could have sounded. Heavenly melody, in our then state of mind, would
only have still further harrowed us. A soul-moving harmony, correctly

performed, we should have taken as a spirit-warning, and have given up
all hope. But about the strains of "He's got `em on," jerked

spasmodically, and with involuntary variations, out of a wheezy
accordion, there was something singularly human and reassuring.

The sweet sounds drew nearer, and soon the boat from which they were
worked lay alongside us.

It contained a party of provincial `Arrys and `Arriets, out for a
moonlight sail. (There was not any moon, but that was not their fault.)

I never saw more attractive, lovable people in all my life. I hailed
them, and asked if they could tell me the way to Wallingford lock; and I

explained that I had been looking for it for the last two hours.
"Wallingford lock!" they answered. "Lor' love you, sir, that's been done

away with for over a year. There ain't no Wallingford lock now, sir.
You're close to Cleeve now. Blow me tight if `ere ain't a gentleman been

looking for Wallingford lock, Bill!"
I had never thought of that. I wanted to fall upon all their necks and

bless them; but the stream was running too strong just there to allow of
this, so I had to content myself with mere cold-sounding words of

gratitude.
We thanked them over and over again, and we said it was a lovely night,

and we wished them a pleasant trip, and, I think, I invited them all to
come and spend a week with me, and my cousin said her mother would be so

pleased to see them. And we sang the soldiers' chorus out of FAUST, and
got home in time for supper, after all.

CHAPTER X.
OUR FIRST NIGHT. - UNDER CANVAS. - AN APPEAL FOR HELP. - CONTRARINESS OF

TEA-KETTLES, HOW TO OVERCOME. - SUPPER. - HOW TO FEEL VIRTUOUS. - WANTED!
A COMFORTABLY-APPOINTED, WELL-DRAINED DESERT ISLAND, NEIGHBOURHOOD OF

SOUTH PACIFIC OCEAN PREFERRED. - FUNNY THING THAT HAPPENED TO GEORGE'S
FATHER. - A RESTLESS NIGHT.

HARRIS and I began to think that Bell Weir lock must have been done away
with after the same manner. George had towed us up to Staines, and we

had taken the boat from there, and it seemed that we were dragging fifty
tons after us, and were walking forty miles. It was half-past seven when

we were through, and we all got in, and sculled up close to the left
bank, looking out for a spot to haul up in.

We had originally intended to go on to Magna Charta Island, a sweetly
pretty part of the river, where it winds through a soft, green valley,

and to camp in one of the many picturesque inlets to be found round that
tiny shore. But, somehow, we did not feel that we yearned for the

picturesque nearly so much now as we had earlier in the day. A bit of
water between a coal-barge and a gas-works would have quite satisfied us

for that night. We did not want scenery. We wanted to have our supper
and go to bed. However, we did pull up to the point - "Picnic Point," it

is called - and dropped into a very pleasant nook under a great elm-tree,
to the spreading roots of which we fastened the boat.

Then we thought we were going to have supper (we had dispensed with tea,
so as to save time), but George said no; that we had better get the

canvas up first, before it got quite dark, and while we could see what we
were doing. Then, he said, all our work would be done, and we could sit

down to eat with an easy mind.
That canvas wanted more putting up than I think any of us had bargained

for. It looked so simple in the abstract. You took five iron arches,
like gigantic croquet hoops, and fitted them up over the boat, and then

stretched the canvas over them, and fastened it down: it would take quite
ten minutes, we thought.

That was an under-estimate.
We took up the hoops, and began to drop them into the sockets placed for

them. You would not imagine this to be dangerous work; but, looking back
now, the wonder to me is that any of us are alive to tell the tale. They

were not hoops, they were demons. First they would not fit into their
sockets at all, and we had to jump on them, and kick them, and hammer at

them with the boat-hook; and, when they were in, it turned out that they
were the wrong hoops for those particular sockets, and they had to come

out again.
But they would not come out, until two of us had gone and struggled with

them for five minutes, when they would jump up suddenly, and try and
throw us into the water and drown us. They had hinges in the middle,

and, when we were not looking, they nipped us with these hinges in
delicate parts of the body; and, while we were wrestling with one side of

the hoop, and endeavouring to persuade it to do its duty, the other side
would come behind us in a cowardly manner, and hit us over the head.

We got them fixed at last, and then all that was to be done was to
arrange the covering over them. George unrolled it, and fastened one end

over the nose of the boat. Harris stood in the middle to take it from
George and roll it on to me, and I kept by the stern to receive it. It

was a long time coming down to me. George did his part all right, but it
was new work to Harris, and he bungled it.

How he managed it I do not know, he could not explain himself; but by
some mysterious process or other he succeeded, after ten minutes of

superhuman effort, in getting himself completely rolled up in it. He was
so firmly wrapped round and tucked in and folded over, that he could not

get out. He, of course, made frantic struggles for freedom - the
birthright of every Englishman, - and, in doing so (I learned this

afterwards), knocked over George; and then George, swearing at Harris,
began to struggle too, and got himself entangled and rolled up.

I knew nothing about all this at the time. I did not understand the
business at all myself. I had been told to stand where I was, and wait

till the canvas came to me, and Montmorency and I stood there and waited,
both as good as gold. We could see the canvas being violently jerked and

tossed about, pretty considerably; but we supposed this was part of the
method, and did not interfere.

We also heard much smothered language coming from underneath it, and we
guessed that they were finding the job rather troublesome, and concluded

that we would wait until things had got a little simpler before we joined
in.

We waited some time, but matters seemed to get only more and more
involved, until, at last, George's head came wriggling out over the side

of the boat, and spoke up.
It said:

"Give us a hand here, can't you, you cuckoo; standing there like a
stuffed mummy, when you see we are both being suffocated, you dummy!"

I never could withstand an appeal for help, so I went and undid them; not
before it was time, either, for Harris was nearly black in the face.

It took us half an hour's hard labour, after that, before it was properly
up, and then we cleared the decks, and got out supper. We put the kettle

on to boil, up in the nose of the boat, and went down to the stern and
pretended to take no notice of it, but set to work to get the other

things out.
That is the only way to get a kettle to boil up the river. If it sees

that you are waiting for it and are anxious, it will never even sing.
You have to go away and begin your meal, as if you were not going to have

any tea at all. You must not even look round at it. Then you will soon
hear it sputtering away, mad to be made into tea.

It is a good plan, too, if you are in a great hurry, to talk very loudly
to each other about how you don't need any tea, and are not going to have

any. You get near the kettle, so that it can overhear you, and then you
shout out, "I don't want any tea; do you, George?" to which George shouts

back, "Oh, no, I don't like tea; we'll have lemonade instead - tea's so
indigestible." Upon which the kettle boils over, and puts the stove out.

We adopted this harmless bit of trickery, and the result was that, by the
time everything else was ready, the tea was waiting. Then we lit the