ONE OF THE CROWD 7 
not so much the fishing, as she says, but just 
the getting out where the winds are iree. 
The crowd contains many types for 
profitable study by the student of human 
nature. Made up largely of working 
people, many of them well-to-do, it presents 
varied contrasts. Here is a café proprietor, 
there a thriving butcher or grocery man. 
Architects, artists and clerks all rub 
shoulders in bubbling good humor on the 
trip. The weight of care and the week’s 
business worries are all lost and forgotten 
in these hours of play. The big-hearted 
German-American at my side tells me he 
goes out somewhere every week. “It keeps 
a man intrim,” hesays. “I get tired of the 
fish and often give them to some one less 
fortunate before I leave the boat. I like 
to get the cool sea breezes and be in the 
push. It does a fellow good even if it is 
Sunday.” Note his ruddy cheeks and con- 
tented grin, and contradict him if you will. 
When the boat weighs anchor for home 
volunteer quartettes and choruses start up 
“In Dear Old Georgia,” ‘“‘Consolation,”’ 
and ‘‘Wait Till the Sun Shines, Nellie,” 
but I hear only the words of some verses I 
read that very morning: 
“There is a garden of the South 
That lies along the sea, 
Kissed ever by the summer’s mouth 
And sweet with melody.” 
And better still: 
““Where all the livelong, brooding day, 
And all night long, 
The far sea-journeying wind should come 
Down to the doorway of your home, 
To lure thee ever the old way 
With the old song.” 
Wound at convenient places are the erst- 
while busy lines, now drying in the sun. 
Everything is in disorder. Most of the men 
have taken off their fishing togs and have 
donned street clothes once more. It is 
difficult to recognize some of them after 
the change. All the available seating space 
is occupied with parties of friends and little 
family groups, chatting over the incidents 
of the day. Pipes and tobacco are in great 
demand; indeed as much so as something 
to eat. ‘‘Here with that tobacco,’ be- 
comes a common request. | 
Thousands of city folk, modern cave- 
dwellers, if you please, have taken ad- 
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the week’s business worries 
and forgotten 
vantage of the glorious summer day, and in 
motor boats and launches, sailboats and 
yachts, are passing with ease among the 
larger craft. It is an inspiring sight to the 
lover of the out-of-doors. The whole world 
seems joyous outside of the “‘four walls and 
a ceiling” which hem a man’s soul in. It 
is gratifying, also, to know that every year 
the number of people seeking outdoor 
amusement grows larger and larger. All 
of which calls to mind words written by 
Thoreau years ago: “‘One moment of life 
costs many hours, hours not of business, 
but of preparation and invitation. Yet the 
man who does not betake himself at once 
and desperately to sawing is called a 
loafer, though he may be knocking at the 
door of heaven all the while, which shall 
surely be opened to him.”’? And when to the 
fascination of nature in its larger aspects 
