple, there is nothing so beautiful in the world as themyth of the divine huntress. It is no use for a man to take to thewoods; we know him; St. Anthony tried the same thing long ago, andhad a pitiful time of it by all accounts. But there is this aboutsome women, which overtops the best gymnosophist among men, thatthey suffice to themselves, and can walk in a high and cold zonewithout the countenance of any trousered being. I declare, although the reverse of a professed ascetic, I am more obliged towomen for this ideal than I should be to the majority of them, orindeed to any but one, for a spontaneous kiss. There is nothing soencouraging as the spectacle of self-sufficiency. And when I thinkof the slim and lovely maidens, running the woods all night to thenote of Diana's horn; moving among the old oaks, as fancy-free asthey; things of the forest and the starlight, not touched by thecommotion of man's hot and turbid life--although there are plentyother ideals that I should prefer--I find my heart beat at thethought of this one. 'Tis to fail in life, but to fail with what agrace! That is not lost which is not regretted. And where--hereslips out the male--where would be much of the glory of inspiringlove, if there were no contempt to overcome?

ON THE WILLEBROEK CANAL

Next morning, when we set forth on the Willebroek Canal, the rainbegan heavy and chill. The water of the canal stood at about thedrinking temperature of tea; and under this cold aspersion, thesurface was covered with steam. The exhilaration of departure, andthe easy motion of the boats under each stroke of the paddles, supported us through this misfortune while it lasted; and when thecloud passed and the sun came out again, our spirits went up abovethe range of stay-at-home humours. A good breeze rustled andshivered in the rows of trees that bordered the canal. The leavesflickered in and out of the light in tumultuous masses. It seemedsailing weather to eye and ear; but down between the banks, thewind reached us only in faint and desultory puffs. There washardly enough to steer by. Progress was intermittent andunsatisfactory. A jocular person, of marine antecedents, hailed usfrom the tow-path with a 'C'est vite, mais c'est long. '

The canal was busy enough. Every now and then we met or overtook along string of boats, with great green tillers; high sterns with awindow on either side of the rudder, and perhaps a jug or a flower-pot in one of the windows; a dinghy following behind; a womanbusied about the day's dinner, and a handful of children. Thesebarges were all tied one behind the other with tow ropes, to thenumber of twenty-five or thirty; and the line was headed and keptin motion by a steamer of strange construction. It had neitherpaddle-wheel nor screw; but by some gear not rightly comprehensibleto the unmechanical mind, it fetched up over its bow a small brightchain which lay along the bottom of the canal, and paying it outagain over the stern, dragged itself forward, link by link, withits whole retinue of loaded skows. Until one had found out the keyto the enigma, there was something solemn and uncomfortable in theprogress of one of these trains, as it moved gently along the waterwith nothing to mark its advance but an eddy alongside dying awayinto the wake. 

Of all the creatures of commercial enterprise, a canal barge is byfar the most delightful to consider. It may spread its sails, andthen you see it sailing high above the tree-tops and the windmill, sailing on the aqueduct, sailing through the green corn-lands: themost picturesque of things amphibious. Or the horse plods along ata foot-pace as if there were no such thing as business in theworld; and the man dreaming at the tiller sees the same spire onthe horizon all day long. It is a mystery how things ever get totheir destination at this rate; and to see the barges waiting theirturn at a lock, affords a fine lesson of how easily the world maybe taken. There should be many contented spirits on board, forsuch a life is both to travel and to stay at home. 

The chimney smokes for dinner as you go along; the banks of thecanal slowly unroll their scenery to contemplative eyes; the bargefloats by great forests and through great cities with their publicbuildings and their lamps at night; and for the bargee, in hisfloating home, 'travelling abed, ' it is merely as if he werelistening to another man's story or turning the leaves of apicture-book in which he had no concern. He may take his afternoonwalk in some foreign country on the banks of the canal, and thencome home to dinner at his own fireside. 

There is not enough exercise in such a life for any high measure ofhealth; but a high measure of health is only necessary forunhealthy people. The slug of a fellow, who is never ill nor well, has a quiet time of it in life, and dies all the easier. 

I am sure I would rather be a bargee than occupy any position underheaven that required attendance at an office. There are fewcallings, I should say, where a man gives up less of his liberty inreturn for regular meals. The bargee is on shipboard--he is masterin his own ship--he can land whenever he will--he can never be keptbeating off a lee-shore a whole frosty night when the sheets are ashard as iron; and so far as I can make out, time stands as nearlystill with him as is compatible with the return of bed-time or thedinner-hour. It is not easy to see why a bargee should ever die. 

Half-way between Willebroek and Villevorde, in a beautiful reach ofcanal like a squire's avenue, we went ashore to lunch. There weretwo eggs, a junk of bread, and a bottle of wine on board theArethusa; and two eggs and an Etna cooking apparatus on board theCigarette. The master of the latter boat smashed one of the eggsin the course of disembarkation; but observing pleasantly that itmight still be cooked a la papier, he dropped it into the Etna, inits covering of Flemish newspaper. We landed in a blink of fineweather; but we had not been two minutes ashore before the windfreshened into half a gale, and the rain began to patter on ourshoulders. We sat as close about the Etna as we could. Thespirits burned with great ostentation; the grass caught flame everyminute or two, and had to be trodden out; and before long, therewere several burnt fingers of the party. But the solid quantity ofcookery accomplished was out of proportion with so much display;and when we desisted, after two applications of the fire, the soundegg was little more than loo-warm; and as for a la papier, it was acold and sordid fricassee of printer's ink and broken egg-shell. We made shift to roast the other two, by putting them close to theburning spirits; and that with better success. And then weuncorked the bottle of wine, and sat down in a ditch with our canoeaprons over our knees. It rained smartly. Discomfort, when it ishonestly uncomfortable and makes no nauseous pretensions to thecontrary, is a vastly humorous business; and people well steepedand stupefied in the open air are in a good vein for laughter. From this point of view, even egg a la papier offered by way offood may pass muster as a sort of accessory to the fun. But thismanner of jest, although it may be taken in good part, does notinvite repetition; and from that time forward, the Etna voyagedlike a gentleman in the locker of the Cigarette. 

It is almost unnecessary to mention that when lunch was over and wegot aboard again and made sail, the wind promptly died away. Therest of the journey to Villevorde, we still spread our canvas tothe unfavouring air; and with now and then a puff, and now and thena spell of paddling, drifted along from lock to lock, between theorderly trees. 

It was a fine, green, fat landscape; or rather a mere green water-lane, going on from village to village. Things had a settled look, as in places long lived in. Crop-headed children spat upon us fromthe bridges as we went below, with a true conservative feeling. But even more conservative were the fishermen, intent upon theirfloats, who let us go by without one glance. They perched uponsterlings and buttresses and along the slope of the embankment, gently occupied. They were indifferent, like pieces of deadnature. They did not move any more than if they had been fishingin an old Dutch print. The leaves fluttered, the water lapped, butthey continued in one stay like so many churches established bylaw. You might have trepanned every one of their innocent heads, and found no more than so much coiled fishing-line below theirskulls. I do not care for your stalwart fellows in india-rubberstockings breasting up mountain torrents with a salmon rod; but Ido dearly love the class of man who plies his unfruitful art, forever and a day, by still and depopulated waters. 

At the last lock, just beyond Villevorde, there was a lock-mistresswho spoke French comprehensibly, and told us we were still a coupleof leagues from Brussels. At the same place, the rain began again. It fell in straight, parallel lines; and the surface of the canalwas thrown up into an infinity of little crystal fountains. Therewere no beds to be had in the neighbourhood. Nothing for it but tolay the sails aside and address ourselves to steady paddling in therain. 

Beautiful country houses, with clocks and long lines of shutteredwindows, and fine old trees standing in groves and avenues, gave arich and sombre aspect in the rain and the deepening dusk to theshores of the canal. I seem to have seen something of the sameeffect in engravings: opulent landscapes, deserted and overhungwith the passage of storm. And throughout we had the escort of ahooded cart, which trotted shabbily along the tow-path, and kept atan almost uniform distance in our wake. 

THE ROYAL SPORT NAUTIQUE

The rain took off near Laeken. But the sun was already down; theair was chill; and we had scarcely a dry stitch between the pair ofus. Nay, now we found ourselves near the end of the Allee Verte, and on the very threshold of Brussels, we were confronted by aserious difficulty. The shores were closely lined by canal boatswaiting their turn at the lock. Nowhere was there any convenientlanding-place; nowhere so much as a stable-yard to leave the canoesin for the night. We scrambled ashore and entered an estaminetwhere some sorry fellows were drinking with the landlord. Thelandlord was pretty round with us; he knew of no coach-house orstable-yard, nothing of the sort; and seeing we had come with nomind to drink, he did not conceal his impatience to be rid of us. One of the sorry fellows came to the rescue. Somewhere in thecorner of the basin there was a slip, he informed us, and somethingelse besides, not very clearly defined by him, but hopefullyconstrued by his hearers. 

Sure enough there was the slip in the corner of the basin; and atthe top of it two nice-looking lads in boating clothes. TheArethusa addressed himself to these. One of them said there wouldbe no difficulty about a night's lodging for our boats; and theother, taking a cigarette from his lips, inquired if they were madeby Searle and Son. The name was quite an introduction. Half-a-dozen other young men came out of a boat-house bearing thesuperscription ROYAL SPORT NAUTIQUE, and joined in the talk. Theywere all very polite, voluble, and enthusiastic; and theirdiscourse was interlarded with English boating terms, and the namesof English boat-builders and English clubs. I do not know, to myshame, any spot in my native land where I should have been sowarmly received by the same number of people. We were Englishboating-men, and the Belgian boating-men fell upon our necks. Iwonder if French Huguenots were as cordially greeted by EnglishProtestants when they came across the Channel out of greattribulation. But after all, what religion knits people so closelyas a common sport?

The canoes were carried into the boat-house; they were washed downfor us by the Club servants, the sails were hung out to dry, andeverything made as snug and tidy as a picture. And in themeanwhile we were led upstairs by our new-found brethren, for somore than one of them stated the relationship, and made free oftheir lavatory. This one lent us soap, that one a towel, a thirdand fourth helped us to undo our bags. And all the time suchquestions, such assurances of respect and sympathy! I declare Inever knew what glory was before. 

'Yes, yes, the Royal Sport Nautique is the oldest club in Belgium. '

'We number two hundred. '

'We'--this is not a substantive speech, but an abstract of manyspeeches, the impression left upon my mind after a great deal oftalk; and very youthful, pleasant, natural, and patriotic it seemsto me to be--'We have gained all races, except those where we werecheated by the French. '

'You must leave all your wet things to be dried. '

'O! entre freres! In any boat-house in England we should find thesame. ' (I cordially hope they might. )

'En Angleterre, vous employez des sliding-seats, n'est-ce pas?'

'We are all employed in commerce during the day; but in theevening, voyez-vous, nous sommes serieux. '

These were the words. They were all employed over the frivolousmercantile concerns of Belgium during the day; but in the eveningthey found some hours for the serious concerns of life. I may havea wrong idea of wisdom, but I think that was a very wise remark. People connected with literature and philosophy are busy all theirdays in getting rid of second-hand notions and false standards. Itis their profession, in the sweat of their brows, by doggedthinking, to recover their old fresh view of life, and distinguishwhat they really and originally like, from what they have onlylearned to tolerate perforce. And these Royal Nautical Sportsmenhad the distinction still quite legible in their hearts. They hadstill those clean perceptions of what is nice and nasty, what isinteresting and what is dull, which envious old gentlemen refer toas illusions. The nightmare illusion of middle age, the bear's hugof custom gradually squeezing the life out of a man's soul, had notyet begun for these happy-starred young Belgians. They still knewthat the interest they took in their business was a trifling affaircompared to their spontaneous, long-suffering affection fornautical sports. To know what you prefer, instead of humbly sayingAmen to what the world tells you you ought to prefer, is to havekept your soul alive. Such a man may be generous; he may be honestin something more than the commercial sense; he may love hisfriends with an elective, personal sympathy, and not accept them asan adjunct of the station to which he has been called. He may be aman, in short, acting on his own instincts, keeping in his ownshape that God made him in; and not a mere crank in the socialengine-house, welded on principles that he does not understand, andfor purposes that he does not care for. 

For will any one dare to tell me that business is more entertainingthan fooling among boats? He must have never seen a boat, or neverseen an office, who says so. And for certain the one is a greatdeal better for the health. There should be nothing so much aman's business as his amusements. Nothing but money-grubbing canbe put forward to the contrary; no one but

Mammon, the least erected spirit that fellFrom Heaven, durst risk a word in answer. It is but a lying cant that wouldrepresent the merchant and the banker as people disinterestedlytoiling for mankind, and then most useful when they are mostabsorbed in their transactions; for the man is more important thanhis services. And when my Royal Nautical Sportsman shall have sofar fallen from his hopeful youth that he cannot pluck up anenthusiasm over anything but his ledger, I venture to doubt whetherhe will be near so nice a fellow, and whether he would welcome, with so good a grace, a couple of drenched Englishmen paddling intoBrussels in the dusk. 

When we had changed our wet clothes and drunk a glass of pale aleto the Club's prosperity, one of their number escorted us to anhotel. He would not join us at our dinner, but he had no objectionto a glass of wine. Enthusiasm is very wearing; and I begin tounderstand why prophets were unpopular in Judaea, where they werebest known. For three stricken hours did this excellent young mansit beside us to dilate on boats and boat-races; and before heleft, he was kind enough to order our bedroom candles. 

We endeavoured now and again to change the subject; but thediversion did not last a moment: the Royal Nautical Sportsmanbridled, shied, answered the question, and then breasted once moreinto the swelling tide of his subject. I call it his subject; butI think it was he who was subjected. The Arethusa, who holds allracing as a creature of the devil, found himself in a pitifuldilemma. He durst not own his ignorance for the honour of OldEngland, and spoke away about English clubs and English oarsmenwhose fame had never before come to his ears. Several times, and, once above all, on the question of sliding-seats, he was within anace of exposure. As for the Cigarette, who has rowed races in theheat of his blood, but now disowns these slips of his wanton youth, his case was still more desperate; for the Royal Nautical proposedthat he should take an oar in one of their eights on the morrow, tocompare the English with the Belgian stroke. I could see my friendperspiring in his chair whenever that particular topic came up. And there was yet another proposal which had the same effect onboth of us. It appeared that the champion canoeist of Europe (aswell as most other champions) was a Royal Nautical Sportsman. Andif we would only wait until the Sunday, this infernal paddler wouldbe so condescending as to accompany us on our next stage. Neitherof us had the least desire to drive the coursers of the sun againstApollo. 

When the young man was gone, we countermanded our candles, andordered some brandy and water. The great billows had gone over ourhead. The Royal Nautical Sportsmen were as nice young fellows as aman would wish to see, but they were a trifle too young and athought too nautical for us. We began to see that we were old andcynical; we liked ease and the agreeable rambling of the human mindabout this and the other subject; we did not want to disgrace ournative land by messing an eight, or toiling pitifully in the wakeof the champion canoeist. In short, we had recourse to flight. Itseemed ungrateful, but we tried to make that good on a card loadedwith sincere compliments. And indeed it was no time for scruples;we seemed to feel the hot breath of the champion on our necks. 

AT MAUBEUGE

Partly from the terror we had of our good friends the RoyalNauticals, partly from the fact that there were no fewer thanfifty-five locks between Brussels and Charleroi, we concluded thatwe should travel by train across the frontier, boats and all. Fifty-five locks in a day's journey was pretty well tantamount totrudging the whole distance on foot, with the canoes upon ourshoulders, an object of astonishment to the trees on the canalside, and of honest derision to all right-thinking children. 

To pass the frontier, even in a train, is a difficult matter forthe Arethusa. He is somehow or other a marked man for the officialeye. Wherever he journeys, there are the officers gatheredtogether. Treaties are solemnly signed, foreign ministers, ambassadors, and consuls sit throned in state from China to Peru, and the Union Jack flutters on all the winds of heaven. Underthese safeguards, portly clergymen, school-mistresses, gentlemen ingrey tweed suits, and all the ruck and rabble of British touristrypour unhindered, Murray in hand, over the railways of theContinent, and yet the slim person of the Arethusa is taken in themeshes, while these great fish go on their way rejoicing. If hetravels without a passport, he is cast, without any figure aboutthe matter, into noisome dungeons: if his papers are in order, heis suffered to go his way indeed, but not until he has beenhumiliated by a general incredulity. He is a born British subject, yet he has never succeeded in persuading a single official of hisnationality. He flatters himself he is indifferent honest; yet heis rarely taken for anything better than a spy, and there is noabsurd and disreputable means of livelihood but has been attributedto him in some heat of official or popular distrust. . . . 

For the life of me I cannot understand it. I too have been knolledto church, and sat at good men's feasts; but I bear no mark of it. I am as strange as a Jack Indian to their official spectacles. Imight come from any part of the globe, it seems, except from whereI do. My ancestors have laboured in vain, and the gloriousConstitution cannot protect me in my walks abroad. It is a greatthing, believe me, to present a good normal type of the nation youbelong to. 

Nobody else was asked for his papers on the way to Maubeuge; but Iwas; and although I clung to my rights, I had to choose at lastbetween accepting the humiliation and being left behind by thetrain. I was sorry to give way; but I wanted to get to Maubeuge. 

Maubeuge is a fortified town, with a very good inn, the Grand Cerf. It seemed to be inhabited principally by soldiers and bagmen; atleast, these were all that we saw, except the hotel servants. Wehad to stay there some time, for the canoes were in no hurry tofollow us, and at last stuck hopelessly in the custom-house untilwe went back to liberate them. There was nothing to do, nothing tosee. We had good meals, which was a great matter; but that wasall. 

The Cigarette was nearly taken up upon a charge of drawing thefortifications: a feat of which he was hopelessly incapable. Andbesides, as I suppose each belligerent nation has a plan of theother's fortified places already, these precautions are of thenature of shutting the stable door after the steed is away. But Ihave no doubt they help to keep up a good spirit at home. It is agreat thing if you can persuade people that they are somehow orother partakers in a mystery. It makes them feel bigger. Even theFreemasons, who have been shown up to satiety, preserve a kind ofpride; and not a grocer among them, however honest, harmless, andempty-headed he may feel himself to be at bottom, but comes homefrom one of their coenacula with a portentous significance forhimself. 

It is an odd thing, how happily two people, if there are two, canlive in a place where they have no acquaintance. I think thespectacle of a whole life in which you have no part paralysespersonal desire. You are content to become a mere spectator. Thebaker stands in his door; the colonel with his three medals goes byto the cafe at night; the troops drum and trumpet and man theramparts, as bold as so many lions. It would task language to sayhow placidly you behold all this. In a place where you have takensome root, you are provoked out of your indifference; you have ahand in the game; your friends are fighting with the army. But ina strange town, not small enough to grow too soon familiar, nor solarge as to have laid itself out for travellers, you stand so farapart from the business, that you positively forget it would bepossible to go nearer; you have so little human interest aroundyou, that you do not remember yourself to be a man. Perhaps, in avery short time, you would be one no longer. Gymnosophists go intoa wood, with all nature seething around them, with romance on everyside; it would be much more to the purpose if they took up theirabode in a dull country town, where they should see just so much ofhumanity as to keep them from desiring more, and only the staleexternals of man's life. These externals are as dead to us as somany formalities, and speak a dead language in our eyes and ears. They have no more meaning than an oath or a salutation. We are somuch accustomed to see married couples going to church of a Sundaythat we have clean forgotten what they represent; and novelists aredriven to rehabilitate adultery, no less, when they wish to show uswhat a beautiful thing it is for a man and a woman to live for eachother. 

