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The first list we made out had to be torn up. It was clear that the Thames would not allow of the navigation of a boat large enough to take the things we had written down.
George said:
You know we are on a wrong way altogether. We must not think of the things we could do with, but only of the things that we cant do without35.
George comes out really sensible at times. Youd be surprised. I call that downright wisdom, not just as regards the present case, but with reference to our trip up the river of life, generally. How many people, on that voyage, load up the boat with a store of foolish things which they think essential to the pleasure and comfort of the trip, but which are really only useless lumber.
How they pile the poor little boat with fine clothes and big houses; with expensive entertainments that nobody enjoys, with formalities and fashions, with pretence, and with oh, heaviest, maddest lumber of all! the dread of what will my neighbour think, with luxuries, with pleasures that bore.
It is lumber, man all lumber! Throw it overboard. It makes the boat so heavy to pull, you nearly cant row. It makes it so heavy and dangerous to manage, you never know a moments freedom from anxiety and care, never gain a moments rest for dreamy laziness.
Throw the lumber over, man! Let your boat of life be light, packed with only what you need a homely home and simple pleasures, one or two friends, worth the name, someone to love and someone to love you, a cat, a dog, and a pipe or two, enough to eat and enough to wear, and a little more than enough to drink; for thirst is a dangerous thing.
You will find the boat easier to pull then, and it will not be so likely to upset, and it will not matter so much if it does upset. You will have time to think as well as to work. Time to drink in lifes sunshine time to listen to the Aeolian music36 that the wind of God draws from the human heart-strings around us time to I beg your pardon, really. I quite forgot.
Well, we left the list to George, and he began it.
We wont take a tent, suggested George; we will have a boat with a cover. It is ever so much simpler, and more comfortable.
It seemed a good thought, and we adopted it. I do not know whether you have ever seen the thing I mean. You fix iron hoops up over the boat, and stretch a huge canvas over them, and fasten it down all round, and it converts the boat into a sort of little house, and it is beautifully cosy, though a bit stuffy; but there, everything has its disadvantages, as the man said when his mother-in-law died, and they came down upon him for the funeral expenses.
George said that in that case we must take a rug each, a lamp, some soap, a brush and comb (between us), a toothbrush (each), a basin, some tooth-powder, some shaving tackle, and a couple of big-towels for bathing. I notice that people always make gigantic arrangements for bathing when they are going anywhere near the water, but that they dont bathe much when they are there.
It is the same when you go to the sea-side. I always determine when thinking over the matter in London that Ill get up early every morning, and go and swim before breakfast, and I religiously pack up a pair of drawers and a bath towel. I always get red bathing drawers. I rather fancy myself in red drawers. They suit my complexion so. But when I get to the sea I dont feel somehow that I want that early morning bathe nearly so much as I did when I was in town.
On the contrary, I feel more that I want to stop in bed till the last moment, and then come down and have my breakfast. Once or twice I have got out at six and half-dressed myself, and have taken my drawers and towel, and started dismally off. But I havent enjoyed it. They seem to keep a specially cutting east wind, waiting for me, when I go to bathe in the early morning; and they pick out all the three-cornered stones, and put them on the top, and they sharpen up the rocks and cover the points over with a bit of sand so that I cant see them, and they take the sea and put it two miles out, so that I have to huddle myself up37 in my arms and hop, shivering, through six inches of water. And when I do get to the sea, it is rough and quite insulting.
One huge wave catches me up and throws me in a sitting posture, as hard as ever it can, down on to a rock which has been put there for me. And, before Ive said Oh! Ugh! and found out what has gone, the wave comes back and carries me out to mid-ocean. I begin to strike out for38 the shore, and wonder if I shall ever see home and friends again, and wish Id been kinder to my little sister when a boy (when I was a boy, I mean). Just when I have given up all hope, a wave retires and leaves me sprawling like a star-fish on the sand, and I get up and look back and find that Ive been swimming for my life in two feet of water. I hop back and dress, and crawl home, where I have to pretend I liked it.
In the present instance, we all talked as if we were going to have a long swim every morning.
George said it was so pleasant to wake up in the boat in the fresh morning, and dive into the clear river. Harris said there was nothing like a swim before breakfast to give you an appetite. He said it always gave him an appetite. George said that if it was going to make Harris eat more than Harris ordinarily ate, then he should protest against Harris having a bath at all.
He said there would be quite enough hard work in pulling sufficient food for Harris up against stream, as it was.
I urged upon George39, however, how much pleasanter it would be to have Harris clean and fresh about the boat, even if we did have to take a few more hundredweight40 of provisions; and he got to see it in my light, and withdrew his opposition to Harriss bath.
Agreed, finally, that we should take three bath towels, so as not to keep each other waiting.
For clothes, George said two suits of flannel would be sufficient, as we could wash them ourselves, in the river, when they got dirty. We asked him if he had ever tried washing flannels in the river, and he replied: No, not exactly himself like; but he knew some fellows who had, and it was easy enough; and Harris and I could hardly believe he knew what he was talking about, and that three respectable young men, without position or influence, and with no experience in washing, could really clean their own shirts and trousers in the river Thames with a bit of soap.
We were to learn in the days to come, when it was too late, that George was a miserable liar, who could evidently have known nothing about the matter. If you had seen these clothes after but, as the shilling shockers41 say, we anticipate.
Georgу suggested taking a change of underwear and plenty of socks, in case we got upset and wanted a change; also plenty of handkerchiefs, as they would do to wipe things, and a pair of leather boots as well as our boating shoes, as we should want them if we got upset.
Exercises1. Read the chapter and mark the sentences T (true), F (false) or NI (no information).
1. The first thing to settle was what to buy.
2. Harris looks like Uncle Podger.
3. George reminds the narrator of his Uncle Podger.
4. Uncle Podger needs help of his whole family to hang a picture.
5. The first list three friends made was all right.
6. People often load their boats of life with foolish things.
7. The friends decided to take a tent.
8. The narrator likes bathing.