I am not puffing Osea as a residential quarter, but it is worth while recording another tribute to this life-giving air, which I shall be so sorry to leave for a time, when I have written the imminent last words of this biography. The head of a great City company has been staying here recently. He came down, in search of peace, at the end of the London season. He told me, upon the night of his arrival, that he had been unable to sleep for weeks, unable to eat properly, was thoroughly unnerved. Two days afterwards, as we were walking upon the pier, he turned to me in a transport of enthusiasm. "By Jove!" he said, "I have never met anything like it in my life!"—and the man I refer to is one of the best travelled persons of his day.
The silence, the huge arc of sky, the life-giving breezes, the perfect and tranquil beauty—what more can the heart of man desire? Very little, I think, and yet there is even more to be said about Osea.
Situated as it is in the middle of the Blackwater, it is naturally a great yachting centre. At week-ends, moored off the island, there are innumerable boats, from the little yawl with a single cabin and a crew of two, to the stately cutter of a hundred tons, with its auxiliary motor, and its spruce sailors.
There is a pier of about a hundred yards long stretching out into the tideway, where there is always a vast stretch of deep water, and to this pier twice or three times a day, from Maldon, comes Mr. Charrington's own steamer, which runs for the convenience of the island inhabitants and also of excursionists. Day by day this boat, with its hundred or more people, makes a circuit of the island, and proceeds onwards to the German Ocean.
Osea itself is well supplied with boats belonging to the Manor House. There is a large motor-boat, which runs in and out at the disposal of any one. There are sailing-boats, rowing-boats, fishing-boats, to suit every taste, every accident of tide or weather.
Sea fishing can be had all the year round. I have not tried it, personally, nor has Mr. Charrington himself much time to devote to this form of sport, but the islanders assure me that all is as it should be. In the official Maldon guide to Osea I read, and from it I reproduce, as follows—
"Spruling, or handline fishing, is the method most in vogue, using the common log- or lugworm for bait; this fine fellow lives in the sandy mud along the shore, but it is not easily dug by the amateur, although in many spots it is abundant; their local price is generally half-a-crown per quart. The best time for fishing is autumn and spring, but it is only for about two hours before and after low tide that it is possible to hold ground, the tide running too strong before and after; by spruling sufficient fish can often be caught; a party of four has caught as many as 400 good fish in about two hours. These are mostly dabs, plaice, whiting, codling, and the large-mouthed, voracious little father-lasher, locally called 'bull-rout,' which often gives good sport, but is otherwise very little use; occasionally a weaver, with its poisonous fin, or a red gurnard may be caught. A more successful method of fishing is by hoop-netting, baiting with the small shore-crab, but this is not permitted upon the ground of the Tollesbury and Mersea Oyster Fishery Co., which is well marked by the large beacons on each shore; the upper edge of the oyster ground is a very good spot for sport. Dabs, plaice, and similar flatfish are known as market-fish, scantlings and hoppers, according to size, the latter being the smallest; soles as soles, slips and tongues.
"Spruling is best by night, especially in September and October for codling and whiting, and when lying quietly at anchor, possibly waiting for the tide to get slack enough to fish, we are sure to notice the tide leaving the mud, and then the drain heads, as they are called locally, make a noise like the tail of a mill when the wheel is in motion, or like the hum of a distant railway train. This is always especially noticeable just at dusk.
"The variety of sport to be derived from sea-fishing is great, and its votaries will not need them to be particularised, while the amateur can learn best by following the instructions of his fellow-sportsmen. Bass are frequently caught up to 10 lb. in weight. Grey mullet are almost as big, but they are very agile and wary, jumping like hares over a peternet when shooting the creeks. Garfish are taken in plenty in early summer; they swim on the top of the water, and when present are sure to be seen in the sun jumping out and playing on the surface; when cooked, these little-known, long-nosed fish much resemble mackerel, but they are sweeter; a foolish prejudice exists against them because their bones are grass-green. It seems almost impossible to hook the wily and soft-mouthed mullet, but bass, garfish and other summer species may be taken by drift lines. Eels, which are abundant, but not so large as they used to be, are taken in quantities, but generally by the professional by babbing; this is practised from a punt in shallow water, by threading a bunch of logworms on worsted and sinking this to the bottom on a short line, with a six- to eight-foot rod. Anchor or moor the punt so that it does not sheer about with the tide. A bite is quickly felt, as the eel tugs very strongly, but to catch them all requires practice; flounders are often caught with the eels. Eel shearing or spearing on the mud, either when walking on splatches (flat boards tied on to the soles of your boots) or from a punt or boat, is seldom profitable to the amateur. Eel trawling with a very fine-meshed net, a most destructive operation, was first discovered by John Heard, of Tollesbury, when trawling for prawns on Mersea shore. To catch the eels it is necessary to have a tunnel in the trawl to prevent them coming back and escaping; they travel backwards.
"The various kinds of net-fishing are too numerous to mention, but there are several of the Maldon fishermen who can be prevailed upon for a consideration to take a passenger or two for a day's trawling, if he be not too particular as to the luxury of his accommodation. The known fish fauna of the Blackwater is a rich one, and the occurrence of almost any British species in this fine estuary is possible. Salmon and trout are frequently taken."
There is a little shooting, but not much—I except always wildfowl. For several years in the past the shooting has been let, but Mr. Charrington has given up disposing of his rights, and in the season such game as there is upon the island is always at the disposal of sportsmen who are living there. Still, I think that fifty brace of partridges would mean a very good year upon Osea.
I am tempted to catalogue the wild flowers, though I know nothing about the details, except that all is beautiful. There are printed authorities to consult upon the floral delights of Osea. And the descriptive writer is too apt to catalogue the gutter, and think he is writing of the street. Let all those things go. Let me rather tell in a few final words of gentle evenings, August nights, and silver dawns, in which I have talked of deep things with my host.
A world of physical and material beauty has its way in inducing high and beautiful thoughts in the human mind. Charrington and I have sat in the garden of the Manor House when a great round, red moon has hung in a sky of black velvet, and the kissing night-breezes have filled us with health and thrilled the blood. But it has not been only æsthetic enjoyment of material perfection that irradiated the night. It has been the stories he has told me in his low voice, while the red end of his cigar—for, like Spurgeon, he is a great smoker—has pulsed and glowed in the blackness—that have brought one's thoughts nearer and nearer to the heavenly mysteries that dark and dawn have curtained from the human sense.