One person in Maubeuge, however, showed me something more than hisoutside. That was the driver of the hotel omnibus: a mean enoughlooking little man, as well as I can remember; but with a spark ofsomething human in his soul. He had heard of our little journey, and came to me at once in envious sympathy. How he longed totravel! he told me. How he longed to be somewhere else, and seethe round world before he went into the grave! 'Here I am, ' saidhe. 'I drive to the station. Well. And then I drive back againto the hotel. And so on every day and all the week round. My God, is that life?' I could not say I thought it was--for him. Hepressed me to tell him where I had been, and where I hoped to go;and as he listened, I declare the fellow sighed. Might not thishave been a brave African traveller, or gone to the Indies afterDrake? But it is an evil age for the gypsily inclined among men. He who can sit squarest on a three-legged stool, he it is who hasthe wealth and glory. 

I wonder if my friend is still driving the omnibus for the GrandCerf? Not very likely, I believe; for I think he was on the eve ofmutiny when we passed through, and perhaps our passage determinedhim for good. Better a thousand times that he should be a tramp, and mend pots and pans by the wayside, and sleep under trees, andsee the dawn and the sunset every day above a new horizon. I thinkI hear you say that it is a respectable position to drive anomnibus? Very well. What right has he who likes it not, to keepthose who would like it dearly out of this respectable position?Suppose a dish were not to my taste, and you told me that it was afavourite amongst the rest of the company, what should I concludefrom that? Not to finish the dish against my stomach, I suppose. 

Respectability is a very good thing in its way, but it does notrise superior to all considerations. I would not for a momentventure to hint that it was a matter of taste; but I think I willgo as far as this: that if a position is admittedly unkind, uncomfortable, unnecessary, and superfluously useless, although itwere as respectable as the Church of England, the sooner a man isout of it, the better for himself, and all concerned. 

ON THE SAMBRE CANALISED

TO QUARTES

About three in the afternoon the whole establishment of the GrandCerf accompanied us to the water's edge. The man of the omnibuswas there with haggard eyes. Poor cage-bird! Do I not rememberthe time when I myself haunted the station, to watch train aftertrain carry its complement of freemen into the night, and read thenames of distant places on the time-bills with indescribablelongings?

We were not clear of the fortifications before the rain began. Thewind was contrary, and blew in furious gusts; nor were the aspectsof nature any more clement than the doings of the sky. For wepassed through a stretch of blighted country, sparsely covered withbrush, but handsomely enough diversified with factory chimneys. Welanded in a soiled meadow among some pollards, and there smoked apipe in a flaw of fair weather. But the wind blew so hard, wecould get little else to smoke. There were no natural objects inthe neighbourhood, but some sordid workshops. A group of childrenheaded by a tall girl stood and watched us from a little distanceall the time we stayed. I heartily wonder what they thought of us. 

At Hautmont, the lock was almost impassable; the landing-placebeing steep and high, and the launch at a long distance. Near adozen grimy workmen lent us a hand. They refused any reward; and, what is much better, refused it handsomely, without conveying anysense of insult. 'It is a way we have in our countryside, ' saidthey. And a very becoming way it is. In Scotland, where also youwill get services for nothing, the good people reject your money asif you had been trying to corrupt a voter. When people take thetrouble to do dignified acts, it is worth while to take a littlemore, and allow the dignity to be common to all concerned. But inour brave Saxon countries, where we plod threescore years and tenin the mud, and the wind keeps singing in our ears from birth toburial, we do our good and bad with a high hand and almostoffensively; and make even our alms a witness-bearing and an act ofwar against the wrong. 

After Hautmont, the sun came forth again and the wind went down;and a little paddling took us beyond the ironworks and through adelectable land. The river wound among low hills, so thatsometimes the sun was at our backs, and sometimes it stood rightahead, and the river before us was one sheet of intolerable glory. On either hand, meadows and orchards bordered, with a margin ofsedge and water flowers, upon the river. The hedges were of greatheight, woven about the trunks of hedgerow elms; and the fields, asthey were often very small, looked like a series of bowers alongthe stream. There was never any prospect; sometimes a hill-topwith its trees would look over the nearest hedgerow, just to make amiddle distance for the sky; but that was all. The heaven was bareof clouds. The atmosphere, after the rain, was of enchantingpurity. The river doubled among the hillocks, a shining strip ofmirror glass; and the dip of the paddles set the flowers shakingalong the brink. 

In the meadows wandered black and white cattle fantasticallymarked. One beast, with a white head and the rest of the bodyglossy black, came to the edge to drink, and stood gravelytwitching his ears at me as I went by, like some sort ofpreposterous clergyman in a play. A moment after I heard a loudplunge, and, turning my head, saw the clergyman struggling toshore. The bank had given way under his feet. 

Besides the cattle, we saw no living things except a few birds anda great many fishermen. These sat along the edges of the meadows, sometimes with one rod, sometimes with as many as half a score. They seemed stupefied with contentment; and when we induced them toexchange a few words with us about the weather, their voicessounded quiet and far away. There was a strange diversity ofopinion among them as to the kind of fish for which they set theirlures; although they were all agreed in this, that the river wasabundantly supplied. Where it was plain that no two of them hadever caught the same kind of fish, we could not help suspectingthat perhaps not any one of them had ever caught a fish at all. Ihope, since the afternoon was so lovely, that they were one and allrewarded; and that a silver booty went home in every basket for thepot. Some of my friends would cry shame on me for this; but Iprefer a man, were he only an angler, to the bravest pair of gillsin all God's waters. I do not affect fishes unless when cooked insauce; whereas an angler is an important piece of river scenery, and hence deserves some recognition among canoeists. He can alwaystell you where you are after a mild fashion; and his quiet presenceserves to accentuate the solitude and stillness, and remind you ofthe glittering citizens below your boat. 

The Sambre turned so industriously to and fro among his littlehills, that it was past six before we drew near the lock atQuartes. There were some children on the tow-path, with whom theCigarette fell into a chaffing talk as they ran along beside us. It was in vain that I warned him. In vain I told him, in English, that boys were the most dangerous creatures; and if once you beganwith them, it was safe to end in a shower of stones. For my ownpart, whenever anything was addressed to me, I smiled gently andshook my head as though I were an inoffensive person inadequatelyacquainted with French. For indeed I have had such experience athome, that I would sooner meet many wild animals than a troop ofhealthy urchins. 

But I was doing injustice to these peaceable young Hainaulters. When the Cigarette went off to make inquiries, I got out upon thebank to smoke a pipe and superintend the boats, and became at oncethe centre of much amiable curiosity. The children had been joinedby this time by a young woman and a mild lad who had lost an arm;and this gave me more security. When I let slip my first word orso in French, a little girl nodded her head with a comical grown-upair. 'Ah, you see, ' she said, 'he understands well enough now; hewas just making believe. ' And the little group laughed togethervery good-naturedly. 

They were much impressed when they heard we came from England; andthe little girl proffered the information that England was anisland 'and a far way from here--bien loin d'ici. '

'Ay, you may say that, a far way from here, ' said the lad with onearm. 

I was as nearly home-sick as ever I was in my life; they seemed tomake it such an incalculable distance to the place where I firstsaw the day. They admired the canoes very much. And I observedone piece of delicacy in these children, which is worthy of record. They had been deafening us for the last hundred yards withpetitions for a sail; ay, and they deafened us to the same tunenext morning when we came to start; but then, when the canoes werelying empty, there was no word of any such petition. Delicacy? orperhaps a bit of fear for the water in so crank a vessel? I hatecynicism a great deal worse than I do the devil; unless perhaps thetwo were the same thing? And yet 'tis a good tonic; the cold tuband bath-towel of the sentiments; and positively necessary to lifein cases of advanced sensibility. 

From the boats they turned to my costume. They could not makeenough of my red sash; and my knife filled them with awe. 

'They make them like that in England, ' said the boy with one arm. I was glad he did not know how badly we make them in England now-a-days. 'They are for people who go away to sea, ' he added, 'and todefend one's life against great fish. '

I felt I was becoming a more and more romantic figure to the littlegroup at every word. And so I suppose I was. Even my pipe, although it was an ordinary French clay pretty well 'trousered, ' asthey call it, would have a rarity in their eyes, as a thing comingfrom so far away. And if my feathers were not very fine inthemselves, they were all from over seas. One thing in my outfit, however, tickled them out of all politeness; and that was thebemired condition of my canvas shoes. I suppose they were sure themud at any rate was a home product. The little girl (who was thegenius of the party) displayed her own sabots in competition; and Iwish you could have seen how gracefully and merrily she did it. 

The young woman's milk-can, a great amphora of hammered brass, stood some way off upon the sward. I was glad of an opportunity todivert public attention from myself, and return some of thecompliments I had received. So I admired it cordially both forform and colour, telling them, and very truly, that it was asbeautiful as gold. They were not surprised. The things wereplainly the boast of the countryside. And the children expatiatedon the costliness of these amphorae, which sell sometimes as highas thirty francs apiece; told me how they were carried on donkeys, one on either side of the saddle, a brave caparison in themselves;and how they were to be seen all over the district, and at thelarger farms in great number and of great size. 

PONT-SUR-SAMBRE

WE ARE PEDLARS

The Cigarette returned with good news. There were beds to be hadsome ten minutes' walk from where we were, at a place called Pont. We stowed the canoes in a granary, and asked among the children fora guide. The circle at once widened round us, and our offers ofreward were received in dispiriting silence. We were plainly apair of Bluebeards to the children; they might speak to us inpublic places, and where they had the advantage of numbers; but itwas another thing to venture off alone with two uncouth andlegendary characters, who had dropped from the clouds upon theirhamlet this quiet afternoon, sashed and be-knived, and with aflavour of great voyages. The owner of the granary came to ourassistance, singled out one little fellow and threatened him withcorporalities; or I suspect we should have had to find the way forourselves. As it was, he was more frightened at the granary manthan the strangers, having perhaps had some experience of theformer. But I fancy his little heart must have been going at afine rate; for he kept trotting at a respectful distance in front, and looking back at us with scared eyes. Not otherwise may thechildren of the young world have guided Jove or one of his Olympiancompeers on an adventure. 

A miry lane led us up from Quartes with its church and bickeringwindmill. The hinds were trudging homewards from the fields. Abrisk little woman passed us by. She was seated across a donkeybetween a pair of glittering milk-cans; and, as she went, shekicked jauntily with her heels upon the donkey's side, andscattered shrill remarks among the wayfarers. It was notable thatnone of the tired men took the trouble to reply. Our conductorsoon led us out of the lane and across country. The sun had gonedown, but the west in front of us was one lake of level gold. Thepath wandered a while in the open, and then passed under a trellislike a bower indefinitely prolonged. On either hand were shadowyorchards; cottages lay low among the leaves, and sent their smoketo heaven; every here and there, in an opening, appeared the greatgold face of the west. 

I never saw the Cigarette in such an idyllic frame of mind. Hewaxed positively lyrical in praise of country scenes. I was littleless exhilarated myself; the mild air of the evening, the shadows, the rich lights and the silence, made a symphonious accompanimentabout our walk; and we both determined to avoid towns for thefuture and sleep in hamlets. 

At last the path went between two houses, and turned the party outinto a wide muddy high-road, bordered, as far as the eye couldreach on either hand, by an unsightly village. The houses stoodwell back, leaving a ribbon of waste land on either side of theroad, where there were stacks of firewood, carts, barrows, rubbish-heaps, and a little doubtful grass. Away on the left, a gaunttower stood in the middle of the street. What it had been in pastages, I know not: probably a hold in time of war; but now-a-daysit bore an illegible dial-plate in its upper parts, and near thebottom an iron letter-box. 

The inn to which we had been recommended at Quartes was full, orelse the landlady did not like our looks. I ought to say, thatwith our long, damp india-rubber bags, we presented rather adoubtful type of civilisation: like rag-and-bone men, theCigarette imagined. 'These gentlemen are pedlars?--Ces messieurssont des marchands?'--asked the landlady. And then, withoutwaiting for an answer, which I suppose she thought superfluous inso plain a case, recommended us to a butcher who lived hard by thetower, and took in travellers to lodge. 

Thither went we. But the butcher was flitting, and all his bedswere taken down. Or else he didn't like our look. As a partingshot, we had 'These gentlemen are pedlars?'

It began to grow dark in earnest. We could no longer distinguishthe faces of the people who passed us by with an inarticulate good-evening. And the householders of Pont seemed very economical withtheir oil; for we saw not a single window lighted in all that longvillage. I believe it is the longest village in the world; but Idaresay in our predicament every pace counted three times over. Wewere much cast down when we came to the last auberge; and lookingin at the dark door, asked timidly if we could sleep there for thenight. A female voice assented in no very friendly tones. Weclapped the bags down and found our way to chairs. 

The place was in total darkness, save a red glow in the chinks andventilators of the stove. But now the landlady lit a lamp to seeher new guests; I suppose the darkness was what saved us anotherexpulsion; for I cannot say she looked gratified at our appearance. We were in a large bare apartment, adorned with two allegoricalprints of Music and Painting, and a copy of the law against publicdrunkenness. On one side, there was a bit of a bar, with somehalf-a-dozen bottles. Two labourers sat waiting supper, inattitudes of extreme weariness; a plain-looking lass bustled aboutwith a sleepy child of two; and the landlady began to derange thepots upon the stove, and set some beefsteak to grill. 

'These gentlemen are pedlars?' she asked sharply. And that was allthe conversation forthcoming. We began to think we might bepedlars after all. I never knew a population with so narrow arange of conjecture as the innkeepers of Pont-sur-Sambre. Butmanners and bearing have not a wider currency than bank-notes. Youhave only to get far enough out of your beat, and all youraccomplished airs will go for nothing. These Hainaulters could seeno difference between us and the average pedlar. Indeed we hadsome grounds for reflection while the steak was getting ready, tosee how perfectly they accepted us at their own valuation, and howour best politeness and best efforts at entertainment seemed to fitquite suitably with the character of packmen. At least it seemed agood account of the profession in France, that even before suchjudges we could not beat them at our own weapons. 

At last we were called to table. The two hinds (and one of themlooked sadly worn and white in the face, as though sick with over-work and under-feeding) supped off a single plate of some sort ofbread-berry, some potatoes in their jackets, a small cup of coffeesweetened with sugar-candy, and one tumbler of swipes. Thelandlady, her son, and the lass aforesaid, took the same. Our mealwas quite a banquet by comparison. We had some beefsteak, not sotender as it might have been, some of the potatoes, some cheese, anextra glass of the swipes, and white sugar in our coffee. 

You see what it is to be a gentleman--I beg your pardon, what it isto be a pedlar. It had not before occurred to me that a pedlar wasa great man in a labourer's ale-house; but now that I had to enactthe part for an evening, I found that so it was. He has in hishedge quarters somewhat the same pre-eminency as the man who takesa private parlour in an hotel. The more you look into it, the moreinfinite are the class distinctions among men; and possibly, by ahappy dispensation, there is no one at all at the bottom of thescale; no one but can find some superiority over somebody else, tokeep up his pride withal. 

We were displeased enough with our fare. Particularly theCigarette, for I tried to make believe that I was amused with theadventure, tough beefsteak and all. According to the Lucretianmaxim, our steak should have been flavoured by the look of theother people's bread-berry. But we did not find it so in practice. You may have a head-knowledge that other people live more poorlythan yourself, but it is not agreeable--I was going to say, it isagainst the etiquette of the universe--to sit at the same table andpick your own superior diet from among their crusts. I had notseen such a thing done since the greedy boy at school with hisbirthday cake. It was odious enough to witness, I could remember;and I had never thought to play the part myself. But there againyou see what it is to be a pedlar. 

There is no doubt that the poorer classes in our country are muchmore charitably disposed than their superiors in wealth. And Ifancy it must arise a great deal from the comparative indistinctionof the easy and the not so easy in these ranks. A workman or apedlar cannot shutter himself off from his less comfortableneighbours. If he treats himself to a luxury, he must do it in theface of a dozen who cannot. And what should more directly lead tocharitable thoughts? . . . Thus the poor man, camping out in life, sees it as it is, and knows that every mouthful he puts in hisbelly has been wrenched out of the fingers of the hungry. 

But at a certain stage of prosperity, as in a balloon ascent, thefortunate person passes through a zone of clouds, and sublunarymatters are thenceforward hidden from his view. He sees nothingbut the heavenly bodies, all in admirable order, and positively asgood as new. He finds himself surrounded in the most touchingmanner by the attentions of Providence, and compares himselfinvoluntarily with the lilies and the skylarks. He does notprecisely sing, of course; but then he looks so unassuming in hisopen landau! If all the world dined at one table, this philosophywould meet with some rude knocks. 

PONT-SUR-SAMBRE

THE TRAVELLING MERCHANT

Like the lackeys in Moliere's farce, when the true nobleman brokein on their high life below stairs, we were destined to beconfronted with a real pedlar. To make the lesson still morepoignant for fallen gentlemen like us, he was a pedlar ofinfinitely more consideration than the sort of scurvy fellows wewere taken for: like a lion among mice, or a ship of war bearingdown upon two cock-boats. Indeed, he did not deserve the name ofpedlar at all: he was a travelling merchant. 

I suppose it was about half-past eight when this worthy, MonsieurHector Gilliard of Maubeuge, turned up at the ale-house door in atilt cart drawn by a donkey, and cried cheerily on the inhabitants. He was a lean, nervous flibbertigibbet of a man, with something thelook of an actor, and something the look of a horse-jockey. He hadevidently prospered without any of the favours of education; for headhered with stern simplicity to the masculine gender, and in thecourse of the evening passed off some fancy futures in a veryflorid style of architecture. With him came his wife, a comelyyoung woman with her hair tied in a yellow kerchief, and their son, a little fellow of four, in a blouse and military kepi. It wasnotable that the child was many degrees better dressed than eitherof the parents. We were informed he was already at a boarding-school; but the holidays having just commenced, he was off to spendthem with his parents on a cruise. An enchanting holidayoccupation, was it not? to travel all day with father and mother inthe tilt cart full of countless treasures; the green countryrattling by on either side, and the children in all the villagescontemplating him with envy and wonder? It is better fun, duringthe holidays, to be the son of a travelling merchant, than son andheir to the greatest cotton-spinner in creation. And as for beinga reigning prince--indeed I never saw one if it was not MasterGilliard!

While M. Hector and the son of the house were putting up thedonkey, and getting all the valuables under lock and key, thelandlady warmed up the remains of our beefsteak, and fried the coldpotatoes in slices, and Madame Gilliard set herself to waken theboy, who had come far that day, and was peevish and dazzled by thelight. He was no sooner awake than he began to prepare himself forsupper by eating galette, unripe pears, and cold potatoes--with, sofar as I could judge, positive benefit to his appetite. 

The landlady, fired with motherly emulation, awoke her own littlegirl; and the two children were confronted. Master Gilliard lookedat her for a moment, very much as a dog looks at his own reflectionin a mirror before he turns away. He was at that time absorbed inthe galette. His mother seemed crestfallen that he should displayso little inclination towards the other sex; and expressed herdisappointment with some candour and a very proper reference to theinfluence of years. 

