Just as the ebbing tide had lowered the yawl fairly on the baulks, another steamer came in from France, crowded with passengers, and the waves of her swell lifted my poor little boat off her position, and rudely fixed her upon only one baulk, from which it was not possible to move her; therefore, when the tide descended she was hung up askew in a ludicrous position of extreme discomfort to her weary bones; but when I went outside to examine below, there was nothing whatever amiss, and gladness for this outweighed all other troubles, and left me quite ready for a good sleep at night.
For this purpose we rowed the yawl into a quiet little river, and lashed her alongside a neat schooner, whose captain and wife and children and their little dog ‘Lady’ were soon great friends, for they were courteous people, as might be expected in a respectable vessel; it is generally so.
Now the Rob Roy settled into soft mud for a good rest of three days, and I went to the Inn where “Mr. Smith” landed from France in 1848, after he had given up being King Louis Philippe.
The Inn traded upon this fact, and it had other peculiarities—very bad chops, worse tea, no public room, and a very deaf waitress! the whole sufficiently uncomfortable to justify my complaint, and it must be a very bad inn indeed that is not comfortable enough for me.
Here I was soon accosted by a reader of canoe books, and next day we inspected the oyster-beds, and a curious corn-mill driven by tide-water confined in a basin—one of the few mills worked by the power of the moon. Also we wandered over the new sea fortifications, which are built and hewed by our Government one week, and the week afterwards if there comes a shower of rain they tumble down again. This is the case, at any rate, with the Newhaven fortress, and we must only hope that an invading army will not attack the place during the wrong week.
Three steamers in a day, all crowded with Exhibition passengers, that was a large traffic for a small port like Newhaven; but it did not raise the price of anything except ham sandwiches, and I bought my supplies of eggs and butter and bread, and walked off with them all, as usual, to the extreme astonishment of an aristocratic shop-woman.
In crossing a viaduct my straw hat blew off into a deep hole among mud, and I asked a boy to fetch it. The little fellow was a true Briton. He put down his bundle, laboriously built a bridge of stones, and at imminent risk of a regular mud-bath, at length clasped the hat. His pluck was so admirable, that he had a shilling as a reward, which, be it observed, was half the price of the hat itself two months before, a “No. 2” hat, useful to shop in.
This incident put an end to quiet repose, for the boy-life of the town was soon stirred to its lowest depth, and all youngsters with any spirit of gain trooped down to the yawl, waiting off and on for the next day also, in hopes of another mishap as a chance of luck to them.
The dingey too had its usual meed of applause; but one rough mariner was so vociferous in deriding its minuteness, that at last I promised him a sovereign if he could catch me, and he might take any boat in the port. At first he was all for the match, and began to strip and prepare, but his ardour cooled, and his abuse also subsided.
Many Colchester boats were here, nearly all of them well “found,” and with civil crews, who were exceedingly grateful for books to read on the Sunday, and, resting among them, was a little yacht of five tons, which had been sent out with only one man to take her from Dover to Ryde. Poor fellow! he had lost his way at night and was unable to keep awake, until at last two fishermen fell in with the derelict and brought him in here, hungry and amazed; but I regarded him with a good deal of interest as rather in my line of life, and I quite understood his drowsy feelings when staring at the compass in the black, whistling rain.