THE MODERN THAMES. 129 



skill, and is occasionally engaged by a gentleman to 

 give him lessons. They regarded me eagerly — they 

 *' spotted" a Thames freshman who might be made 

 to yield silver; but I walked away down the road 

 into the village. The spire of the church interested 

 me, being of shingles — i.e. of wooden slates — as the 

 houses are roofed in America, as houses were roofed 

 in Elizabethan England; for Young America repro- 

 duces Old England even in roofs. Some of the 

 houses so closely approached the churchyard that 

 the pantry windows on a level with the ground were 

 partly blocked up by the green mounds of graves. 

 Borage grew thickly all over the yard, dropping its 

 blue flowers on the dead. The sharp note of a bugle 

 rang in the air : they were changing guard, I suppose, 

 in Wolsey's Palace. 



III. 



In time I did discover a skiff moored in a little- 

 visited creek, which the boatman got out for me. 

 The sculls were rough and shapeless — it is a remark- 

 able fact that sculls always are, unless you have them 

 made and keep them for your own use. I paddled 

 up the river; I paused by an osier-grown islet; I 

 slipped past the barges, and avoided an unskilful 

 party ; it was the morning, and none of the uproarious 

 as yet were about. Certainly, it was very pleasant. 

 The sunshine gleamed on the water, broad shadows 

 of trees fell across ; swans floated in the by-channels. 

 A peacefulness which peculiarly belongs to water 

 hovered above the river. A house-boat was moored 

 near the willow-grown shore, and it was evidently 