Sure enough a time will come when he will pay more attention to thegirls, and think a great deal less of his mother: let us hope shewill like it as well as she seemed to fancy. But it is odd enough;the very women who profess most contempt for mankind as a sex, seemto find even its ugliest particulars rather lively and high-mindedin their own sons. 

The little girl looked longer and with more interest, probablybecause she was in her own house, while he was a traveller andaccustomed to strange sights. And besides there was no galette inthe case with her. 

All the time of supper, there was nothing spoken of but my younglord. The two parents were both absurdly fond of their child. Monsieur kept insisting on his sagacity: how he knew all thechildren at school by name; and when this utterly failed on trial, how he was cautious and exact to a strange degree, and if askedanything, he would sit and think--and think, and if he did not knowit, 'my faith, he wouldn't tell you at all--foi, il ne vous le dirapas': which is certainly a very high degree of caution. Atintervals, M. Hector would appeal to his wife, with his mouth fullof beefsteak, as to the little fellow's age at such or such a timewhen he had said or done something memorable; and I noticed thatMadame usually pooh-poohed these inquiries. She herself was notboastful in her vein; but she never had her fill of caressing thechild; and she seemed to take a gentle pleasure in recalling allthat was fortunate in his little existence. No schoolboy couldhave talked more of the holidays which were just beginning and lessof the black school-time which must inevitably follow after. Sheshowed, with a pride perhaps partly mercantile in origin, hispockets preposterously swollen with tops and whistles and string. When she called at a house in the way of business, it appeared hekept her company; and whenever a sale was made, received a sou outof the profit. Indeed they spoiled him vastly, these two goodpeople. But they had an eye to his manners for all that, andreproved him for some little faults in breeding, which occurredfrom time to time during supper. 

On the whole, I was not much hurt at being taken for a pedlar. Imight think that I ate with greater delicacy, or that my mistakesin French belonged to a different order; but it was plain thatthese distinctions would be thrown away upon the landlady and thetwo labourers. In all essential things we and the Gilliards cutvery much the same figure in the ale-house kitchen. M. Hector wasmore at home, indeed, and took a higher tone with the world; butthat was explicable on the ground of his driving a donkey-cart, while we poor bodies tramped afoot. I daresay, the rest of thecompany thought us dying with envy, though in no ill sense, to beas far up in the profession as the new arrival. 

And of one thing I am sure: that every one thawed and became morehumanised and conversible as soon as these innocent people appearedupon the scene. I would not very readily trust the travellingmerchant with any extravagant sum of money; but I am sure his heartwas in the right place. In this mixed world, if you can find oneor two sensible places in a man--above all, if you should find awhole family living together on such pleasant terms--you may surelybe satisfied, and take the rest for granted; or, what is a greatdeal better, boldly make up your mind that you can do perfectlywell without the rest; and that ten thousand bad traits cannot makea single good one any the less good. 

It was getting late. M. Hector lit a stable lantern and went offto his cart for some arrangements; and my young gentleman proceededto divest himself of the better part of his raiment, and playgymnastics on his mother's lap, and thence on to the floor, withaccompaniment of laughter. 

'Are you going to sleep alone?' asked the servant lass. 

'There's little fear of that, ' says Master Gilliard. 

'You sleep alone at school, ' objected his mother. 'Come, come, youmust be a man. '

But he protested that school was a different matter from theholidays; that there were dormitories at school; and silenced thediscussion with kisses: his mother smiling, no one better pleasedthan she. 

There certainly was, as he phrased it, very little fear that heshould sleep alone; for there was but one bed for the trio. We, onour part, had firmly protested against one man's accommodation fortwo; and we had a double-bedded pen in the loft of the house, furnished, beside the beds, with exactly three hat-pegs and onetable. There was not so much as a glass of water. But the windowwould open, by good fortune. 

Some time before I fell asleep the loft was full of the sound ofmighty snoring: the Gilliards, and the labourers, and the peopleof the inn, all at it, I suppose, with one consent. The young moonoutside shone very clearly over Pont-sur-Sambre, and down upon theale-house where all we pedlars were abed. 

ON THE SAMBRE CANALISED

TO LANDRECIES

In the morning, when we came downstairs, the landlady pointed outto us two pails of water behind the street-door. 'Voila de l'eaupour vous debarbouiller, ' says she. And so there we made a shiftto wash ourselves, while Madame Gilliard brushed the family bootson the outer doorstep, and M. Hector, whistling cheerily, arrangedsome small goods for the day's campaign in a portable chest ofdrawers, which formed a part of his baggage. Meanwhile the childwas letting off Waterloo crackers all over the floor. 

I wonder, by-the-bye, what they call Waterloo crackers in France;perhaps Austerlitz crackers. There is a great deal in the point ofview. Do you remember the Frenchman who, travelling by way ofSouthampton, was put down in Waterloo Station, and had to driveacross Waterloo Bridge? He had a mind to go home again, it seems. 

Pont itself is on the river, but whereas it is ten minutes' walkfrom Quartes by dry land, it is six weary kilometres by water. Weleft our bags at the inn, and walked to our canoes through the wetorchards unencumbered. Some of the children were there to see usoff, but we were no longer the mysterious beings of the nightbefore. A departure is much less romantic than an unexplainedarrival in the golden evening. Although we might be greatly takenat a ghost's first appearance, we should behold him vanish withcomparative equanimity. 

The good folk of the inn at Pont, when we called there for thebags, were overcome with marvelling. At sight of these two daintylittle boats, with a fluttering Union Jack on each, and all thevarnish shining from the sponge, they began to perceive that theyhad entertained angels unawares. The landlady stood upon thebridge, probably lamenting she had charged so little; the son ranto and fro, and called out the neighbours to enjoy the sight; andwe paddled away from quite a crowd of wrapt observers. Thesegentlemen pedlars, indeed! Now you see their quality too late. 

The whole day was showery, with occasional drenching plumps. Wewere soaked to the skin, then partially dried in the sun, thensoaked once more. But there were some calm intervals, and onenotably, when we were skirting the forest of Mormal, a sinistername to the ear, but a place most gratifying to sight and smell. It looked solemn along the river-side, drooping its boughs into thewater, and piling them up aloft into a wall of leaves. What is aforest but a city of nature's own, full of hardy and innocuousliving things, where there is nothing dead and nothing made withthe hands, but the citizens themselves are the houses and publicmonuments? There is nothing so much alive, and yet so quiet, as awoodland; and a pair of people, swinging past in canoes, feel verysmall and bustling by comparison. 

And surely of all smells in the world, the smell of many trees isthe sweetest and most fortifying. The sea has a rude, pistollingsort of odour, that takes you in the nostrils like snuff, andcarries with it a fine sentiment of open water and tall ships; butthe smell of a forest, which comes nearest to this in tonicquality, surpasses it by many degrees in the quality of softness. Again, the smell of the sea has little variety, but the smell of aforest is infinitely changeful; it varies with the hour of the day, not in strength merely, but in character; and the different sortsof trees, as you go from one zone of the wood to another, seem tolive among different kinds of atmosphere. Usually the resin of thefir predominates. But some woods are more coquettish in theirhabits; and the breath of the forest of Mormal, as it came aboardupon us that showery afternoon, was perfumed with nothing lessdelicate than sweetbrier. 

I wish our way had always lain among woods. Trees are the mostcivil society. An old oak that has been growing where he standssince before the Reformation, taller than many spires, more statelythan the greater part of mountains, and yet a living thing, liableto sicknesses and death, like you and me: is not that in itself aspeaking lesson in history? But acres on acres full of suchpatriarchs contiguously rooted, their green tops billowing in thewind, their stalwart younglings pushing up about their knees: awhole forest, healthy and beautiful, giving colour to the light, giving perfume to the air: what is this but the most imposingpiece in nature's repertory? Heine wished to lie like Merlin underthe oaks of Broceliande. I should not be satisfied with one tree;but if the wood grew together like a banyan grove, I would beburied under the tap-root of the whole; my parts should circulatefrom oak to oak; and my consciousness should be diffused abroad inall the forest, and give a common heart to that assembly of greenspires, so that it also might rejoice in its own loveliness anddignity. I think I feel a thousand squirrels leaping from bough tobough in my vast mausoleum; and the birds and the winds merrilycoursing over its uneven, leafy surface. 

Alas! the forest of Mormal is only a little bit of a wood, and itwas but for a little way that we skirted by its boundaries. Andthe rest of the time the rain kept coming in squirts and the windin squalls, until one's heart grew weary of such fitful, scoldingweather. It was odd how the showers began when we had to carry theboats over a lock, and must expose our legs. They always did. This is a sort of thing that readily begets a personal feelingagainst nature. There seems no reason why the shower should notcome five minutes before or five minutes after, unless you supposean intention to affront you. The Cigarette had a mackintosh whichput him more or less above these contrarieties. But I had to bearthe brunt uncovered. I began to remember that nature was a woman. My companion, in a rosier temper, listened with great satisfactionto my Jeremiads, and ironically concurred. He instanced, as acognate matter, the action of the tides, 'which, ' said he, 'wasaltogether designed for the confusion of canoeists, except in sofar as it was calculated to minister to a barren vanity on the partof the moon. '

At the last lock, some little way out of Landrecies, I refused togo any farther; and sat in a drift of rain by the side of the bank, to have a reviving pipe. A vivacious old man, whom I take to havebeen the devil, drew near and questioned me about our journey. Inthe fulness of my heart, I laid bare our plans before him. He saidit was the silliest enterprise that ever he heard of. Why, did Inot know, he asked me, that it was nothing but locks, locks, locks, the whole way? not to mention that, at this season of the year, weshould find the Oise quite dry? 'Get into a train, my little youngman, ' said he, I and go you away home to your parents. ' I was soastounded at the man's malice, that I could only stare at him insilence. A tree would never have spoken to me like this. At lastI got out with some words. We had come from Antwerp already, Itold him, which was a good long way; and we should do the rest inspite of him. Yes, I said, if there were no other reason, I woulddo it now, just because he had dared to say we could not. Thepleasant old gentleman looked at me sneeringly, made an allusion tomy canoe, and marched of, waggling his head. 

I was still inwardly fuming, when up came a pair of young fellows, who imagined I was the Cigarette's servant, on a comparison, Isuppose, of my bare jersey with the other's mackintosh, and askedme many questions about my place and my master's character. I saidhe was a good enough fellow, but had this absurd voyage on thehead. 'O no, no, ' said one, 'you must not say that; it is notabsurd; it is very courageous of him. ' I believe these were acouple of angels sent to give me heart again. It was trulyfortifying to reproduce all the old man's insinuations, as if theywere original to me in my character of a malcontent footman, andhave them brushed away like so many flies by these admirable youngmen. 

When I recounted this affair to the Cigarette, 'They must have acurious idea of how English servants behave, ' says he dryly, 'foryou treated me like a brute beast at the lock. '

I was a good deal mortified; but my temper had suffered, it is afact. 

AT LANDRECIES

At Landrecies the rain still fell and the wind still blew; but wefound a double-bedded room with plenty of furniture, real water-jugs with real water in them, and dinner: a real dinner, notinnocent of real wine. After having been a pedlar for one night, and a butt for the elements during the whole of the next day, thesecomfortable circumstances fell on my heart like sunshine. Therewas an English fruiterer at dinner, travelling with a Belgianfruiterer; in the evening at the cafe, we watched our compatriotdrop a good deal of money at corks; and I don't know why, but thispleased us. 

It turned out we were to see more of Landrecies than we expected;for the weather next day was simply bedlamite. It is not the placeone would have chosen for a day's rest; for it consists almostentirely of fortifications. Within the ramparts, a few blocks ofhouses, a long row of barracks, and a church, figure, with whatcountenance they may, as the town. There seems to be no trade; anda shopkeeper from whom I bought a sixpenny flint-and-steel, was somuch affected that he filled my pockets with spare flints into thebargain. The only public buildings that had any interest for uswere the hotel and the cafe. But we visited the church. Therelies Marshal Clarke. But as neither of us had ever heard of thatmilitary hero, we bore the associations of the spot with fortitude. 

In all garrison towns, guard-calls, and reveilles, and such like, make a fine romantic interlude in civic business. Bugles, anddrums, and fifes, are of themselves most excellent things innature; and when they carry the mind to marching armies, and thepicturesque vicissitudes of war, they stir up something proud inthe heart. But in a shadow of a town like Landrecies, with littleelse moving, these points of war made a proportionate commotion. Indeed, they were the only things to remember. It was just theplace to hear the round going by at night in the darkness, with thesolid tramp of men marching, and the startling reverberations ofthe drum. It reminded you, that even this place was a point in thegreat warfaring system of Europe, and might on some future day beringed about with cannon smoke and thunder, and make itself a nameamong strong towns. 

The drum, at any rate, from its martial voice and notablephysiological effect, nay, even from its cumbrous and comicalshape, stands alone among the instruments of noise. And if it betrue, as I have heard it said, that drums are covered with asses'skin, what a picturesque irony is there in that! As if this long-suffering animal's hide had not been sufficiently belaboured duringlife, now by Lyonnese costermongers, now by presumptuous Hebrewprophets, it must be stripped from his poor hinder quarters afterdeath, stretched on a drum, and beaten night after night round thestreets of every garrison town in Europe. And up the heights ofAlma and Spicheren, and wherever death has his red flag a-flying, and sounds his own potent tuck upon the cannons, there also mustthe drummer-boy, hurrying with white face over fallen comrades, batter and bemaul this slip of skin from the loins of peaceabledonkeys. 

Generally a man is never more uselessly employed than when he is atthis trick of bastinadoing asses' hide. We know what effect it hasin life, and how your dull ass will not mend his pace with beating. But in this state of mummy and melancholy survival of itself, whenthe hollow skin reverberates to the drummer's wrist, and each dub-a-dub goes direct to a man's heart, and puts madness there, andthat disposition of the pulses which we, in our big way of talking, nickname Heroism:- is there not something in the nature of arevenge upon the donkey's persecutors? Of old, he might say, youdrubbed me up hill and down dale, and I must endure; but now that Iam dead, those dull thwacks that were scarcely audible in countrylanes, have become stirring music in front of the brigade; and forevery blow that you lay on my old greatcoat, you will see a comradestumble and fall. 

Not long after the drums had passed the cafe, the Cigarette and theArethusa began to grow sleepy, and set out for the hotel, which wasonly a door or two away. But although we had been somewhatindifferent to Landrecies, Landrecies had not been indifferent tous. All day, we learned, people had been running out between thesqualls to visit our two boats. Hundreds of persons, so saidreport, although it fitted ill with our idea of the town--hundredsof persons had inspected them where they lay in a coal-shed. Wewere becoming lions in Landrecies, who had been only pedlars thenight before in Pont. 

And now, when we left the cafe, we were pursued and overtaken atthe hotel door by no less a person than the Juge de Paix: afunctionary, as far as I can make out, of the character of a ScotsSheriff-Substitute. He gave us his card and invited us to sup withhim on the spot, very neatly, very gracefully, as Frenchmen can dothese things. It was for the credit of Landrecies, said he; andalthough we knew very well how little credit we could do the place, we must have been churlish fellows to refuse an invitation sopolitely introduced. 

The house of the Judge was close by; it was a well-appointedbachelor's establishment, with a curious collection of old brasswarming-pans upon the walls. Some of these were most elaboratelycarved. It seemed a picturesque idea for a collector. You couldnot help thinking how many night-caps had wagged over thesewarming-pans in past generations; what jests may have been made, and kisses taken, while they were in service; and how often theyhad been uselessly paraded in the bed of death. If they could onlyspeak, at what absurd, indecorous, and tragical scenes had they notbeen present!

The wine was excellent. When we made the Judge our complimentsupon a bottle, 'I do not give it you as my worst, ' said he. Iwonder when Englishmen will learn these hospitable graces. Theyare worth learning; they set off life, and make ordinary momentsornamental. 

There were two other Landrecienses present. One was the collectorof something or other, I forget what; the other, we were told, wasthe principal notary of the place. So it happened that we all fivemore or less followed the law. At this rate, the talk was prettycertain to become technical. The Cigarette expounded the Poor Lawsvery magisterially. And a little later I found myself laying downthe Scots Law of Illegitimacy, of which I am glad to say I knownothing. The collector and the notary, who were both married men, accused the Judge, who was a bachelor, of having started thesubject. He deprecated the charge, with a conscious, pleased air, just like all the men I have ever seen, be they French or English. How strange that we should all, in our unguarded moments, ratherlike to be thought a bit of a rogue with the women!

As the evening went on, the wine grew more to my taste; the spiritsproved better than the wine; the company was genial. This was thehighest water mark of popular favour on the whole cruise. Afterall, being in a Judge's house, was there not something semi-official in the tribute? And so, remembering what a great countryFrance is, we did full justice to our entertainment. Landrecieshad been a long while asleep before we returned to the hotel; andthe sentries on the ramparts were already looking for daybreak. 

SAMBRE AND OISE CANAL

CANAL BOATS

Next day we made a late start in the rain. The Judge politelyescorted us to the end of the lock under an umbrella. We had nowbrought ourselves to a pitch of humility in the matter of weather, not often attained except in the Scottish Highlands. A rag of bluesky or a glimpse of sunshine set our hearts singing; and when therain was not heavy, we counted the day almost fair. 

Long lines of barges lay one after another along the canal; many ofthem looking mighty spruce and shipshape in their jerkin ofArchangel tar picked out with white and green. Some carried gayiron railings, and quite a parterre of flower-pots. Childrenplayed on the decks, as heedless of the rain as if they had beenbrought up on Loch Carron side; men fished over the gunwale, someof them under umbrellas; women did their washing; and every bargeboasted its mongrel cur by way of watch-dog. Each one barkedfuriously at the canoes, running alongside until he had got to theend of his own ship, and so passing on the word to the dog aboardthe next. We must have seen something like a hundred of theseembarkations in the course of that day's paddle, ranged one afteranother like the houses in a street; and from not one of them werewe disappointed of this accompaniment. It was like visiting amenagerie, the Cigarette remarked. 

These little cities by the canal side had a very odd effect uponthe mind. They seemed, with their flower-pots and smokingchimneys, their washings and dinners, a rooted piece of nature inthe scene; and yet if only the canal below were to open, one junkafter another would hoist sail or harness horses and swim away intoall parts of France; and the impromptu hamlet would separate, houseby house, to the four winds. The children who played together to-day by the Sambre and Oise Canal, each at his own father'sthreshold, when and where might they next meet?

For some time past the subject of barges had occupied a great dealof our talk, and we had projected an old age on the canals ofEurope. It was to be the most leisurely of progresses, now on aswift river at the tail of a steam-boat, now waiting horses fordays together on some inconsiderable junction. We should be seenpottering on deck in all the dignity of years, our white beardsfalling into our laps. We were ever to be busied among paint-pots;so that there should be no white fresher, and no green more emeraldthan ours, in all the navy of the canals. There should be books inthe cabin, and tobacco-jars, and some old Burgundy as red as aNovember sunset and as odorous as a violet in April. There shouldbe a flageolet, whence the Cigarette, with cunning touch, shoulddraw melting music under the stars; or perhaps, laying that aside, upraise his voice--somewhat thinner than of yore, and with here andthere a quaver, or call it a natural grace-note--in rich and solemnpsalmody. 

All this, simmering in my mind, set me wishing to go aboard one ofthese ideal houses of lounging. I had plenty to choose from, as Icoasted one after another, and the dogs bayed at me for a vagrant. At last I saw a nice old man and his wife looking at me with someinterest, so I gave them good-day and pulled up alongside. I beganwith a remark upon their dog, which had somewhat the look of apointer; thence I slid into a compliment on Madame's flowers, andthence into a word in praise of their way of life. 

