112 WAYFARING NOTIONS 



bigger dykes, and a shower of windmills scattered 

 about the whole mise-en-scene — its own brothers 

 have appeared to you time and again on canvas 

 coloured by Nicholas and the other (Gaspard) 

 Poussin, Berghem, and by plenty more who 

 drew what they saw in Flanders and Holland. I 

 put it to you, Refereaders, whether if you didn't 

 know who Rye was, so to speak, and took it on 

 in casual rencontre without Winchelsea to give 

 you hints, you would not write down this Cinque 

 Port as Dutch. You must, I am sure of that, 

 and so, as I said, I felt satisfaction in proving the 

 place for myself. 



Dutch, not a bit of it ; but very English, 

 though English of a peculiar type, is old Rye, 

 what is left of it, and New, what has been added 

 of late, mostly with reverential desire to preserve 

 the unities and assume mediaevality if you have 

 it not. A quaint mosaic in many anomalous 

 ways, an ''amphibious" resort where the agri- 

 cultural and sea-going industries meet and merge, 

 is this most peaceful haven of rest, eloquent 

 always of stormy, strifeful days, yet a nook 

 wherein to take breathing time, thinking of made 

 rather than making history. Rye offers a calm 

 land anchorage wherein to lay up for repairs ; or 

 as paid off, in permanence to dwell and be 

 thankful, putting aside tiresome harness of life's 

 hard Sturm und Drang. Here, if anywhere, you 

 should ''forget" as one forgets long toil in the 

 transient sleep that might be a night's or of a few 

 seconds only, but means an absolute break of 

 some sort in labour's continuity and refreshment 

 withal beyond the power of all stimulant, cordial 

 or medicinal. "That solar shadow as it 

 measures time it life resembles, too," says the 



