“Ah! the little canoe Américain. But it is not mine, monsieur, it belongs to my brother Achille. He is out of town.”
I thanked him, left the note and bowed myself out, saving my more intricate vocabulary for the open air. Three days later I received the following answer:
“Monsieur,
“I am truly desolate, I beg of you to believe me, not to be able to acquiesce to your amiable request, but it will be impossible for me to rent my St. Lawrence skiff. I hope sincerely you can find what you wish. Might I suggest hunting at Asnières? If I am not intruding, let me advise you, monsieur, to take for that delightful little voyage so Arcadian, a strong rope of thirty meters and a gaff which will prove useful in going through the locks.
“Permit me to express to you again, sir, my very sincere regrets and the assurance of my distinguished sentiments.
“Yours, etc.”
Photo by F. Berkeley Smith
THE BOAT BUILDERS AT ARGENTEUIL
Finally, just outside of Paris, at Asnières, in the workshop of a constructeur de bateaux, Monsieur Malo Lebreton, I discovered an excellent boat, brand-new, but rather heavy and flat-bottomed. Both of these seeming defects, however, proved advantages before the end of the trip. A short portable mast carried a leg-of-mutton sail, which I hoisted one sunny afternoon, and left Asnières, with a fair wind driving me along under old bridges and past little islands in the direction of Argenteuil.