If you ventured on such an experiment in England you would get aslap in the face at once. The life would be shown to be a vileone, not without a side shot at your better fortune. Now, what Ilike so much in France is the clear unflinching recognition byeverybody of his own luck. They all know on which side their breadis buttered, and take a pleasure in showing it to others, which issurely the better part of religion. And they scorn to make a poormouth over their poverty, which I take to be the better part ofmanliness. I have heard a woman in quite a better position athome, with a good bit of money in hand, refer to her own child witha horrid whine as 'a poor man's child. ' I would not say such athing to the Duke of Westminster. And the French are full of thisspirit of independence. Perhaps it is the result of republicaninstitutions, as they call them. Much more likely it is becausethere are so few people really poor, that the whiners are notenough to keep each other in countenance. 

The people on the barge were delighted to hear that I admired theirstate. They understood perfectly well, they told me, how Monsieurenvied them. Without doubt Monsieur was rich; and in that case hemight make a canal boat as pretty as a villa--joli comme unchateau. And with that they invited me on board their own watervilla. They apologised for their cabin; they had not been richenough to make it as it ought to be. 

'The fire should have been here, at this side. ' explained thehusband. 'Then one might have a writing-table in the middle--books--and' (comprehensively) 'all. It would be quite coquettish--ca serait tout-a-fait coquet. ' And he looked about him as thoughthe improvements were already made. It was plainly not the firsttime that he had thus beautified his cabin in imagination; and whennext he makes a bit, I should expect to see the writing-table inthe middle. 

Madame had three birds in a cage. They were no great thing, sheexplained. Fine birds were so dear. They had sought to get aHollandais last winter in Rouen (Rouen? thought I; and is thiswhole mansion, with its dogs and birds and smoking chimneys, so fara traveller as that? and as homely an object among the cliffs andorchards of the Seine as on the green plains of Sambre?)--they hadsought to get a Hollandais last winter in Rouen; but these costfifteen francs apiece--picture it--fifteen francs!

'Pour un tout petit oiseau--For quite a little bird, ' added thehusband. 

As I continued to admire, the apologetics died away, and the goodpeople began to brag of their barge, and their happy condition inlife, as if they had been Emperor and Empress of the Indies. Itwas, in the Scots phrase, a good hearing, and put me in good humourwith the world. If people knew what an inspiriting thing it is tohear a man boasting, so long as he boasts of what he really has, Ibelieve they would do it more freely and with a better grace. 

They began to ask about our voyage. You should have seen how theysympathised. They seemed half ready to give up their barge andfollow us. But these canaletti are only gypsies semi-domesticated. The semi-domestication came out in rather a pretty form. SuddenlyMadam's brow darkened. 'Cependant, ' she began, and then stopped;and then began again by asking me if I were single?

'Yes, ' said I. 

'And your friend who went by just now?'

He also was unmarried. 

O then--all was well. She could not have wives left alone at home;but since there were no wives in the question, we were doing thebest we could. 

'To see about one in the world, ' said the husband, 'il n'y a queca--there is nothing else worth while. A man, look you, who sticksin his own village like a bear, ' he went on, '--very well, he seesnothing. And then death is the end of all. And he has seennothing. '

Madame reminded her husband of an Englishman who had come up thiscanal in a steamer. 

'Perhaps Mr. Moens in the Ytene, ' I suggested. 

'That's it, ' assented the husband. 'He had his wife and familywith him, and servants. He came ashore at all the locks and askedthe name of the villages, whether from boatmen or lock-keepers; andthen he wrote, wrote them down. Oh, he wrote enormously! Isuppose it was a wager. '

A wager was a common enough explanation for our own exploits, butit seemed an original reason for taking notes. 

THE OISE IN FLOOD

Before nine next morning the two canoes were installed on a lightcountry cart at Etreux: and we were soon following them along theside of a pleasant valley full of hop-gardens and poplars. Agreeable villages lay here and there on the slope of the hill;notably, Tupigny, with the hop-poles hanging their garlands in thevery street, and the houses clustered with grapes. There was afaint enthusiasm on our passage; weavers put their heads to thewindows; children cried out in ecstasy at sight of the two'boaties'--barguettes: and bloused pedestrians, who wereacquainted with our charioteer, jested with him on the nature ofhis freight. 

We had a shower or two, but light and flying. The air was cleanand sweet among all these green fields and green things growing. There was not a touch of autumn in the weather. And when, atVadencourt, we launched from a little lawn opposite a mill, the sunbroke forth and set all the leaves shining in the valley of theOise. 

The river was swollen with the long rains. From Vadencourt all theway to Origny, it ran with ever-quickening speed, taking freshheart at each mile, and racing as though it already smelt the sea. The water was yellow and turbulent, swung with an angry eddy amonghalf-submerged willows, and made an angry clatter along stonyshores. The course kept turning and turning in a narrow and well-timbered valley. Now the river would approach the side, and rungriding along the chalky base of the hill, and show us a few opencolza-fields among the trees. Now it would skirt the garden-wallsof houses, where we might catch a glimpse through a doorway, andsee a priest pacing in the chequered sunlight. Again, the foliageclosed so thickly in front, that there seemed to be no issue; onlya thicket of willows, overtopped by elms and poplars, under whichthe river ran flush and fleet, and where a kingfisher flew pastlike a piece of the blue sky. On these different manifestationsthe sun poured its clear and catholic looks. The shadows lay assolid on the swift surface of the stream as on the stable meadows. The light sparkled golden in the dancing poplar leaves, and broughtthe hills into communion with our eyes. And all the while theriver never stopped running or took breath; and the reeds along thewhole valley stood shivering from top to toe. 

There should be some myth (but if there is, I know it not) foundedon the shivering of the reeds. There are not many things in naturemore striking to man's eye. It is such an eloquent pantomime ofterror; and to see such a number of terrified creatures takingsanctuary in every nook along the shore, is enough to infect asilly human with alarm. Perhaps they are only a-cold, and nowonder, standing waist-deep in the stream. Or perhaps they havenever got accustomed to the speed and fury of the river's flux, orthe miracle of its continuous body. Pan once played upon theirforefathers; and so, by the hands of his river, he still plays uponthese later generations down all the valley of the Oise; and playsthe same air, both sweet and shrill, to tell us of the beauty andthe terror of the world. 

The canoe was like a leaf in the current. It took it up and shookit, and carried it masterfully away, like a Centaur carrying off anymph. To keep some command on our direction required hard anddiligent plying of the paddle. The river was in such a hurry forthe sea! Every drop of water ran in a panic, like as many peoplein a frightened crowd. But what crowd was ever so numerous, or sosingle-minded? All the objects of sight went by at a dancemeasure; the eyesight raced with the racing river; the exigenciesof every moment kept the pegs screwed so tight, that our beingquivered like a well-tuned instrument; and the blood shook off itslethargy, and trotted through all the highways and byways of theveins and arteries, and in and out of the heart, as if circulationwere but a holiday journey, and not the daily moil of threescoreyears and ten. The reeds might nod their heads in warning, andwith tremulous gestures tell how the river was as cruel as it wasstrong and cold, and how death lurked in the eddy underneath thewillows. But the reeds had to stand where they were; and those whostand still are always timid advisers. As for us, we could haveshouted aloud. If this lively and beautiful river were, indeed, athing of death's contrivance, the old ashen rogue had famouslyoutwitted himself with us. I was living three to the minute. Iwas scoring points against him every stroke of my paddle, everyturn of the stream. I have rarely had better profit of my life. 

For I think we may look upon our little private war with deathsomewhat in this light. If a man knows he will sooner or later berobbed upon a journey, he will have a bottle of the best in everyinn, and look upon all his extravagances as so much gained upon thethieves. And above all, where instead of simply spending, he makesa profitable investment for some of his money, when it will be outof risk of loss. So every bit of brisk living, and above all whenit is healthful, is just so much gained upon the wholesale filcher, death. We shall have the less in our pockets, the more in ourstomach, when he cries stand and deliver. A swift stream is afavourite artifice of his, and one that brings him in a comfortablething per annum; but when he and I come to settle our accounts, Ishall whistle in his face for these hours upon the upper Oise. 

Towards afternoon we got fairly drunken with the sunshine and theexhilaration of the pace. We could no longer contain ourselves andour content. The canoes were too small for us; we must be out andstretch ourselves on shore. And so in a green meadow we bestowedour limbs on the grass, and smoked deifying tobacco and proclaimedthe world excellent. It was the last good hour of the day, and Idwell upon it with extreme complacency. 

On one side of the valley, high up on the chalky summit of thehill, a ploughman with his team appeared and disappeared at regularintervals. At each revelation he stood still for a few secondsagainst the sky: for all the world (as the Cigarette declared)like a toy Burns who should have just ploughed up the MountainDaisy. He was the only living thing within view, unless we are tocount the river. 

On the other side of the valley a group of red roofs and a belfryshowed among the foliage. Thence some inspired bell-ringer madethe afternoon musical on a chime of bells. There was somethingvery sweet and taking in the air he played; and we thought we hadnever heard bells speak so intelligibly, or sing so melodiously, asthese. It must have been to some such measure that the spinnersand the young maids sang, 'Come away, Death, ' in the ShakespearianIllyria. There is so often a threatening note, something blatantand metallic, in the voice of bells, that I believe we have fullymore pain than pleasure from hearing them; but these, as theysounded abroad, now high, now low, now with a plaintive cadencethat caught the ear like the burthen of a popular song, were alwaysmoderate and tunable, and seemed to fall in with the spirit ofstill, rustic places, like the noise of a waterfall or the babbleof a rookery in spring. I could have asked the bell-ringer for hisblessing, good, sedate old man, who swung the rope so gently to thetime of his meditations. I could have blessed the priest or theheritors, or whoever may be concerned with such affairs in France, who had left these sweet old bells to gladden the afternoon, andnot held meetings, and made collections, and had their namesrepeatedly printed in the local paper, to rig up a peal of brand-new, brazen, Birmingham-hearted substitutes, who should bombardtheir sides to the provocation of a brand-new bell-ringer, and fillthe echoes of the valley with terror and riot. 

At last the bells ceased, and with their note the sun withdrew. The piece was at an end; shadow and silence possessed the valley ofthe Oise. We took to the paddle with glad hearts, like people whohave sat out a noble performance and returned to work. The riverwas more dangerous here; it ran swifter, the eddies were moresudden and violent. All the way down we had had our fill ofdifficulties. Sometimes it was a weir which could be shot, sometimes one so shallow and full of stakes that we must withdrawthe boats from the water and carry them round. But the chief sortof obstacle was a consequence of the late high winds. Every two orthree hundred yards a tree had fallen across the river, and usuallyinvolved more than another in its fall. 

Often there was free water at the end, and we could steer round theleafy promontory and hear the water sucking and bubbling among thetwigs. Often, again, when the tree reached from bank to bank, there was room, by lying close, to shoot through underneath, canoeand all. Sometimes it was necessary to get out upon the trunkitself and pull the boats across; and sometimes, when the streamwas too impetuous for this, there was nothing for it but to landand 'carry over. ' This made a fine series of accidents in theday's career, and kept us aware of ourselves. 

Shortly after our re-embarkation, while I was leading by a longway, and still full of a noble, exulting spirit in honour of thesun, the swift pace, and the church bells, the river made one ofits leonine pounces round a corner, and I was aware of anotherfallen tree within a stone-cast. I had my backboard down in atrice, and aimed for a place where the trunk seemed high enoughabove the water, and the branches not too thick to let me slipbelow. When a man has just vowed eternal brotherhood with theuniverse, he is not in a temper to take great determinationscoolly, and this, which might have been a very importantdetermination for me, had not been taken under a happy star. Thetree caught me about the chest, and while I was yet struggling tomake less of myself and get through, the river took the matter outof my hands, and bereaved me of my boat. The Arethusa swung roundbroadside on, leaned over, ejected so much of me as still remainedon board, and thus disencumbered, whipped under the tree, righted, and went merrily away down stream. 

I do not know how long it was before I scrambled on to the tree towhich I was left clinging, but it was longer than I cared about. My thoughts were of a grave and almost sombre character, but Istill clung to my paddle. The stream ran away with my heels asfast as I could pull up my shoulders, and I seemed, by the weight, to have all the water of the Oise in my trousers-pockets. You cannever know, till you try it, what a dead pull a river makes againsta man. Death himself had me by the heels, for this was his lastambuscado, and he must now join personally in the fray. And stillI held to my paddle. At last I dragged myself on to my stomach onthe trunk, and lay there a breathless sop, with a mingled sense ofhumour and injustice. A poor figure I must have presented to Burnsupon the hill-top with his team. But there was the paddle in myhand. On my tomb, if ever I have one, I mean to get these wordsinscribed: 'He clung to his paddle. '

The Cigarette had gone past a while before; for, as I might haveobserved, if I had been a little less pleased with the universe atthe moment, there was a clear way round the tree-top at the fartherside. He had offered his services to haul me out, but as I wasthen already on my elbows, I had declined, and sent him down streamafter the truant Arethusa. The stream was too rapid for a man tomount with one canoe, let alone two, upon his hands. So I crawledalong the trunk to shore, and proceeded down the meadows by theriver-side. I was so cold that my heart was sore. I had now anidea of my own why the reeds so bitterly shivered. I could havegiven any of them a lesson. The Cigarette remarked facetiouslythat he thought I was 'taking exercise' as I drew near, until hemade out for certain that I was only twittering with cold. I had arub down with a towel, and donned a dry suit from the india-rubberbag. But I was not my own man again for the rest of the voyage. Ihad a queasy sense that I wore my last dry clothes upon my body. The struggle had tired me; and perhaps, whether I knew it or not, Iwas a little dashed in spirit. The devouring element in theuniverse had leaped out against me, in this green valley quickenedby a running stream. The bells were all very pretty in their way, but I had heard some of the hollow notes of Pan's music. Would thewicked river drag me down by the heels, indeed? and look sobeautiful all the time? Nature's good-humour was only skin-deepafter all. 

There was still a long way to go by the winding course of thestream, and darkness had fallen, and a late bell was ringing inOrigny Sainte-Benoite, when we arrived. 

ORIGNY SAINTE-BENOITE

A BY-DAY

The next day was Sunday, and the church bells had little rest;indeed, I do not think I remember anywhere else so great a choiceof services as were here offered to the devout. And while thebells made merry in the sunshine, all the world with his dog wasout shooting among the beets and colza. 

In the morning a hawker and his wife went down the street at afoot-pace, singing to a very slow, lamentable music 'O France, mesamours. ' It brought everybody to the door; and when our landladycalled in the man to buy the words, he had not a copy of them left. She was not the first nor the second who had been taken with thesong. There is something very pathetic in the love of the Frenchpeople, since the war, for dismal patriotic music-making. I havewatched a forester from Alsace while some one was singing 'Lesmalheurs de la France, ' at a baptismal party in the neighbourhoodof Fontainebleau. He arose from the table and took his son aside, close by where I was standing. 'Listen, listen, ' he said, bearingon the boy's shoulder, 'and remember this, my son. ' A little afterhe went out into the garden suddenly, and I could hear him sobbingin the darkness. 

The humiliation of their arms and the loss of Alsace and Lorrainemade a sore pull on the endurance of this sensitive people; andtheir hearts are still hot, not so much against Germany as againstthe Empire. In what other country will you find a patriotic dittybring all the world into the street? But affliction heightenslove; and we shall never know we are Englishmen until we have lostIndia. Independent America is still the cross of my existence; Icannot think of Farmer George without abhorrence; and I never feelmore warmly to my own land than when I see the Stars and Stripes, and remember what our empire might have been. 

The hawker's little book, which I purchased, was a curious mixture. Side by side with the flippant, rowdy nonsense of the Paris music-halls, there were many pastoral pieces, not without a touch ofpoetry, I thought, and instinct with the brave independence of thepoorer class in France. There you might read how the wood-cuttergloried in his axe, and the gardener scorned to be ashamed of hisspade. It was not very well written, this poetry of labour, butthe pluck of the sentiment redeemed what was weak or wordy in theexpression. The martial and the patriotic pieces, on the otherhand, were tearful, womanish productions one and all. The poet hadpassed under the Caudine Forks; he sang for an army visiting thetomb of its old renown, with arms reversed; and sang not ofvictory, but of death. There was a number in the hawker'scollection called 'Conscrits Francais, ' which may rank among themost dissuasive war-lyrics on record. It would not be possible tofight at all in such a spirit. The bravest conscript would turnpale if such a ditty were struck up beside him on the morning ofbattle; and whole regiments would pile their arms to its tune. 

If Fletcher of Saltoun is in the right about the influence ofnational songs, you would say France was come to a poor pass. Butthe thing will work its own cure, and a sound-hearted andcourageous people weary at length of snivelling over theirdisasters. Already Paul Deroulede has written some manly militaryverses. There is not much of the trumpet note in them, perhaps, tostir a man's heart in his bosom; they lack the lyrical elation, andmove slowly; but they are written in a grave, honourable, stoicalspirit, which should carry soldiers far in a good cause. One feelsas if one would like to trust Deroulede with something. It will behappy if he can so far inoculate his fellow-countrymen that theymay be trusted with their own future. And in the meantime, here isan antidote to 'French Conscripts' and much other dolefulversification. 

We had left the boats over-night in the custody of one whom weshall call Carnival. I did not properly catch his name, andperhaps that was not unfortunate for him, as I am not in a positionto hand him down with honour to posterity. To this person'spremises we strolled in the course of the day, and found quite alittle deputation inspecting the canoes. There was a stoutgentleman with a knowledge of the river, which he seemed eager toimpart. There was a very elegant young gentleman in a black coat, with a smattering of English, who led the talk at once to theOxford and Cambridge Boat Race. And then there were three handsomegirls from fifteen to twenty; and an old gentleman in a blouse, with no teeth to speak of, and a strong country accent. Quite thepick of Origny, I should suppose. 

The Cigarette had some mysteries to perform with his rigging in thecoach-house; so I was left to do the parade single-handed. I foundmyself very much of a hero whether I would or not. The girls werefull of little shudderings over the dangers of our journey. And Ithought it would be ungallant not to take my cue from the ladies. My mishap of yesterday, told in an off-hand way, produced a deepsensation. It was Othello over again, with no less than threeDesdemonas and a sprinkling of sympathetic senators in thebackground. Never were the canoes more flattered, or flatteredmore adroitly. 

'It is like a violin, ' cried one of the girls in an ecstasy. 

'I thank you for the word, mademoiselle, ' said I. 'All the moresince there are people who call out to me that it is like acoffin. '

'Oh! but it is really like a violin. It is finished like aviolin, ' she went on. 

'And polished like a violin, ' added a senator. 

'One has only to stretch the cords, ' concluded another, 'and thentum-tumty-tum'--he imitated the result with spirit. 

Was not this a graceful little ovation? Where this people findsthe secret of its pretty speeches, I cannot imagine; unless thesecret should be no other than a sincere desire to please? But thenno disgrace is attached in France to saying a thing neatly; whereasin England, to talk like a book is to give in one's resignation tosociety. 

The old gentleman in the blouse stole into the coach-house, andsomewhat irrelevantly informed the Cigarette that he was the fatherof the three girls and four more: quite an exploit for aFrenchman. 

'You are very fortunate, ' answered the Cigarette politely. 

And the old gentleman, having apparently gained his point, stoleaway again. 

