An Hour's Row by W. Clark Russell — Read

There is not a more painfully diverting sight in the whole world than that of a cockney with a face as yellow as a London fog, a tall hat at the back of his head, his coloured shirt-sleeves rolled above his elbows, tugging upon the sea at a small pair of oars in a rather heavy wherry. He has no idea of tides, of waves, of winds, or weather. He looks to leeward for squalls, and over the stern for any other news of the sea. The current that dangerously and helplessly sweeps him away from the land delights him by a sense of velocity. The waves which rise and threaten to fill the boat gladden him with the sensation of going "up and down. " I once took the trouble to watch a cockney get into a wherry and row himself out to sea. I kept a very powerful glass bearing upon him, and had his face within reach of my hand, so to speak, when he was two miles off. There was a strong tide setting to the eastward, in which direction lay the North Sea. He went away very fast, and with my eye to the telescope I found myself smiling in sympathy with his radiant enjoyment of the speed at which his boat was going. He did not feather his oars, but rowed with prodigious contortions of his body, carrying his nose aft until I thought he would tumble upon it in the stern sheets, and then lying back at an angle so acute that I was constantly watching for his heels, whilst his oars flourished themselves in the air like a pair of tongs in the hands of a clown. I was sure, by the expression in his face, that he believed it was his fine rowing that made the boat go so fast. He did not know that the tide was helping him at the rate of very nearly three and a half land miles an hour.

At last he thought it was time to turn back. He let go one oar to pull at the other with both hands, and so he got his boat's head round. He still smiled and looked confident, and rowed unintermittently for about ten minutes, in which time he had gone astern about the sixteenth of a mile. Then he stopped and took a look over the bows. His face was no longer radiant, but, on the contrary, very much puzzled, and even slightly distressed. He rowed hard again, and then stopped and took another look. This time he seemed horribly frightened. Indeed, examined through the telescope, his yellow face was a curious study. The emotions of his soul were finely expressed, and every time he stopped rowing to turn his head and gaze at the land, a fresh passion was depictured on his fog-coloured lineaments. Eventually a couple of boatmen went to succour him, and with much difficulty towed him home. He stepped on shore very defiantly, and, instead of rewarding the boatmen for their services, expressed his gratitude by offering to row either of them for a pound.