Those who do not like the name of mud should see how these lights are answered by the floor of mud in simple silver and steel. Twice a day the motion of the wave is there, twice a day the still shore. With that cradling change go the changes of the boats and barges at the wharves. All is life, but there is no colour, except where you very dimly perceive that a sail is red as the sails are on the Adriatic. It is a view to teach painting, to teach seeing. We have not such another school in London as Chelsea Reach. If Chelsea ever becomes grande ville too, the shape of the river will be altered, and the profile of that curve, sharp and fine with masts against the west will be abolished: there will be no beauty of tides, no silver wet mirror, no barges.
There is nothing quite like Chelsea. The spoiling of Chelsea will not be the same thing as the spoiling of the country by pushing on a suburb, for instance; for in that case there is country beyond, only deferred. But there is no Cheyne Walk, no Chelsea, further up the river, or anywhere in the world of rivers.
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ST. PAUL’S AT DAWN.
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The Last Boat.