We all got very friendly together. The girls proposed to startwith us on the morrow, if you please! And, jesting apart, everyone was anxious to know the hour of our departure. Now, when youare going to crawl into your canoe from a bad launch, a crowd, however friendly, is undesirable; and so we told them not beforetwelve, and mentally determined to be off by ten at latest. 

Towards evening, we went abroad again to post some letters. It wascool and pleasant; the long village was quite empty, except for oneor two urchins who followed us as they might have followed amenagerie; the hills and the tree-tops looked in from all sidesthrough the clear air; and the bells were chiming for yet anotherservice. 

Suddenly we sighted the three girls standing, with a fourth sister, in front of a shop on the wide selvage of the roadway. We had beenvery merry with them a little while ago, to be sure. But what wasthe etiquette of Origny? Had it been a country road, of course weshould have spoken to them; but here, under the eyes of all thegossips, ought we to do even as much as bow? I consulted theCigarette. 

'Look, ' said he. 

I looked. There were the four girls on the same spot; but now fourbacks were turned to us, very upright and conscious. CorporalModesty had given the word of command, and the well-disciplinedpicket had gone right-about-face like a single person. Theymaintained this formation all the while we were in sight; but weheard them tittering among themselves, and the girl whom we had notmet laughed with open mouth, and even looked over her shoulder atthe enemy. I wonder was it altogether modesty after all? or inpart a sort of country provocation?

As we were returning to the inn, we beheld something floating inthe ample field of golden evening sky, above the chalk cliffs andthe trees that grow along their summit. It was too high up, toolarge, and too steady for a kite; and as it was dark, it could notbe a star. For although a star were as black as ink and as ruggedas a walnut, so amply does the sun bathe heaven with radiance, thatit would sparkle like a point of light for us. The village wasdotted with people with their heads in air; and the children werein a bustle all along the street and far up the straight road thatclimbs the hill, where we could still see them running in looseknots. It was a balloon, we learned, which had left Saint Quentinat half-past five that evening. Mighty composedly the majority ofthe grown people took it. But we were English, and were soonrunning up the hill with the best. Being travellers ourselves in asmall way, we would fain have seen these other travellers alight. 

The spectacle was over by the time we gained the top of the hill. All the gold had withered out of the sky, and the balloon haddisappeared. Whither? I ask myself; caught up into the seventhheaven? or come safely to land somewhere in that blue unevendistance, into which the roadway dipped and melted before our eyes?Probably the aeronauts were already warming themselves at a farmchimney, for they say it is cold in these unhomely regions of theair. The night fell swiftly. Roadside trees and disappointedsightseers, returning through the meadows, stood out in blackagainst a margin of low red sunset. It was cheerfuller to face theother way, and so down the hill we went, with a full moon, thecolour of a melon, swinging high above the wooded valley, and thewhite cliffs behind us faintly reddened by the fire of the chalkkilns. 

The lamps were lighted, and the salads were being made in OrignySainte-Benoite by the river. 

ORIGNY SAINTE-BENOITE

THE COMPANY AT TABLE

Although we came late for dinner, the company at table treated usto sparkling wine. 'That is how we are in France, ' said one. 'Those who sit down with us are our friends. ' And the restapplauded. 

They were three altogether, and an odd trio to pass the Sundaywith. 

Two of them were guests like ourselves, both men of the north. Oneruddy, and of a full habit of body, with copious black hair andbeard, the intrepid hunter of France, who thought nothing so small, not even a lark or a minnow, but he might vindicate his prowess byits capture. For such a great, healthy man, his hair flourishinglike Samson's, his arteries running buckets of red blood, to boastof these infinitesimal exploits, produced a feeling ofdisproportion in the world, as when a steam-hammer is set tocracking nuts. The other was a quiet, subdued person, blond andlymphatic and sad, with something the look of a Dane: 'Tristestetes de Danois!' as Gaston Lafenestre used to say. 

I must not let that name go by without a word for the best of allgood fellows now gone down into the dust. We shall never again seeGaston in his forest costume--he was Gaston with all the world, inaffection, not in disrespect--nor hear him wake the echoes ofFontainebleau with the woodland horn. Never again shall his kindsmile put peace among all races of artistic men, and make theEnglishman at home in France. Never more shall the sheep, who werenot more innocent at heart than he, sit all unconsciously for hisindustrious pencil. He died too early, at the very moment when hewas beginning to put forth fresh sprouts, and blossom intosomething worthy of himself; and yet none who knew him will thinkhe lived in vain. I never knew a man so little, for whom yet I hadso much affection; and I find it a good test of others, how muchthey had learned to understand and value him. His was indeed agood influence in life while he was still among us; he had a freshlaugh, it did you good to see him; and however sad he may have beenat heart, he always bore a bold and cheerful countenance, and tookfortune's worst as it were the showers of spring. But now hismother sits alone by the side of Fontainebleau woods, where hegathered mushrooms in his hardy and penurious youth. 

Many of his pictures found their way across the Channel: besidesthose which were stolen, when a dastardly Yankee left him alone inLondon with two English pence, and perhaps twice as many words ofEnglish. If any one who reads these lines should have a scene ofsheep, in the manner of Jacques, with this fine creature'ssignature, let him tell himself that one of the kindest and bravestof men has lent a hand to decorate his lodging. There may bebetter pictures in the National Gallery; but not a painter amongthe generations had a better heart. Precious in the sight of theLord of humanity, the Psalms tell us, is the death of his saints. It had need to be precious; for it is very costly, when by thestroke, a mother is left desolate, and the peace-maker, and peace-looker, of a whole society is laid in the ground with Caesar andthe Twelve Apostles. 

There is something lacking among the oaks of Fontainebleau; andwhen the dessert comes in at Barbizon, people look to the door fora figure that is gone. 

The third of our companions at Origny was no less a person than thelandlady's husband: not properly the landlord, since he workedhimself in a factory during the day, and came to his own house atevening as a guest: a man worn to skin and bone by perpetualexcitement, with baldish head, sharp features, and swift, shiningeyes. On Saturday, describing some paltry adventure at a duck-hunt, he broke a plate into a score of fragments. Whenever he madea remark, he would look all round the table with his chin raised, and a spark of green light in either eye, seeking approval. Hiswife appeared now and again in the doorway of the room, where shewas superintending dinner, with a 'Henri, you forget yourself, ' ora 'Henri, you can surely talk without making such a noise. 'Indeed, that was what the honest fellow could not do. On the mosttrifling matter his eyes kindled, his fist visited the table, andhis voice rolled abroad in changeful thunder. I never saw such apetard of a man; I think the devil was in him. He had twofavourite expressions: 'it is logical, ' or illogical, as the casemight be: and this other, thrown out with a certain bravado, as aman might unfurl a banner, at the beginning of many a long andsonorous story: 'I am a proletarian, you see. ' Indeed, we saw itvery well. God forbid that ever I should find him handling a gunin Paris streets! That will not be a good moment for the generalpublic. 

I thought his two phrases very much represented the good and evilof his class, and to some extent of his country. It is a strongthing to say what one is, and not be ashamed of it; even althoughit be in doubtful taste to repeat the statement too often in oneevening. I should not admire it in a duke, of course; but as timesgo, the trait is honourable in a workman. On the other hand, it isnot at all a strong thing to put one's reliance upon logic; and ourown logic particularly, for it is generally wrong. We never knowwhere we are to end, if once we begin following words or doctors. There is an upright stock in a man's own heart, that is trustierthan any syllogism; and the eyes, and the sympathies and appetites, know a thing or two that have never yet been stated in controversy. Reasons are as plentiful as blackberries; and, like fisticuffs, they serve impartially with all sides. Doctrines do not stand orfall by their proofs, and are only logical in so far as they arecleverly put. An able controversialist no more than an ablegeneral demonstrates the justice of his cause. But France is allgone wandering after one or two big words; it will take some timebefore they can be satisfied that they are no more than words, however big; and when once that is done, they will perhaps findlogic less diverting. 

The conversation opened with details of the day's shooting. Whenall the sportsmen of a village shoot over the village territory proindiviso, it is plain that many questions of etiquette and prioritymust arise. 

'Here now, ' cried the landlord, brandishing a plate, 'here is afield of beet-root. Well. Here am I then. I advance, do I not?Eh bien! sacristi, ' and the statement, waxing louder, rolls offinto a reverberation of oaths, the speaker glaring about forsympathy, and everybody nodding his head to him in the name ofpeace. 

The ruddy Northman told some tales of his own prowess in keepingorder: notably one of a Marquis. 

'Marquis, ' I said, 'if you take another step I fire upon you. Youhave committed a dirtiness, Marquis. '

Whereupon, it appeared, the Marquis touched his cap and withdrew. 

The landlord applauded noisily. 'It was well done, ' he said. 'Hedid all that he could. He admitted he was wrong. ' And then oathupon oath. He was no marquis-lover either, but he had a sense ofjustice in him, this proletarian host of ours. 

From the matter of hunting, the talk veered into a generalcomparison of Paris and the country. The proletarian beat thetable like a drum in praise of Paris. 'What is Paris? Paris isthe cream of France. There are no Parisians: it is you and I andeverybody who are Parisians. A man has eighty chances per cent. Toget on in the world in Paris. ' And he drew a vivid sketch of theworkman in a den no bigger than a dog-hutch, making articles thatwere to go all over the world. 'Eh bien, quoi, c'est magnifique, ca!' cried he. 

The sad Northman interfered in praise of a peasant's life; hethought Paris bad for men and women; 'centralisation, ' said he -

But the landlord was at his throat in a moment. It was alllogical, he showed him; and all magnificent. 'What a spectacle!What a glance for an eye!' And the dishes reeled upon the tableunder a cannonade of blows. 

Seeking to make peace, I threw in a word in praise of the libertyof opinion in France. I could hardly have shot more amiss. Therewas an instant silence, and a great wagging of significant heads. They did not fancy the subject, it was plain; but they gave me tounderstand that the sad Northman was a martyr on account of hisviews. 'Ask him a bit, ' said they. 'Just ask him. '

'Yes, sir, ' said he in his quiet way, answering me, although I hadnot spoken, 'I am afraid there is less liberty of opinion in Francethan you may imagine. ' And with that he dropped his eyes, andseemed to consider the subject at an end. 

Our curiosity was mightily excited at this. How, or why, or when, was this lymphatic bagman martyred? We concluded at once it was onsome religious question, and brushed up our memories of theInquisition, which were principally drawn from Poe's horrid story, and the sermon in Tristram Shandy, I believe. 

On the morrow we had an opportunity of going further into thequestion; for when we rose very early to avoid a sympathisingdeputation at our departure, we found the hero up before us. Hewas breaking his fast on white wine and raw onions, in order tokeep up the character of martyr, I conclude. We had a longconversation, and made out what we wanted in spite of his reserve. But here was a truly curious circumstance. It seems possible fortwo Scotsmen and a Frenchman to discuss during a long half-hour, and each nationality have a different idea in view throughout. Itwas not till the very end that we discovered his heresy had beenpolitical, or that he suspected our mistake. The terms and spiritin which he spoke of his political beliefs were, in our eyes, suited to religious beliefs. And vice versa. 

Nothing could be more characteristic of the two countries. Politics are the religion of France; as Nanty Ewart would havesaid, 'A d-d bad religion'; while we, at home, keep most of ourbitterness for little differences about a hymn-book, or a Hebrewword which perhaps neither of the parties can translate. Andperhaps the misconception is typical of many others that may neverbe cleared up: not only between people of different race, butbetween those of different sex. 

As for our friend's martyrdom, he was a Communist, or perhaps onlya Communard, which is a very different thing; and had lost one ormore situations in consequence. I think he had also been rejectedin marriage; but perhaps he had a sentimental way of consideringbusiness which deceived me. He was a mild, gentle creature, anyway; and I hope he has got a better situation, and married amore suitable wife since then. 

DOWN THE OISE

TO MOY

Carnival notoriously cheated us at first. Finding us easy in ourways, he regretted having let us off so cheaply; and taking measide, told me a cock-and-bull story with the moral of another fivefrancs for the narrator. The thing was palpably absurd; but I paidup, and at once dropped all friendliness of manner, and kept him inhis place as an inferior with freezing British dignity. He saw ina moment that he had gone too far, and killed a willing horse; hisface fell; I am sure he would have refunded if he could only havethought of a decent pretext. He wished me to drink with him, but Iwould none of his drinks. He grew pathetically tender in hisprofessions; but I walked beside him in silence or answered him instately courtesies; and when we got to the landing-place, passedthe word in English slang to the Cigarette. 

In spite of the false scent we had thrown out the day before, theremust have been fifty people about the bridge. We were as pleasantas we could be with all but Carnival. We said good-bye, shakinghands with the old gentleman who knew the river and the younggentleman who had a smattering of English; but never a word forCarnival. Poor Carnival! here was a humiliation. He who had beenso much identified with the canoes, who had given orders in ourname, who had shown off the boats and even the boatmen like aprivate exhibition of his own, to be now so publicly shamed by thelions of his caravan! I never saw anybody look more crestfallenthan he. He hung in the background, coming timidly forward everand again as he thought he saw some symptom of a relenting humour, and falling hurriedly back when he encountered a cold stare. Letus hope it will be a lesson to him. 

I would not have mentioned Carnival's peccadillo had not the thingbeen so uncommon in France. This, for instance, was the only caseof dishonesty or even sharp practice in our whole voyage. We talkvery much about our honesty in England. It is a good rule to be onyour guard wherever you hear great professions about a very littlepiece of virtue. If the English could only hear how they arespoken of abroad, they might confine themselves for a while toremedying the fact; and perhaps even when that was done, give usfewer of their airs. 

The young ladies, the graces of Origny, were not present at ourstart, but when we got round to the second bridge, behold, it wasblack with sightseers! We were loudly cheered, and for a good waybelow, young lads and lasses ran along the bank still cheering. What with current and paddling, we were flashing along likeswallows. It was no joke to keep up with us upon the woody shore. But the girls picked up their skirts, as if they were sure they hadgood ankles, and followed until their breath was out. The last toweary were the three graces and a couple of companions; and just asthey too had had enough, the foremost of the three leaped upon atree-stump and kissed her hand to the canoeists. Not Dianaherself, although this was more of a Venus after all, could havedone a graceful thing more gracefully. 'Come back again!' shecried; and all the others echoed her; and the hills about Orignyrepeated the words, 'Come back. ' But the river had us round anangle in a twinkling, and we were alone with the green trees andrunning water. 

Come back? There is no coming back, young ladies, on the impetuousstream of life. 

'The merchant bows unto the seaman's star, The ploughman from the sun his season takes. '

And we must all set our pocket-watches by the clock of fate. Thereis a headlong, forthright tide, that bears away man with hisfancies like a straw, and runs fast in time and space. It is fullof curves like this, your winding river of the Oise; and lingersand returns in pleasant pastorals; and yet, rightly thought upon, never returns at all. For though it should revisit the same acreof meadow in the same hour, it will have made an ample sweepbetween-whiles; many little streams will have fallen in; manyexhalations risen towards the sun; and even although it were thesame acre, it will no more be the same river of Oise. And thus, Ograces of Origny, although the wandering fortune of my life shouldcarry me back again to where you await death's whistle by theriver, that will not be the old I who walks the street; and thosewives and mothers, say, will those be you?

There was never any mistake about the Oise, as a matter of fact. In these upper reaches it was still in a prodigious hurry for thesea. It ran so fast and merrily, through all the windings of itschannel, that I strained my thumb, fighting with the rapids, andhad to paddle all the rest of the way with one hand turned up. Sometimes it had to serve mills; and being still a little river, ran very dry and shallow in the meanwhile. We had to put our legsout of the boat, and shove ourselves off the sand of the bottomwith our feet. And still it went on its way singing among thepoplars, and making a green valley in the world. After a goodwoman, and a good book, and tobacco, there is nothing so agreeableon earth as a river. I forgave it its attempt on my life; whichwas after all one part owing to the unruly winds of heaven that hadblown down the tree, one part to my own mismanagement, and only athird part to the river itself, and that not out of malice, butfrom its great preoccupation over its business of getting to thesea. A difficult business, too; for the detours it had to make arenot to be counted. The geographers seem to have given up theattempt; for I found no map represent the infinite contortion ofits course. A fact will say more than any of them. After we hadbeen some hours, three if I mistake not, flitting by the trees atthis smooth, break-neck gallop, when we came upon a hamlet andasked where we were, we had got no farther than four kilometres(say two miles and a half) from Origny. If it were not for thehonour of the thing (in the Scots saying), we might almost as wellhave been standing still. 

We lunched on a meadow inside a parallelogram of poplars. Theleaves danced and prattled in the wind all round about us. Theriver hurried on meanwhile, and seemed to chide at our delay. Little we cared. The river knew where it was going; not so we:the less our hurry, where we found good quarters and a pleasanttheatre for a pipe. At that hour, stockbrokers were shouting inParis Bourse for two or three per cent. ; but we minded them aslittle as the sliding stream, and sacrificed a hecatomb of minutesto the gods of tobacco and digestion. Hurry is the resource of thefaithless. Where a man can trust his own heart, and those of hisfriends, to-morrow is as good as to-day. And if he die in themeanwhile, why then, there he dies, and the question is solved. 

We had to take to the canal in the course of the afternoon;because, where it crossed the river, there was, not a bridge, but asiphon. If it had not been for an excited fellow on the bank, weshould have paddled right into the siphon, and thenceforward notpaddled any more. We met a man, a gentleman, on the tow-path, whowas much interested in our cruise. And I was witness to a strangeseizure of lying suffered by the Cigarette: who, because his knifecame from Norway, narrated all sorts of adventures in that country, where he has never been. He was quite feverish at the end, andpleaded demoniacal possession. 

Moy (pronounce Moy) was a pleasant little village, gathered round achateau in a moat. The air was perfumed with hemp fromneighbouring fields. At the Golden Sheep we found excellententertainment. German shells from the siege of La Fere, Nurnbergfigures, gold-fish in a bowl, and all manner of knick-knacks, embellished the public room. The landlady was a stout, plain, short-sighted, motherly body, with something not far short of agenius for cookery. She had a guess of her excellence herself. After every dish was sent in, she would come and look on at thedinner for a while, with puckered, blinking eyes. 'C'est bon, n'est-ce pas?' she would say; and when she had received a properanswer, she disappeared into the kitchen. That common French dish, partridge and cabbages, became a new thing in my eyes at the GoldenSheep; and many subsequent dinners have bitterly disappointed me inconsequence. Sweet was our rest in the Golden Sheep at Moy. 

LA FERE OF CURSED MEMORY

We lingered in Moy a good part of the day, for we were fond ofbeing philosophical, and scorned long journeys and early starts onprinciple. The place, moreover, invited to repose. People inelaborate shooting costumes sallied from the chateau with guns andgame-bags; and this was a pleasure in itself, to remain behindwhile these elegant pleasure-seekers took the first of the morning. In this way, all the world may be an aristocrat, and play the dukeamong marquises, and the reigning monarch among dukes, if he willonly outvie them in tranquillity. An imperturbable demeanour comesfrom perfect patience. Quiet minds cannot be perplexed orfrightened, but go on in fortune or misfortune at their own privatepace, like a clock during a thunderstorm. 

