“‘Yet,’ said I in reply, ‘you have no lack of custom. As it is this day’s business has left many disappointed, and I see upon the further bank the fires of those who have been kept waiting the whole day. They will be a hundred or more to claim your services by morning.’
“‘That is true,’ he answered, ‘but luckily few come as loaded as you or with so many beasts. This is none the less a good place of traffic, for it is the only passage across the water for many miles up and down stream, and serves the main road through the kingdom.’
“I asked him why had he not thought to meet the pressure by purchasing larger boats, or more of them, and hiring more men; since it was clear there was profit in the place, and a greater demand of travellers than he could accommodate.
“He answered again in the surly tone which people use when they boast of changeless custom, that the old boat had been good enough for his father and had served him all his own life, and was good enough for him. By this reply I saw that he was without the funds for replacing his old boat by more and better craft. This my discovery was the beginning of all that followed.
“Before striking my camp the next day I first put the old ferryman in a reasonable humour by giving him good food and drink and treating him honestly in my conversation. When I saw that he was in a mood to be approached I suggested that we should enter a kind of partnership.
“‘I am,’ said I, ‘quite at my leisure. I am under no need to go forward until I choose. I have thought of hiring some one of these habitations which I see in yonder grove, and of making a long sojourn here, for the perpetual spectacle of all this traffic crossing and re-crossing a great river under the mountains is a delight.’
“The old ferryman answered that he needed no partner, that he earned all that he needed by his trade and that he preferred to be alone. He also said that my foreign face was distasteful to him, and that grand people were often less trustworthy than they seemed.
“‘Your sentiments,’ I answered, ‘are a proof of your wisdom, and also do you honour. But has it not occurred to you that if in the place of this one old craft half a dozen good new boats, much larger and properly manned, were provided, more comers would be tempted to pass here, there would be less delay, both the volume of traffic and the pace would be increased? I cannot but think it an excellent proposition.’
“I have found, my dear nephews, that obstinate old men are easier to shepherd into financial schemes than any other sort: nor was I here disappointed.
“The old mule made the admission which all such men make after the first conventional delays. He said: ‘That is all very well, but who is to pay for them?’