Little Rivers | Page 6

authority. But in lowlier and less dangerous
matters, such as we are now concerned with, one may dare to speak in
plain English. I am all for the little rivers. Let those who will, chant in
heroic verse the renown of Amazon and Mississippi and Niagara, but
my prose shall flow--or straggle along at such a pace as the prosaic
muse may grant me to attain--in praise of Beaverkill and Neversink and
Swiftwater, of Saranac and Raquette and Ausable, of Allegash and
Aroostook and Moose River. "Whene'er I take my walks abroad," it
shall be to trace the clear Rauma from its rise on the fjeld to its rest in
the fjord; or to follow the Ericht and the Halladale through the heather.
The Ziller and the Salzach shall be my guides through the Tyrol; the
Rotha and the Dove shall lead me into the heart of England. My
sacrificial flames shall be kindled with birch-bark along the wooded
stillwaters of the Penobscot and the Peribonca, and my libations drawn
from the pure current of the Ristigouche and the Ampersand, and my

altar of remembrance shall rise upon the rocks beside the falls of
Seboomok.
I will set my affections upon rivers that are not too great for intimacy.
And if by chance any of these little ones have also become famous, like
the Tweed and the Thames and the Arno, I at least will praise them,
because they are still at heart little rivers.
If an open fire is, as Charles Dudley Warner says, the eye of a room;
then surely a little river may be called the mouth, the most expressive
feature, of a landscape. It animates and enlivens the whole scene. Even
a railway journey becomes tolerable when the track follows the course
of a running stream.
What charming glimpses you catch from the window as the train winds
along the valley of the French Broad from Asheville, or climbs the
southern Catskills beside the Aesopus, or slides down the Pusterthal
with the Rienz, or follows the Glommen and the Gula from Christiania
to Throndhjem. Here is a mill with its dripping, lazy wheel, the type of
somnolent industry; and there is a white cascade, foaming in silent
pantomime as the train clatters by; and here is a long, still pool with the
cows standing knee-deep in the water and swinging their tails in calm
indifference to the passing world; and there is a lone fisherman sitting
upon a rock, rapt in contemplation of the point of his rod. For a
moment you become a partner of his tranquil enterprise. You turn
around, you crane your neck to get the last sight of his motionless angle.
You do not know what kind of fish he expects to catch, nor what
species of bait he is using, but at least you pray that he may have a bite
before the train swings around the next curve. And if perchance your
wish is granted, and you see him gravely draw some unknown,
reluctant, shining reward of patience from the water, you feel like
swinging your hat from the window and crying out "Good luck!"
Little rivers seem to have the indefinable quality that belongs to certain
people in the world,--the power of drawing attention without courting it,
the faculty of exciting interest by their very presence and way of doing
things.

The most fascinating part of a city or town is that through which the
water flows. Idlers always choose a bridge for their place of meditation
when they can get it; and, failing that, you will find them sitting on the
edge of a quay or embankment, with their feet hanging over the water.
What a piquant mingling of indolence and vivacity you can enjoy by
the river-side! The best point of view in Rome, to my taste, is the Ponte
San Angelo; and in Florence or Pisa I never tire of loafing along the
Lung' Arno. You do not know London until you have seen it from the
Thames. And you will miss the charm of Cambridge unless you take a
little boat and go drifting on the placid Cam, beneath the bending trees,
along the backs of the colleges.
But the real way to know a little river is not to glance at it here or there
in the course of a hasty journey, nor to become acquainted with it after
it has been partly civilised and spoiled by too close contact with the
works of man. You must go to its native haunts; you must see it in
youth and freedom; you must accommodate yourself to its pace, and
give yourself to its influence, and follow its meanderings whithersoever
they may lead you.
Now, of this pleasant pastime there are three principal forms. You may
go as