We made a very short day of it to La Fere; but the dusk wasfalling, and a small rain had begun before we stowed the boats. LaFere is a fortified town in a plain, and has two belts of rampart. Between the first and the second extends a region of waste land andcultivated patches. Here and there along the wayside were postersforbidding trespass in the name of military engineering. At last, a second gateway admitted us to the town itself. Lighted windowslooked gladsome, whiffs of comfortable cookery came abroad upon theair. The town was full of the military reserve, out for the FrenchAutumn Manoeuvres, and the reservists walked speedily and woretheir formidable great-coats. It was a fine night to be withindoors over dinner, and hear the rain upon the windows. 

The Cigarette and I could not sufficiently congratulate each otheron the prospect, for we had been told there was a capital inn at LaFere. Such a dinner as we were going to eat! such beds as we wereto sleep in!--and all the while the rain raining on houseless folkover all the poplared countryside! It made our mouths water. Theinn bore the name of some woodland animal, stag, or hart, or hind, I forget which. But I shall never forget how spacious and howeminently habitable it looked as we drew near. The carriage entrywas lighted up, not by intention, but from the mere superfluity offire and candle in the house. A rattle of many dishes came to ourears; we sighted a great field of table-cloth; the kitchen glowedlike a forge and smelt like a garden of things to eat. 

Into this, the inmost shrine and physiological heart of a hostelry, with all its furnaces in action, and all its dressers charged withviands, you are now to suppose us making our triumphal entry, apair of damp rag-and-bone men, each with a limp india-rubber bagupon his arm. I do not believe I have a sound view of thatkitchen; I saw it through a sort of glory: but it seemed to mecrowded with the snowy caps of cookmen, who all turned round fromtheir saucepans and looked at us with surprise. There was no doubtabout the landlady, however: there she was, heading her army, aflushed, angry woman, full of affairs. Her I asked politely--toopolitely, thinks the Cigarette--if we could have beds: shesurveying us coldly from head to foot. 

'You will find beds in the suburb, ' she remarked. 'We are too busyfor the like of you. '

If we could make an entrance, change our clothes, and order abottle of wine, I felt sure we could put things right; so said I:'If we cannot sleep, we may at least dine, '--and was for depositingmy bag. 

What a terrible convulsion of nature was that which followed in thelandlady's face! She made a run at us, and stamped her foot. 

'Out with you--out of the door!' she screeched. 'Sortez! sortez!sortez par la porte!'

I do not know how it happened, but next moment we were out in therain and darkness, and I was cursing before the carriage entry likea disappointed mendicant. Where were the boating men of Belgium?where the Judge and his good wines? and where the graces of Origny?Black, black was the night after the firelit kitchen; but what wasthat to the blackness in our heart? This was not the first timethat I have been refused a lodging. Often and often have I plannedwhat I should do if such a misadventure happened to me again. Andnothing is easier to plan. But to put in execution, with the heartboiling at the indignity? Try it; try it only once; and tell mewhat you did. 

It is all very fine to talk about tramps and morality. Six hoursof police surveillance (such as I have had), or one brutalrejection from an inn-door, change your views upon the subject likea course of lectures. As long as you keep in the upper regions, with all the world bowing to you as you go, social arrangementshave a very handsome air; but once get under the wheels, and youwish society were at the devil. I will give most respectable men afortnight of such a life, and then I will offer them twopence forwhat remains of their morality. 

For my part, when I was turned out of the Stag, or the Hind, orwhatever it was, I would have set the temple of Diana on fire, ifit had been handy. There was no crime complete enough to expressmy disapproval of human institutions. As for the Cigarette, Inever knew a man so altered. 'We have been taken for pedlarsagain, ' said he. 'Good God, what it must be to be a pedlar inreality!' He particularised a complaint for every joint in thelandlady's body. Timon was a philanthropist alongside of him. Andthen, when he was at the top of his maledictory bent, he wouldsuddenly break away and begin whimperingly to commiserate the poor. 'I hope to God, ' he said, --and I trust the prayer was answered, --'that I shall never be uncivil to a pedlar. ' Was this theimperturbable Cigarette? This, this was he. O change beyondreport, thought, or belief!

Meantime the heaven wept upon our heads; and the windows grewbrighter as the night increased in darkness. We trudged in and outof La Fere streets; we saw shops, and private houses where peoplewere copiously dining; we saw stables where carters' nags hadplenty of fodder and clean straw; we saw no end of reservists, whowere very sorry for themselves this wet night, I doubt not, andyearned for their country homes; but had they not each man hisplace in La Fere barracks? And we, what had we?

There seemed to be no other inn in the whole town. People gave usdirections, which we followed as best we could, generally with theeffect of bringing us out again upon the scene of our disgrace. Wewere very sad people indeed by the time we had gone all over LaFere; and the Cigarette had already made up his mind to lie under apoplar and sup off a loaf of bread. But right at the other end, the house next the town-gate was full of light and bustle. 'Bazin, aubergiste, loge a pied, ' was the sign. 'A la Croix de Malte. 'There were we received. 

The room was full of noisy reservists drinking and smoking; and wewere very glad indeed when the drums and bugles began to go aboutthe streets, and one and all had to snatch shakoes and be off forthe barracks. 

Bazin was a tall man, running to fat: soft-spoken, with adelicate, gentle face. We asked him to share our wine; but heexcused himself, having pledged reservists all day long. This wasa very different type of the workman-innkeeper from the bawlingdisputatious fellow at Origny. He also loved Paris, where he hadworked as a decorative painter in his youth. There were suchopportunities for self-instruction there, he said. And if any onehas read Zola's description of the workman's marriage-partyvisiting the Louvre, they would do well to have heard Bazin by wayof antidote. He had delighted in the museums in his youth. 'Onesees there little miracles of work, ' he said; 'that is what makes agood workman; it kindles a spark. ' We asked him how he managed inLa Fere. 'I am married, ' he said, 'and I have my pretty children. But frankly, it is no life at all. From morning to night I pledgea pack of good enough fellows who know nothing. '

It faired as the night went on, and the moon came out of theclouds. We sat in front of the door, talking softly with Bazin. At the guard-house opposite, the guard was being for ever turnedout, as trains of field artillery kept clanking in out of thenight, or patrols of horsemen trotted by in their cloaks. MadameBazin came out after a while; she was tired with her day's work, Isuppose; and she nestled up to her husband and laid her head uponhis breast. He had his arm about her, and kept gently patting heron the shoulder. I think Bazin was right, and he was reallymarried. Of how few people can the same be said!

Little did the Bazins know how much they served us. We werecharged for candles, for food and drink, and for the beds we sleptin. But there was nothing in the bill for the husband's pleasanttalk; nor for the pretty spectacle of their married life. Andthere was yet another item unchanged. For these people'spoliteness really set us up again in our own esteem. We had athirst for consideration; the sense of insult was still hot in ourspirits; and civil usage seemed to restore us to our position inthe world. 

How little we pay our way in life! Although we have our pursescontinually in our hand, the better part of service goes stillunrewarded. But I like to fancy that a grateful spirit gives asgood as it gets. Perhaps the Bazins knew how much I liked them?perhaps they also were healed of some slights by the thanks that Igave them in my manner?

DOWN THE OISE

THROUGH THE GOLDEN VALLEY

Below La Fere the river runs through a piece of open pastoralcountry; green, opulent, loved by breeders; called the GoldenValley. In wide sweeps, and with a swift and equable gallop, theceaseless stream of water visits and makes green the fields. Kine, and horses, and little humorous donkeys, browse together in themeadows, and come down in troops to the river-side to drink. Theymake a strange feature in the landscape; above all when they arestartled, and you see them galloping to and fro with theirincongruous forms and faces. It gives a feeling as of great, unfenced pampas, and the herds of wandering nations. There werehills in the distance upon either hand; and on one side, the riversometimes bordered on the wooded spurs of Coucy and St. Gobain. 

The artillery were practising at La Fere; and soon the cannon ofheaven joined in that loud play. Two continents of cloud met andexchanged salvos overhead; while all round the horizon we could seesunshine and clear air upon the hills. What with the guns and thethunder, the herds were all frightened in the Golden Valley. Wecould see them tossing their heads, and running to and fro intimorous indecision; and when they had made up their minds, and thedonkey followed the horse, and the cow was after the donkey, wecould hear their hooves thundering abroad over the meadows. It hada martial sound, like cavalry charges. And altogether, as far asthe ears are concerned, we had a very rousing battle-pieceperformed for our amusement. 

At last the guns and the thunder dropped off; the sun shone on thewet meadows; the air was scented with the breath of rejoicing treesand grass; and the river kept unweariedly carrying us on at itsbest pace. There was a manufacturing district about Chauny; andafter that the banks grew so high that they hid the adjacentcountry, and we could see nothing but clay sides, and one willowafter another. Only, here and there, we passed by a village or aferry, and some wondering child upon the bank would stare after usuntil we turned the corner. I daresay we continued to paddle inthat child's dreams for many a night after. 

Sun and shower alternated like day and night, making the hourslonger by their variety. When the showers were heavy, I could feeleach drop striking through my jersey to my warm skin; and theaccumulation of small shocks put me nearly beside myself. Idecided I should buy a mackintosh at Noyon. It is nothing to getwet; but the misery of these individual pricks of cold all over mybody at the same instant of time made me flail the water with mypaddle like a madman. The Cigarette was greatly amused by theseebullitions. It gave him something else to look at besides claybanks and willows. 

All the time, the river stole away like a thief in straight places, or swung round corners with an eddy; the willows nodded, and wereundermined all day long; the clay banks tumbled in; the Oise, whichhad been so many centuries making the Golden Valley, seemed to havechanged its fancy, and be bent upon undoing its performance. Whata number of things a river does, by simply following Gravity in theinnocence of its heart!

NOYON CATHEDRAL

Noyon stands about a mile from the river, in a little plainsurrounded by wooded hills, and entirely covers an eminence withits tile roofs, surmounted by a long, straight-backed cathedralwith two stiff towers. As we got into the town, the tile roofsseemed to tumble uphill one upon another, in the oddest disorder;but for all their scrambling, they did not attain above the kneesof the cathedral, which stood, upright and solemn, over all. Asthe streets drew near to this presiding genius, through the market-place under the Hotel de Ville, they grew emptier and morecomposed. Blank walls and shuttered windows were turned to thegreat edifice, and grass grew on the white causeway. 'Put off thyshoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest isholy ground. ' The Hotel du Nord, nevertheless, lights its seculartapers within a stone-cast of the church; and we had the superbeast-end before our eyes all morning from the window of ourbedroom. I have seldom looked on the east-end of a church withmore complete sympathy. As it flanges out in three wide terracesand settles down broadly on the earth, it looks like the poop ofsome great old battle-ship. Hollow-backed buttresses carry vases, which figure for the stern lanterns. There is a roll in theground, and the towers just appear above the pitch of the roof, asthough the good ship were bowing lazily over an Atlantic swell. Atany moment it might be a hundred feet away from you, climbing thenext billow. At any moment a window might open, and some oldadmiral thrust forth a cocked hat, and proceed to take anobservation. The old admirals sail the sea no longer; the oldships of battle are all broken up, and live only in pictures; butthis, that was a church before ever they were thought upon, isstill a church, and makes as brave an appearance by the Oise. Thecathedral and the river are probably the two oldest things formiles around; and certainly they have both a grand old age. 

The Sacristan took us to the top of one of the towers, and showedus the five bells hanging in their loft. From above, the town wasa tesselated pavement of roofs and gardens; the old line of rampartwas plainly traceable; and the Sacristan pointed out to us, faracross the plain, in a bit of gleaming sky between two clouds, thetowers of Chateau Coucy. 

I find I never weary of great churches. It is my favourite kind ofmountain scenery. Mankind was never so happily inspired as when itmade a cathedral: a thing as single and specious as a statue tothe first glance, and yet, on examination, as lively andinteresting as a forest in detail. The height of spires cannot betaken by trigonometry; they measure absurdly short, but how tallthey are to the admiring eye! And where we have so many elegantproportions, growing one out of the other, and all together intoone, it seems as if proportion transcended itself, and becamesomething different and more imposing. I could never fathom how aman dares to lift up his voice to preach in a cathedral. What ishe to say that will not be an anti-climax? For though I have hearda considerable variety of sermons, I never yet heard one that wasso expressive as a cathedral. 'Tis the best preacher itself, andpreaches day and night; not only telling you of man's art andaspirations in the past, but convicting your own soul of ardentsympathies; or rather, like all good preachers, it sets youpreaching to yourself;--and every man is his own doctor of divinityin the last resort. 

As I sat outside of the hotel in the course of the afternoon, thesweet groaning thunder of the organ floated out of the church likea summons. I was not averse, liking the theatre so well, to sitout an act or two of the play, but I could never rightly make outthe nature of the service I beheld. Four or five priests and asmany choristers were singing Miserere before the high altar when Iwent in. There was no congregation but a few old women on chairsand old men kneeling on the pavement. After a while a long trainof young girls, walking two and two, each with a lighted taper inher hand, and all dressed in black with a white veil, came frombehind the altar, and began to descend the nave; the four firstcarrying a Virgin and child upon a table. The priests andchoristers arose from their knees and followed after, singing 'AveMary' as they went. In this order they made the circuit of thecathedral, passing twice before me where I leaned against a pillar. The priest who seemed of most consequence was a strange, down-looking old man. He kept mumbling prayers with his lips; but as helooked upon me darkling, it did not seem as if prayer wereuppermost in his heart. Two others, who bore the burthen of thechaunt, were stout, brutal, military-looking men of forty, withbold, over-fed eyes; they sang with some lustiness, and trolledforth 'Ave Mary' like a garrison catch. The little girls weretimid and grave. As they footed slowly up the aisle, each one tooka moment's glance at the Englishman; and the big nun who playedmarshal fairly stared him out of countenance. As for thechoristers, from first to last they misbehaved as only boys canmisbehave; and cruelly marred the performance with their antics. 

I understood a great deal of the spirit of what went on. Indeed itwould be difficult not to understand the Miserere, which I take tobe the composition of an atheist. If it ever be a good thing totake such despondency to heart, the Miserere is the right music, and a cathedral a fit scene. So far I am at one with theCatholics:- an odd name for them, after all? But why, in God'sname, these holiday choristers? why these priests who stealwandering looks about the congregation while they feign to be atprayer? why this fat nun, who rudely arranges her procession andshakes delinquent virgins by the elbow? why this spitting, andsnuffing, and forgetting of keys, and the thousand and one littlemisadventures that disturb a frame of mind laboriously edified withchaunts and organings? In any play-house reverend fathers may seewhat can be done with a little art, and how, to move highsentiments, it is necessary to drill the supernumeraries and haveevery stool in its proper place. 

One other circumstance distressed me. I could bear a Misereremyself, having had a good deal of open-air exercise of late; but Iwished the old people somewhere else. It was neither the rightsort of music nor the right sort of divinity for men and women whohave come through most accidents by this time, and probably have anopinion of their own upon the tragic element in life. A person upin years can generally do his own Miserere for himself; although Inotice that such an one often prefers Jubilate Deo for his ordinarysinging. On the whole, the most religious exercise for the aged isprobably to recall their own experience; so many friends dead, somany hopes disappointed, so many slips and stumbles, and withal somany bright days and smiling providences; there is surely thematter of a very eloquent sermon in all this. 

On the whole, I was greatly solemnised. In the little pictorialmap of our whole Inland Voyage, which my fancy still preserves, andsometimes unrolls for the amusement of odd moments, Noyon cathedralfigures on a most preposterous scale, and must be nearly as largeas a department. I can still see the faces of the priests as ifthey were at my elbow, and hear Ave Maria, ora pro nobis, soundingthrough the church. All Noyon is blotted out for me by thesesuperior memories; and I do not care to say more about the place. It was but a stack of brown roofs at the best, where I believepeople live very reputably in a quiet way; but the shadow of thechurch falls upon it when the sun is low, and the five bells areheard in all quarters, telling that the organ has begun. If ever Ijoin the Church of Rome, I shall stipulate to be Bishop of Noyon onthe Oise. 

DOWN THE OISE

TO COMPIEGNE

The most patient people grow weary at last with being continuallywetted with rain; except of course in the Scottish Highlands, wherethere are not enough fine intervals to point the difference. Thatwas like to be our case, the day we left Noyon. I remember nothingof the voyage; it was nothing but clay banks and willows, and rain;incessant, pitiless, beating rain; until we stopped to lunch at alittle inn at Pimprez, where the canal ran very near the river. Wewere so sadly drenched that the landlady lit a few sticks in thechimney for our comfort; there we sat in a steam of vapour, lamenting our concerns. The husband donned a game-bag and strodeout to shoot; the wife sat in a far corner watching us. I think wewere worth looking at. We grumbled over the misfortune of La Fere;we forecast other La Feres in the future;--although things wentbetter with the Cigarette for spokesman; he had more aplombaltogether than I; and a dull, positive way of approaching alandlady that carried off the india-rubber bags. Talking of LaFere put us talking of the reservists. 

'Reservery, ' said he, 'seems a pretty mean way to spend ones autumnholiday. '

'About as mean, ' returned I dejectedly, 'as canoeing. '

'These gentlemen travel for their pleasure?' asked the landlady, with unconscious irony. 

It was too much. The scales fell from our eyes. Another wet day, it was determined, and we put the boats into the train. 

The weather took the hint. That was our last wetting. Theafternoon faired up: grand clouds still voyaged in the sky, butnow singly, and with a depth of blue around their path; and asunset in the daintiest rose and gold inaugurated a thick night ofstars and a month of unbroken weather. At the same time, the riverbegan to give us a better outlook into the country. The banks werenot so high, the willows disappeared from along the margin, andpleasant hills stood all along its course and marked their profileon the sky. 

In a little while the canal, coming to its last lock, began todischarge its water-houses on the Oise; so that we had no lack ofcompany to fear. Here were all our old friends; the Deo Gratias ofConde and the Four Sons of Aymon journeyed cheerily down streamalong with us; we exchanged waterside pleasantries with thesteersman perched among the lumber, or the driver hoarse withbawling to his horses; and the children came and looked over theside as we paddled by. We had never known all this while how muchwe missed them; but it gave us a fillip to see the smoke from theirchimneys. 

A little below this junction we made another meeting of yet moreaccount. For there we were joined by the Aisne, already a far-travelled river and fresh out of Champagne. Here ended theadolescence of the Oise; this was his marriage day; thenceforwardhe had a stately, brimming march, conscious of his own dignity andsundry dams. He became a tranquil feature in the scene. The treesand towns saw themselves in him, as in a mirror. He carried thecanoes lightly on his broad breast; there was no need to work hardagainst an eddy: but idleness became the order of the day, andmere straightforward dipping of the paddle, now on this side, nowon that, without intelligence or effort. Truly we were coming intohalcyon weather upon all accounts, and were floated towards the sealike gentlemen. 

We made Compiegne as the sun was going down: a fine profile of atown above the river. Over the bridge, a regiment was parading tothe drum. People loitered on the quay, some fishing, some lookingidly at the stream. And as the two boats shot in along the water, we could see them pointing them out and speaking one to another. We landed at a floating lavatory, where the washerwomen were stillbeating the clothes. 

AT COMPIEGNE

We put up at a big, bustling hotel in Compiegne, where nobodyobserved our presence. 

