"It is not good that the man
should be alone," said the Lord God.
I live now as it were in two worlds, the world of sight, and the
world of sound; and they scarcely ever touch each other. I hear
the grind of heavy traffic, the struggle of horses on the frost-
breathed ground, the decorous jolt of omnibuses, the jangle of cab
bells, the sharp warning of bicycles at the corner, the swift
rattle of costers' carts as they go south at night with their
shouting, goading crew. All these things I hear, and more; but I
see no road, only the silent river of my heart with its tale of
wonder and years, and the white beat of seagulls' wings in strong
inquiring flight.
Sometimes there is naught to see on the waterway but a solitary
black hull, a very Stygian ferry-boat, manned by a solitary figure,
and moving slowly up under the impulse of the far-reaching sweeps.
Then the great barges pass with their coffined treasure, drawn by a
small self-righteous steam-tug. Later, lightened of their load,
and waiting on wind and tide, I see them swooping by like birds set
free; tawny sails that mind me of red-roofed Whitby with its
northern fleet; black sails as of some heedless Theseus; white
sails that sweep out of the morning mist "like restless
gossameres." They make the bridge, which is just within my vision,
and then away past Westminster and Blackfriars where St Paul's
great dome lifts the cross high over a self-seeking city; past
Southwark where England's poet illuminates in the scroll of divine
wisdom the sign of the Tabard; past the Tower with its haunting
ghosts of history; past Greenwich, fairy city, caught in the meshes
of riverside mist; and then the salt and speer of the sea, the
companying with great ships, the fresh burden.
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