Under One Flag

I replied to the inquiry with the courtesy which I felt that the occasion required.

"Where am I going to? Shortly, sir, I expect to go into the river, when you have finally decided to send me there."

This courtesy of mine the gentleman in the check coat and the top hat mistook for humour.

"Funny, ain't yer?"

"I shall be when they fish me out. Not a doubt of it."

"I shouldn't be surprised but what you fancies yourself."

"Should you not be surprised? Indeed. Think of that now!"

This remark of mine seemed to rouse the gentleman's ire. I do not know why. He became personal.

"I've seen better blokes nor you sold down our street two for three ha'pence, with a plate o' whelks thrown in-long-faced lardy!"

"Go a'ead, Bill, never mind 'im!"

"'Is mother don't know 'e's out!"

This from his two friends in the bow. Bill went "a'ead." He thrust his sculls into the stream, or meant to, and pulled with all his might, and caught a crab, and went backwards on to the twain in the prow. It was a marvel the craft did not go over. The ladies screamed, the gentlemen struggled, but there is a providence which attends on fools, and the last I saw of them, Bill, having another row with the sculls, was starting in pursuit of his top hat, which floated on the shining waters.

This sort of thing was doing me good. Ordinarily I should have resented Richmond emulating Hampstead Heath on a Bank Holiday; but, things being as they were, the position gave my nervous system just that fillip it required. I felt that if I could only have a row royal with some half-dozen of those beanfeasters-a good old-fashioned shindy-they would enjoy themselves and I should, and I should go back to dream dreams with a sound mind in a sound body, even though the latter was ornamented by a bruise or two.

I had that trifling argument, dear me, yes. Shades of my sires! what displays of oarsmanship I saw that afternoon.

"I say, matey, give us 'old of that there oar!"

The request came from an individual who formed one of a crew of four, with the usual eight or ten passengers, and who was looking with a certain amount of longing at a scull which was drifting on the stream towards me.

"How did you happen to lose it?" I inquired, as I drew it towards me.

"It was my friend as done it; 'e 'it it out of my 'and."

This was an allusion to the rower in front of him, which the rower resented.

"'Ow do yer make that out? Didn't you clout me in the middle of the back with it, and ain't you been clouting me with it all the way along, and didn't I say to you, ''Enery, if you keeps on a-doing that something'll 'appen'?"

The gentleman who had been deprived of his scull dissented.

"If you knocks your back against my oar what's that got to do with me?"

"Why, you crackpot, don't you know better than that? If you was to 'old your oar as you ought to, I shouldn't come agin it, should I?"

"It's easy talking!"

"Ain't I sittin' in front of yer?"

"Course you are."

"Then why don't you keep your eye on the middle of my back?"

"So I do."

"Then why don't you move when I move?"

"'Ow can I? 'Ow am I to know when you're goin' to move? Sometimes you never move at all."

"You're a pretty sort to come out rowin' with, you don't know no more about a boat than a baby. 'Ere, put me ashore! I've 'ad enough of bein' mucked about by the likes o' you. I should enjoy myself more if I was lookin' on from the land."

The last speaker was, I believe, the most sensible man on the river that afternoon.

On a sudden I found myself in the middle of a race. I was lazying past the Island. I had long since given up all thoughts of Molesey, and was taking my ease, anticipating what might happen, when three boats which I had just passed all at once went mad. There was a single and a double skiff, and a four-oared tub. With one accord they started racing. I was only a yard or two in front, and though I might have pulled clear, on the other hand I might not; and, anyhow, it was their business not to run me down, a fact which they did not seem to be aware of. On they came, shouting and splashing, the steering, in particular, being something frightful to behold. In a minute we were all four in a heap. They yelled at me, passengers and crews, with an unanimity which was amazing.

"Why don't yer get out of the way?"

"Pardon me, ladies and gentlemen, but, really, how could I?"

"If yer don't know 'ow to row what d'yer want to get into a boat for?"

"That, curiously enough, was an inquiry which I was about to address to you."

The stroke of the four diverted public attention from me by falling foul of the lady who was supposed-it was the purest supposition-to be acting as coxswain.

"Don't pull both strings at once! Pull this 'and, now pull the other! Don't I tell you not to pull both strings at once! What d'yer think yer doin'?"

"Fust you says pull this 'and, then you says pull that 'and, 'ow am I to know?"

A gentleman in the double skiff interposed.

"That's right, my little dear, don't you tyke none of 'is lip. You jump inter the water and swim to me, I'll look arter yer!"

Apparently this gentleman had forgotten that there was somebody else whom it was his duty to look after, a fact of which he was suddenly reminded.

"I'm sure if the lydy'd like to chynge places with me, I'm willin'; it don't myke no manner o' odds to me. If this is your idea of lookin' arter a lydy, it ain't mine, that's all I sye."

When I at last drew clear they still were wrangling. I have a faint recollection that the ladies were threatening to "mark" each other, or anybody else who wanted it. It seemed clear that their ideas of pleasure were inseparably associated with words of a kind.

II

THE ROMANCE OF THE LADY IN THE BOAT

As I was abreast of Ham House my attention was caught by the proceedings of the occupants of a boat upon my left. These were two gentlemen and a lady. The gentlemen were not only having "words;" quite evidently they were passing from "language" to something else. I thought for a second or two that they were going to fight it out in the boat, in which case I should quite certainly have enjoyed an opportunity of earning the Royal Humane Society's medal, but, apparently yielding to the urgent entreaties of the attendant lady, they changed their minds.

"Don't fight 'ere!" she exclaimed. "You're a pretty sort to come for a holiday with, upon my word!"

They undoubtedly were, on anybody's word. With the possible intention of meeting her views to the best of their ability, they began to pull to the shore as hard as they could, each keeping severely to a time of his own. Before the boat was really close to land the gentleman in the bow sprang up, jumped overboard, and splashed through the foot or two of water to the bank. Declining to be left behind in an enterprise so excellent, his companion was after him like a shot, and in less than no time they were going it like anything upon the sandy slope. In their ardour it had possibly escaped their attention that the result of their manœuvres would be to leave their fair associate in what, all things considered, might be described as a somewhat awkward situation. There was the boat drifting into the middle of the stream, the oars, which the enthusiastic friends had left in the rowlocks, threatening every moment to part company, while the lady called upon heaven and earth to witness her condition.