Reservery and general militarismus (as the Germans call it) wererampant. A camp of conical white tents without the town lookedlike a leaf out of a picture Bible; sword-belts decorated the wallsof the cafes; and the streets kept sounding all day long withmilitary music. It was not possible to be an Englishman and avoida feeling of elation; for the men who followed the drums weresmall, and walked shabbily. Each man inclined at his own angle, and jolted to his own convenience, as he went. There was nothingof the superb gait with which a regiment of tall Highlanders movesbehind its music, solemn and inevitable, like a natural phenomenon. Who that has seen it can forget the drum-major pacing in front, thedrummers' tiger-skins, the pipers' swinging plaids, the strangeelastic rhythm of the whole regiment footing it in time--and thebang of the drum, when the brasses cease, and the shrill pipes takeup the martial story in their place?

A girl, at school in France, began to describe one of our regimentson parade to her French schoolmates; and as she went on, she toldme, the recollection grew so vivid, she became so proud to be thecountrywoman of such soldiers, and so sorry to be in anothercountry, that her voice failed her and she burst into tears. Ihave never forgotten that girl; and I think she very nearlydeserves a statue. To call her a young lady, with all its niminyassociations, would be to offer her an insult. She may restassured of one thing: although she never should marry a heroicgeneral, never see any great or immediate result of her life, shewill not have lived in vain for her native land. 

But though French soldiers show to ill advantage on parade, on themarch they are gay, alert, and willing like a troop of fox-hunters. I remember once seeing a company pass through the forest ofFontainebleau, on the Chailly road, between the Bas Breau and theReine Blanche. One fellow walked a little before the rest, andsang a loud, audacious marching song. The rest bestirred theirfeet, and even swung their muskets in time. A young officer onhorseback had hard ado to keep his countenance at the words. Younever saw anything so cheerful and spontaneous as their gait;schoolboys do not look more eagerly at hare and hounds; and youwould have thought it impossible to tire such willing marchers. 

My great delight in Compiegne was the town-hall. I doted upon thetown-hall. It is a monument of Gothic insecurity, all turreted, and gargoyled, and slashed, and bedizened with half a score ofarchitectural fancies. Some of the niches are gilt and painted;and in a great square panel in the centre, in black relief on agilt ground, Louis XII. Rides upon a pacing horse, with hand on hipand head thrown back. There is royal arrogance in every line ofhim; the stirruped foot projects insolently from the frame; the eyeis hard and proud; the very horse seems to be treading withgratification over prostrate serfs, and to have the breath of thetrumpet in his nostrils. So rides for ever, on the front of thetown-hall, the good king Louis XII. , the father of his people. 

Over the king's head, in the tall centre turret, appears the dialof a clock; and high above that, three little mechanical figures, each one with a hammer in his hand, whose business it is to chimeout the hours and halves and quarters for the burgesses ofCompiegne. The centre figure has a gilt breast-plate; the twoothers wear gilt trunk-hose; and they all three have elegant, flapping hats like cavaliers. As the quarter approaches, they turntheir heads and look knowingly one to the other; and then, kling gothe three hammers on three little bells below. The hour follows, deep and sonorous, from the interior of the tower; and the gildedgentlemen rest from their labours with contentment. 

I had a great deal of healthy pleasure from their manoeuvres, andtook good care to miss as few performances as possible; and I foundthat even the Cigarette, while he pretended to despise myenthusiasm, was more or less a devotee himself. There is somethinghighly absurd in the exposition of such toys to the outrages ofwinter on a housetop. They would be more in keeping in a glasscase before a Nurnberg clock. Above all, at night, when thechildren are abed, and even grown people are snoring under quilts, does it not seem impertinent to leave these ginger-bread figureswinking and tinkling to the stars and the rolling moon? Thegargoyles may fitly enough twist their ape-like heads; fitly enoughmay the potentate bestride his charger, like a centurion in an oldGerman print of the Via Dolorosa; but the toys should be put awayin a box among some cotton, until the sun rises, and the childrenare abroad again to be amused. 

In Compiegne post-office a great packet of letters awaited us; andthe authorities were, for this occasion only, so polite as to handthem over upon application. 

In some ways, our journey may be said to end with this letter-bagat Compiegne. The spell was broken. We had partly come home fromthat moment. 

No one should have any correspondence on a journey; it is badenough to have to write; but the receipt of letters is the death ofall holiday feeling. 

'Out of my country and myself I go. ' I wish to take a dive amongnew conditions for a while, as into another element. I havenothing to do with my friends or my affections for the time; when Icame away, I left my heart at home in a desk, or sent it forwardwith my portmanteau to await me at my destination. After myjourney is over, I shall not fail to read your admirable letterswith the attention they deserve. But I have paid all this money, look you, and paddled all these strokes, for no other purpose thanto be abroad; and yet you keep me at home with your perpetualcommunications. You tug the string, and I feel that I am atethered bird. You pursue me all over Europe with the littlevexations that I came away to avoid. There is no discharge in thewar of life, I am well aware; but shall there not be so much as aweek's furlough?

We were up by six, the day we were to leave. They had taken solittle note of us that I hardly thought they would havecondescended on a bill. But they did, with some smart particularstoo; and we paid in a civilised manner to an uninterested clerk, and went out of that hotel, with the india-rubber bags, unremarked. No one cared to know about us. It is not possible to rise before avillage; but Compiegne was so grown a town, that it took its easein the morning; and we were up and away while it was still indressing-gown and slippers. The streets were left to peoplewashing door-steps; nobody was in full dress but the cavaliers uponthe town-hall; they were all washed with dew, spruce in theirgilding, and full of intelligence and a sense of professionalresponsibility. Kling went they on the bells for the half-past sixas we went by. I took it kind of them to make me this partingcompliment; they never were in better form, not even at noon upon aSunday. 

There was no one to see us off but the early washerwomen--early andlate--who were already beating the linen in their floating lavatoryon the river. They were very merry and matutinal in their ways;plunged their arms boldly in, and seemed not to feel the shock. Itwould be dispiriting to me, this early beginning and first colddabble of a most dispiriting day's work. But I believe they wouldhave been as unwilling to change days with us as we could be tochange with them. They crowded to the door to watch us paddle awayinto the thin sunny mists upon the river; and shouted heartilyafter us till we were through the bridge. 

CHANGED TIMES

There is a sense in which those mists never rose from off ourjourney; and from that time forth they lie very densely in my note-book. As long as the Oise was a small rural river, it took us nearby people's doors, and we could hold a conversation with natives inthe riparian fields. But now that it had grown so wide, the lifealong shore passed us by at a distance. It was the same differenceas between a great public highway and a country by-path thatwanders in and out of cottage gardens. We now lay in towns, wherenobody troubled us with questions; we had floated into civilisedlife, where people pass without salutation. In sparsely inhabitedplaces, we make all we can of each encounter; but when it comes toa city, we keep to ourselves, and never speak unless we havetrodden on a man's toes. In these waters we were no longer strangebirds, and nobody supposed we had travelled farther than from thelast town. I remember, when we came into L'Isle Adam, forinstance, how we met dozens of pleasure-boats outing it for theafternoon, and there was nothing to distinguish the true voyagerfrom the amateur, except, perhaps, the filthy condition of my sail. The company in one boat actually thought they recognised me for aneighbour. Was there ever anything more wounding? All the romancehad come down to that. Now, on the upper Oise, where nothingsailed as a general thing but fish, a pair of canoeists could notbe thus vulgarly explained away; we were strange and picturesqueintruders; and out of people's wonder sprang a sort of light andpassing intimacy all along our route. There is nothing but tit-for-tat in this world, though sometimes it be a little difficult totrace: for the scores are older than we ourselves, and there hasnever yet been a settling-day since things were. You getentertainment pretty much in proportion as you give. As long as wewere a sort of odd wanderers, to be stared at and followed like aquack doctor or a caravan, we had no want of amusement in return;but as soon as we sank into commonplace ourselves, all whom we metwere similarly disenchanted. And here is one reason of a dozen, why the world is dull to dull persons. 

In our earlier adventures there was generally something to do, andthat quickened us. Even the showers of rain had a revivifyingeffect, and shook up the brain from torpor. But now, when theriver no longer ran in a proper sense, only glided seaward with aneven, outright, but imperceptible speed, and when the sky smiledupon us day after day without variety, we began to slip into thatgolden doze of the mind which follows upon much exercise in theopen air. I have stupefied myself in this way more than once;indeed, I dearly love the feeling; but I never had it to the samedegree as when paddling down the Oise. It was the apotheosis ofstupidity. 

We ceased reading entirely. Sometimes when I found a new paper, Itook a particular pleasure in reading a single number of thecurrent novel; but I never could bear more than three instalments;and even the second was a disappointment. As soon as the talebecame in any way perspicuous, it lost all merit in my eyes; only asingle scene, or, as is the way with these feuilletons, half ascene, without antecedent or consequence, like a piece of a dream, had the knack of fixing my interest. The less I saw of the novel, the better I liked it: a pregnant reflection. But for the mostpart, as I said, we neither of us read anything in the world, andemployed the very little while we were awake between bed and dinnerin poring upon maps. I have always been fond of maps, and canvoyage in an atlas with the greatest enjoyment. The names ofplaces are singularly inviting; the contour of coasts and rivers isenthralling to the eye; and to hit, in a map, upon some place youhave heard of before, makes history a new possession. But wethumbed our charts, on these evenings, with the blankest unconcern. We cared not a fraction for this place or that. We stared at thesheet as children listen to their rattle; and read the names oftowns or villages to forget them again at once. We had no romancein the matter; there was nobody so fancy-free. If you had takenthe maps away while we were studying them most intently, it is afair bet whether we might not have continued to study the tablewith the same delight. 

About one thing we were mightily taken up, and that was eating. Ithink I made a god of my belly. I remember dwelling in imaginationupon this or that dish till my mouth watered; and long before wegot in for the night my appetite was a clamant, instant annoyance. Sometimes we paddled alongside for a while and whetted each otherwith gastronomical fancies as we went. Cake and sherry, a homelyrejection, but not within reach upon the Oise, trotted through myhead for many a mile; and once, as we were approaching Verberie, the Cigarette brought my heart into my mouth by the suggestion ofoyster-patties and Sauterne. 

I suppose none of us recognise the great part that is played inlife by eating and drinking. The appetite is so imperious that wecan stomach the least interesting viands, and pass off a dinner-hour thankfully enough on bread and water; just as there are menwho must read something, if it were only Bradshaw's Guide. Butthere is a romance about the matter after all. Probably the tablehas more devotees than love; and I am sure that food is much moregenerally entertaining than scenery. Do you give in, as WaltWhitman would say, that you are any the less immortal for that?The true materialism is to be ashamed of what we are. To detectthe flavour of an olive is no less a piece of human perfection thanto find beauty in the colours of the sunset. 

Canoeing was easy work. To dip the paddle at the properinclination, now right, now left; to keep the head down stream; toempty the little pool that gathered in the lap of the apron; toscrew up the eyes against the glittering sparkles of sun upon thewater; or now and again to pass below the whistling tow-rope of theDeo Gratias of Conde, or the Four Sons of Aymon--there was not muchart in that; certain silly muscles managed it between sleep andwaking; and meanwhile the brain had a whole holiday, and went tosleep. We took in, at a glance, the larger features of the scene;and beheld, with half an eye, bloused fishers and dabblingwasherwomen on the bank. Now and again we might be half-wakened bysome church spire, by a leaping fish, or by a trail of river grassthat clung about the paddle and had to be plucked off and thrownaway. But these luminous intervals were only partially luminous. A little more of us was called into action, but never the whole. The central bureau of nerves, what in some moods we call Ourselves, enjoyed its holiday without disturbance, like a Government Office. The great wheels of intelligence turned idly in the head, like fly-wheels, grinding no grist. I have gone on for half an hour at atime, counting my strokes and forgetting the hundreds. I flattermyself the beasts that perish could not underbid that, as a lowform of consciousness. And what a pleasure it was! What a hearty, tolerant temper did it bring about! There is nothing captiousabout a man who has attained to this, the one possible apotheosisin life, the Apotheosis of Stupidity; and he begins to feeldignified and longaevous like a tree. 

There was one odd piece of practical metaphysics which accompaniedwhat I may call the depth, if I must not call it the intensity, ofmy abstraction. What philosophers call ME and NOT-ME, EGO and NONEGO, preoccupied me whether I would or no. There was less ME andmore NOT-ME than I was accustomed to expect. I looked on uponsomebody else, who managed the paddling; I was aware of somebodyelse's feet against the stretcher; my own body seemed to have nomore intimate relation to me than the canoe, or the river, or theriver banks. Nor this alone: something inside my mind, a part ofmy brain, a province of my proper being, had thrown off allegianceand set up for itself, or perhaps for the somebody else who did thepaddling. I had dwindled into quite a little thing in a corner ofmyself. I was isolated in my own skull. Thoughts presentedthemselves unbidden; they were not my thoughts, they were plainlysome one else's; and I considered them like a part of thelandscape. I take it, in short, that I was about as near Nirvanaas would be convenient in practical life; and if this be so, I makethe Buddhists my sincere compliments; 'tis an agreeable state, notvery consistent with mental brilliancy, not exactly profitable in amoney point of view, but very calm, golden, and incurious, and onethat sets a man superior to alarms. It may be best figured bysupposing yourself to get dead drunk, and yet keep sober to enjoyit. I have a notion that open-air labourers must spend a largeportion of their days in this ecstatic stupor, which explains theirhigh composure and endurance. A pity to go to the expense oflaudanum, when here is a better paradise for nothing!

This frame of mind was the great exploit of our voyage, take it allin all. It was the farthest piece of travel accomplished. Indeed, it lies so far from beaten paths of language, that I despair ofgetting the reader into sympathy with the smiling, complacentidiocy of my condition; when ideas came and went like motes in asunbeam; when trees and church spires along the bank surged up, from time to time into my notice, like solid objects through arolling cloudland; when the rhythmical swish of boat and paddle inthe water became a cradle-song to lull my thoughts asleep; when apiece of mud on the deck was sometimes an intolerable eyesore, andsometimes quite a companion for me, and the object of pleasedconsideration;--and all the time, with the river running and theshores changing upon either hand, I kept counting my strokes andforgetting the hundreds, the happiest animal in France. 

DOWN THE OISE: CHURCH INTERIORS

We made our first stage below Compiegne to Pont Sainte Maxence. Iwas abroad a little after six the next morning. The air wasbiting, and smelt of frost. In an open place a score of womenwrangled together over the day's market; and the noise of theirnegotiation sounded thin and querulous like that of sparrows on awinter's morning. The rare passengers blew into their hands, andshuffled in their wooden shoes to set the blood agog. The streetswere full of icy shadow, although the chimneys were smokingoverhead in golden sunshine. If you wake early enough at thisseason of the year, you may get up in December to break your fastin June. 

I found my way to the church; for there is always something to seeabout a church, whether living worshippers or dead men's tombs; youfind there the deadliest earnest, and the hollowest deceit; andeven where it is not a piece of history, it will be certain to leakout some contemporary gossip. It was scarcely so cold in thechurch as it was without, but it looked colder. The white nave waspositively arctic to the eye; and the tawdriness of a continentalaltar looked more forlorn than usual in the solitude and the bleakair. Two priests sat in the chancel, reading and waitingpenitents; and out in the nave, one very old woman was engaged inher devotions. It was a wonder how she was able to pass her beadswhen healthy young people were breathing in their palms andslapping their chest; but though this concerned me, I was yet moredispirited by the nature of her exercises. She went from chair tochair, from altar to altar, circumnavigating the church. To eachshrine she dedicated an equal number of beads and an equal lengthof time. Like a prudent capitalist with a somewhat cynical view ofthe commercial prospect, she desired to place her supplications ina great variety of heavenly securities. She would risk nothing onthe credit of any single intercessor. Out of the whole company ofsaints and angels, not one but was to suppose himself her championelect against the Great Assize! I could only think of it as adull, transparent jugglery, based upon unconscious unbelief. 

She was as dead an old woman as ever I saw; no more than bone andparchment, curiously put together. Her eyes, with which sheinterrogated mine, were vacant of sense. It depends on what youcall seeing, whether you might not call her blind. Perhaps she hadknown love: perhaps borne children, suckled them and given thempet names. But now that was all gone by, and had left her neitherhappier nor wiser; and the best she could do with her mornings wasto come up here into the cold church and juggle for a slice ofheaven. It was not without a gulp that I escaped into the streetsand the keen morning air. Morning? why, how tired of it she wouldbe before night! and if she did not sleep, how then? It isfortunate that not many of us are brought up publicly to justifyour lives at the bar of threescore years and ten; fortunate thatsuch a number are knocked opportunely on the head in what they callthe flower of their years, and go away to suffer for their folliesin private somewhere else. Otherwise, between sick children anddiscontented old folk, we might be put out of all conceit of life. 

I had need of all my cerebral hygiene during that day's paddle:the old devotee stuck in my throat sorely. But I was soon in theseventh heaven of stupidity; and knew nothing but that somebody waspaddling a canoe, while I was counting his strokes and forgettingthe hundreds. I used sometimes to be afraid I should remember thehundreds; which would have made a toil of a pleasure; but theterror was chimerical, they went out of my mind by enchantment, andI knew no more than the man in the moon about my only occupation. 

At Creil, where we stopped to lunch, we left the canoes in anotherfloating lavatory, which, as it was high noon, was packed withwasherwomen, red-handed and loud-voiced; and they and their broadjokes are about all I remember of the place. I could look up myhistory-books, if you were very anxious, and tell you a date ortwo; for it figured rather largely in the English wars. But Iprefer to mention a girls' boarding-school, which had an interestfor us because it was a girls' boarding-school, and because weimagined we had rather an interest for it. At least--there werethe girls about the garden; and here were we on the river; andthere was more than one handkerchief waved as we went by. Itcaused quite a stir in my heart; and yet how we should have weariedand despised each other, these girls and I, if we had beenintroduced at a croquet-party! But this is a fashion I love: tokiss the hand or wave a handkerchief to people I shall never seeagain, to play with possibility, and knock in a peg for fancy tohang upon. It gives the traveller a jog, reminds him that he isnot a traveller everywhere, and that his journey is no more than asiesta by the way on the real march of life. 

The church at Creil was a nondescript place in the inside, splashedwith gaudy lights from the windows, and picked out with medallionsof the Dolorous Way. But there was one oddity, in the way of an exvoto, which pleased me hugely: a faithful model of a canal boat, swung from the vault, with a written aspiration that God shouldconduct the Saint Nicolas of Creil to a good haven. The thing wasneatly executed, and would have made the delight of a party of boyson the waterside. But what tickled me was the gravity of the perilto be conjured. You might hang up the model of a sea-going ship, and welcome: one that is to plough a furrow round the world, andvisit the tropic or the frosty poles, runs dangers that are wellworth a candle and a mass. But the Saint Nicolas of Creil, whichwas to be tugged for some ten years by patient draught-horses, in aweedy canal, with the poplars chattering overhead, and the skipperwhistling at the tiller; which was to do all its errands in greeninland places, and never get out of sight of a village belfry inall its cruising; why, you would have thought if anything could bedone without the intervention of Providence, it would be that! Butperhaps the skipper was a humorist: or perhaps a prophet, reminding people of the seriousness of life by this preposteroustoken. 

At Creil, as at Noyon, Saint Joseph seemed a favourite saint on thescore of punctuality. Day and hour can be specified; and gratefulpeople do not fail to specify them on a votive tablet, when prayershave been punctually and neatly answered. Whenever time is aconsideration, Saint Joseph is the proper intermediary. I took asort of pleasure in observing the vogue he had in France, for thegood man plays a very small part in my religion at home. Yet Icould not help fearing that, where the Saint is so much commandedfor exactitude, he will be expected to be very grateful for histablet. 

This is foolishness to us Protestants; and not of great importanceanyway. Whether people's gratitude for the good gifts that come tothem be wisely conceived or dutifully expressed, is a secondarymatter, after all, so long as they feel gratitude. The trueignorance is when a man does not know that he has received a goodgift, or begins to imagine that he has got it for himself. Theself-made man is the funniest windbag after all! There is a markeddifference between decreeing light in chaos, and lighting the gasin a metropolitan back-parlour with a box of patent matches; and dowhat we will, there is always something made to our hand, if itwere only our fingers. 

But there was something worse than foolishness placarded in CreilChurch. The Association of the Living Rosary (of which I had neverpreviously heard) is responsible for that. This Association wasfounded, according to the printed advertisement, by a brief of PopeGregory Sixteenth, on the 17th of January 1832: according to acoloured bas-relief, it seems to have been founded, sometime other, by the Virgin giving one rosary to Saint Dominic, and the InfantSaviour giving another to Saint Catharine of Siena. Pope Gregoryis not so imposing, but he is nearer hand. I could not distinctlymake out whether the Association was entirely devotional, or had aneye to good works; at least it is highly organised: the names offourteen matrons and misses were filled in for each week of themonth as associates, with one other, generally a married woman, atthe top for zelatrice: the leader of the band. Indulgences, plenary and partial, follow on the performance of the duties of theAssociation. 'The partial indulgences are attached to therecitation of the rosary. ' On 'the recitation of the requireddizaine, ' a partial indulgence promptly follows. When people servethe kingdom of heaven with a pass-book in their hands, I shouldalways be afraid lest they should carry the same commercial spiritinto their dealings with their fellow-men, which would make a sadand sordid business of this life. 

There is one more article, however, of happier import. 'All theseindulgences, ' it appeared, 'are applicable to souls in purgatory. 'For God's sake, ye ladies of Creil, apply them all to the souls inpurgatory without delay! Burns would take no hire for his lastsongs, preferring to serve his country out of unmixed love. Suppose you were to imitate the exciseman, mesdames, and even ifthe souls in purgatory were not greatly bettered, some souls inCreil upon the Oise would find themselves none the worse eitherhere or hereafter. 

I cannot help wondering, as I transcribe these notes, whether aProtestant born and bred is in a fit state to understand thesesigns, and do them what justice they deserve; and I cannot helpanswering that he is not. They cannot look so merely ugly and meanto the faithful as they do to me. I see that as clearly as aproposition in Euclid. For these believers are neither weak norwicked. They can put up their tablet commanding Saint Joseph forhis despatch, as if he were still a village carpenter; they can'recite the required dizaine, ' and metaphorically pocket theindulgence, as if they had done a job for Heaven; and then they cango out and look down unabashed upon this wonderful river flowingby, and up without confusion at the pin-point stars, which arethemselves great worlds full of flowing rivers greater than theOise. I see it as plainly, I say, as a proposition in Euclid, thatmy Protestant mind has missed the point, and that there goes withthese deformities some higher and more religious spirit than Idream. 

I wonder if other people would make the same allowances for me!Like the ladies of Creil, having recited my rosary of toleration, Ilook for my indulgence on the spot. 

PRECY AND THE MARIONNETTES

We made Precy about sundown. The plain is rich with tufts ofpoplar. In a wide, luminous curve, the Oise lay under thehillside. A faint mist began to rise and confound the differentdistances together. There was not a sound audible but that of thesheep-bells in some meadows by the river, and the creaking of acart down the long road that descends the hill. The villas intheir gardens, the shops along the street, all seemed to have beendeserted the day before; and I felt inclined to walk discreetly asone feels in a silent forest. All of a sudden, we came round acorner, and there, in a little green round the church, was a bevyof girls in Parisian costumes playing croquet. Their laughter, andthe hollow sound of ball and mallet, made a cheery stir in theneighbourhood; and the look of these slim figures, all corseted andribboned, produced an answerable disturbance in our hearts. Wewere within sniff of Paris, it seemed. And here were females ofour own species playing croquet, just as if Precy had been a placein real life, instead of a stage in the fairyland of travel. For, to be frank, the peasant woman is scarcely to be counted as a womanat all, and after having passed by such a succession of people inpetticoats digging and hoeing and making dinner, this company ofcoquettes under arms made quite a surprising feature in thelandscape, and convinced us at once of being fallible males. 

The inn at Precy is the worst inn in France. Not even in Scotlandhave I found worse fare. It was kept by a brother and sister, neither of whom was out of their teens. The sister, so to speak, prepared a meal for us; and the brother, who had been tippling, came in and brought with him a tipsy butcher, to entertain us as weate. We found pieces of loo-warm pork among the salad, and piecesof unknown yielding substance in the ragout. The butcherentertained us with pictures of Parisian life, with which heprofessed himself well acquainted; the brother sitting the while onthe edge of the billiard-table, toppling precariously, and suckingthe stump of a cigar. In the midst of these diversions, bang wenta drum past the house, and a hoarse voice began issuing aproclamation. It was a man with marionnettes announcing aperformance for that evening. 

He had set up his caravan and lighted his candles on another partof the girls' croquet-green, under one of those open sheds whichare so common in France to shelter markets; and he and his wife, bythe time we strolled up there, were trying to keep order with theaudience. 

It was the most absurd contention. The show-people had set out acertain number of benches; and all who sat upon them were to pay acouple of sous for the accommodation. They were always quite full--a bumper house--as long as nothing was going forward; but let theshow-woman appear with an eye to a collection, and at the firstrattle of her tambourine the audience slipped off the seats, andstood round on the outside with their hands in their pockets. Itcertainly would have tried an angel's temper. The showman roaredfrom the proscenium; he had been all over France, and nowhere, nowhere, 'not even on the borders of Germany, ' had he met with suchmisconduct. Such thieves and rogues and rascals, as he calledthem! And every now and again, the wife issued on another round, and added her shrill quota to the tirade. I remarked here, aselsewhere, how far more copious is the female mind in the materialof insult. The audience laughed in high good-humour over the man'sdeclamations; but they bridled and cried aloud under the woman'spungent sallies. She picked out the sore points. She had thehonour of the village at her mercy. Voices answered her angrilyout of the crowd, and received a smarting retort for their trouble. A couple of old ladies beside me, who had duly paid for theirseats, waxed very red and indignant, and discoursed to each otheraudibly about the impudence of these mountebanks; but as soon asthe show-woman caught a whisper of this, she was down upon themwith a swoop: if mesdames could persuade their neighbours to actwith common honesty, the mountebanks, she assured them, would bepolite enough: mesdames had probably had their bowl of soup, andperhaps a glass of wine that evening; the mountebanks also had ataste for soup, and did not choose to have their little earningsstolen from them before their eyes. Once, things came as far as abrief personal encounter between the showman and some lads, inwhich the former went down as readily as one of his ownmarionnettes to a peal of jeering laughter. 

I was a good deal astonished at this scene, because I am prettywell acquainted with the ways of French strollers, more or lessartistic; and have always found them singularly pleasing. Anystroller must be dear to the right-thinking heart; if it were onlyas a living protest against offices and the mercantile spirit, andas something to remind us that life is not by necessity the kind ofthing we generally make it. Even a German band, if you see itleaving town in the early morning for a campaign in country places, among trees and meadows, has a romantic flavour for theimagination. There is nobody, under thirty, so dead but his heartwill stir a little at sight of a gypsies' camp. 'We are notcotton-spinners all'; or, at least, not all through. There is somelife in humanity yet: and youth will now and again find a braveword to say in dispraise of riches, and throw up a situation to gostrolling with a knapsack. 

An Englishman has always special facilities for intercourse withFrench gymnasts; for England is the natural home of gymnasts. Thisor that fellow, in his tights and spangles, is sure to know a wordor two of English, to have drunk English aff-'n-aff, and perhapsperformed in an English music-hall. He is a countryman of mine byprofession. He leaps, like the Belgian boating men, to the notionthat I must be an athlete myself. 

But the gymnast is not my favourite; he has little or no tinctureof the artist in his composition; his soul is small and pedestrian, for the most part, since his profession makes no call upon it, anddoes not accustom him to high ideas. But if a man is only so muchof an actor that he can stumble through a farce, he is made free ofa new order of thoughts. He has something else to think aboutbeside the money-box. He has a pride of his own, and, what is offar more importance, he has an aim before him that he can neverquite attain. He has gone upon a pilgrimage that will last him hislife long, because there is no end to it short of perfection. Hewill better upon himself a little day by day; or even if he hasgiven up the attempt, he will always remember that once upon a timehe had conceived this high ideal, that once upon a time he hadfallen in love with a star. ''Tis better to have loved and lost. 'Although the moon should have nothing to say to Endymion, althoughhe should settle down with Audrey and feed pigs, do you not thinkhe would move with a better grace, and cherish higher thoughts tothe end? The louts he meets at church never had a fancy aboveAudrey's snood; but there is a reminiscence in Endymion's heartthat, like a spice, keeps it fresh and haughty. 

To be even one of the outskirters of art, leaves a fine stamp on aman's countenance. I remember once dining with a party in the innat Chateau Landon. Most of them were unmistakable bagmen; otherswell-to-do peasantry; but there was one young fellow in a blouse, whose face stood out from among the rest surprisingly. It lookedmore finished; more of the spirit looked out through it; it had aliving, expressive air, and you could see that his eyes took thingsin. My companion and I wondered greatly who and what he could be. It was fair-time in Chateau Landon, and when we went along to thebooths, we had our question answered; for there was our friendbusily fiddling for the peasants to caper to. He was a wanderingviolinist. 

A troop of strollers once came to the inn where I was staying, inthe department of Seine et Marne. There was a father and mother;two daughters, brazen, blowsy hussies, who sang and acted, withoutan idea of how to set about either; and a dark young man, like atutor, a recalcitrant house-painter, who sang and acted not amiss. The mother was the genius of the party, so far as genius can bespoken of with regard to such a pack of incompetent humbugs; andher husband could not find words to express his admiration for hercomic countryman. 'You should see my old woman, ' said he, andnodded his beery countenance. One night they performed in thestable-yard, with flaring lamps--a wretched exhibition, coldlylooked upon by a village audience. Next night, as soon as thelamps were lighted, there came a plump of rain, and they had tosweep away their baggage as fast as possible, and make off to thebarn where they harboured, cold, wet, and supperless. In themorning, a dear friend of mine, who has as warm a heart forstrollers as I have myself, made a little collection, and sent itby my hands to comfort them for their disappointment. I gave it tothe father; he thanked me cordially, and we drank a cup together inthe kitchen, talking of roads, and audiences, and hard times. 

When I was going, up got my old stroller, and off with his hat. 'Iam afraid, ' said he, 'that Monsieur will think me altogether abeggar; but I have another demand to make upon him. ' I began tohate him on the spot. 'We play again to-night, ' he went on. 'Ofcourse, I shall refuse to accept any more money from Monsieur andhis friends, who have been already so liberal. But our programmeof to-night is something truly creditable; and I cling to the ideathat Monsieur will honour us with his presence. ' And then, with ashrug and a smile: 'Monsieur understands--the vanity of anartist!' Save the mark! The vanity of an artist! That is thekind of thing that reconciles me to life: a ragged, tippling, incompetent old rogue, with the manners of a gentleman, and thevanity of an artist, to keep up his self-respect!

But the man after my own heart is M. De Vauversin. It is nearlytwo years since I saw him first, and indeed I hope I may see himoften again. Here is his first programme, as I found it on thebreakfast-table, and have kept it ever since as a relic of brightdays:

'Mesdames et Messieurs, 'Mademoiselle Ferrario et M. De Vauversin auront l'honneur dechanter ce soir les morceaux suivants. 

'Madermoiselle Ferrario chantera--Mignon--Oiseaux Legers--France--Des Francais dorment la--Le chateau bleu--Ou voulez-vous aller?

'M. De Vauversin--Madame Fontaine et M. Robinet--Les plongeurs acheval--Le Mari mecontent--Tais-toi, gamin--Mon voisin l'original--Heureux comme ca--Comme on est trompe. '

They made a stage at one end of the salle-a-manger. And what asight it was to see M. De Vauversin, with a cigarette in his mouth, twanging a guitar, and following Mademoiselle Ferrario's eyes withthe obedient, kindly look of a dog! The entertainment wound upwith a tombola, or auction of lottery tickets: an admirableamusement, with all the excitement of gambling, and no hope of gainto make you ashamed of your eagerness; for there, all is loss; youmake haste to be out of pocket; it is a competition who shall losemost money for the benefit of M. De Vauversin and MademoiselleFerrario. 

M. De Vauversin is a small man, with a great head of black hair, avivacious and engaging air, and a smile that would be delightful ifhe had better teeth. He was once an actor in the Chatelet; but hecontracted a nervous affection from the heat and glare of thefootlights, which unfitted him for the stage. At this crisisMademoiselle Ferrario, otherwise Mademoiselle Rita of the Alcazar, agreed to share his wandering fortunes. 'I could never forget thegenerosity of that lady, ' said he. He wears trousers so tight thatit has long been a problem to all who knew him how he manages toget in and out of them. He sketches a little in water-colours; hewrites verses; he is the most patient of fishermen, and spent longdays at the bottom of the inn-garden fruitlessly dabbling a line inthe clear river. 

You should hear him recounting his experiences over a bottle ofwine; such a pleasant vein of talk as he has, with a ready smile athis own mishaps, and every now and then a sudden gravity, like aman who should hear the surf roar while he was telling the perilsof the deep. For it was no longer ago than last night, perhaps, that the receipts only amounted to a franc and a half, to coverthree francs of railway fare and two of board and lodging. TheMaire, a man worth a million of money, sat in the front seat, repeatedly applauding Mlle. Ferrario, and yet gave no more thanthree sous the whole evening. Local authorities look with such anevil eye upon the strolling artist. Alas! I know it well, who havebeen myself taken for one, and pitilessly incarcerated on thestrength of the misapprehension. Once, M. De Vauversin visited acommissary of police for permission to sing. The commissary, whowas smoking at his ease, politely doffed his hat upon the singer'sentrance. 'Mr. Commissary, ' he began, 'I am an artist. ' And onwent the commissary's hat again. No courtesy for the companions ofApollo! 'They are as degraded as that, ' said M. De Vauversin witha sweep of his cigarette. 

But what pleased me most was one outbreak of his, when we had beentalking all the evening of the rubs, indignities, and pinchings ofhis wandering life. Some one said, it would be better to have amillion of money down, and Mlle. Ferrario admitted that she wouldprefer that mightily. 'Eh bien, moi non;--not I, ' cried DeVauversin, striking the table with his hand. 'If any one is afailure in the world, is it not I? I had an art, in which I havedone things well--as well as some--better perhaps than others; andnow it is closed against me. I must go about the country gatheringcoppers and singing nonsense. Do you think I regret my life? Doyou think I would rather be a fat burgess, like a calf? Not I! Ihave had moments when I have been applauded on the boards: I thinknothing of that; but I have known in my own mind sometimes, when Ihad not a clap from the whole house, that I had found a trueintonation, or an exact and speaking gesture; and then, messieurs, I have known what pleasure was, what it was to do a thing well, what it was to be an artist. And to know what art is, is to havean interest for ever, such as no burgess can find in his pettyconcerns. Tenez, messieurs, je vais vous le dire--it is like areligion. '

Such, making some allowance for the tricks of memory and theinaccuracies of translation, was the profession of faith of M. DeVauversin. I have given him his own name, lest any other wanderershould come across him, with his guitar and cigarette, andMademoiselle Ferrario; for should not all the world delight tohonour this unfortunate and loyal follower of the Muses? MayApollo send him rimes hitherto undreamed of; may the river be nolonger scanty of her silver fishes to his lure; may the cold notpinch him on long winter rides, nor the village jack-in-officeaffront him with unseemly manners; and may he never missMademoiselle Ferrario from his side, to follow with his dutifuleyes and accompany on the guitar!

The marionnettes made a very dismal entertainment. They performeda piece, called Pyramus and Thisbe, in five mortal acts, and allwritten in Alexandrines fully as long as the performers. Onemarionnette was the king; another the wicked counsellor; a third, credited with exceptional beauty, represented Thisbe; and thenthere were guards, and obdurate fathers, and walking gentlemen. Nothing particular took place during the two or three acts that Isat out; but you will he pleased to learn that the unities wereproperly respected, and the whole piece, with one exception, movedin harmony with classical rules. That exception was the comiccountryman, a lean marionnette in wooden shoes, who spoke in proseand in a broad patois much appreciated by the audience. He tookunconstitutional liberties with the person of his sovereign; kickedhis fellow-marionnettes in the mouth with his wooden shoes, andwhenever none of the versifying suitors were about, made love toThisbe on his own account in comic prose. 

This fellow's evolutions, and the little prologue, in which theshowman made a humorous eulogium of his troop, praising theirindifference to applause and hisses, and their single devotion totheir art, were the only circumstances in the whole affair that youcould fancy would so much as raise a smile. But the villagers ofPrecy seemed delighted. Indeed, so long as a thing is anexhibition, and you pay to see it, it is nearly certain to amuse. If we were charged so much a head for sunsets, or if God sent rounda drum before the hawthorns came in flower, what a work should wenot make about their beauty! But these things, like goodcompanions, stupid people early cease to observe: and the AbstractBagman tittups past in his spring gig, and is positively not awareof the flowers along the lane, or the scenery of the weatheroverhead. 

BACK TO THE WORLD

Of the next two days' sail little remains in my mind, and nothingwhatever in my note-book. The river streamed on steadily throughpleasant river-side landscapes. Washerwomen in blue dresses, fishers in blue blouses, diversified the green banks; and therelation of the two colours was like that of the flower and theleaf in the forget-me-not. A symphony in forget-me-not; I thinkTheophile Gautier might thus have characterised that two days'panorama. The sky was blue and cloudless; and the sliding surfaceof the river held up, in smooth places, a mirror to the heaven andthe shores. The washerwomen hailed us laughingly; and the noise oftrees and water made an accompaniment to our dozing thoughts, as wefleeted down the stream. 

The great volume, the indefatigable purpose of the river, held themind in chain. It seemed now so sure of its end, so strong andeasy in its gait, like a grown man full of determination. The surfwas roaring for it on the sands of Havre. 

For my own part, slipping along this moving thoroughfare in myfiddle-case of a canoe, I also was beginning to grow aweary for myocean. To the civilised man, there must come, sooner or later, adesire for civilisation. I was weary of dipping the paddle; I wasweary of living on the skirts of life; I wished to be in the thickof it once more; I wished to get to work; I wished to meet peoplewho understood my own speech, and could meet with me on equalterms, as a man, and no longer as a curiosity. 

And so a letter at Pontoise decided us, and we drew up our keelsfor the last time out of that river of Oise that had faithfullypiloted them, through rain and sunshine, for so long. For so manymiles had this fleet and footless beast of burthen charioted ourfortunes, that we turned our back upon it with a sense ofseparation. We had made a long detour out of the world, but now wewere back in the familiar places, where life itself makes all therunning, and we are carried to meet adventure without a stroke ofthe paddle. Now we were to return, like the voyager in the play, and see what rearrangements fortune had perfected the while in oursurroundings; what surprises stood ready made for us at home; andwhither and how far the world had voyaged in our absence. You maypaddle all day long; but it is when you come back at nightfall, andlook in at the familiar room, that you find Love or Death awaitingyou beside the stove; and the most beautiful adventures are notthose we go to seek.