boy slipped down off the horse with the greatest ease, and stuck his whip into a link of the trace.
“Now, then,” he said, “lay holt o’ his collar, and I’ll give yer a leg up.”
I obeyed him, and seizing my leg, he nearly shot me right over the horse, but by hanging tightly on to the collar I managed to save myself, and shuffled round into the proper position for riding sidewise, feeling the motion of the horse, in spite of a certain amount of boniness of spine, delightfully easy and restful.
“They’re all right,” the boy said, as I glanced at my bundle. “They won’t fall off. Are yer comf’able?”
“Yes, capital,” I said, and we journeyed on, my luck seeming almost too good to be believed.
We went on talking away, now and then passing another barge, when the ropes were passed one over the other boat, and the journey continued.
Soon afterwards I made my first acquaintance with a lock, and got down off the horse to stand by the barge and gaze in wonderment at the process. As it glided softly into the space between walls, a pair of great doors were shut behind it, and I and my new companion helped to turn handles, with the result that I saw the water foam and rush out, and the barge slowly sink down to a lower level, when a couple of great doors were swung open at the other end. There was a certain amount of pushing and thrusting, and the barge glided out into the river ten feet lower than it was before.
Then the rope was once more made fast, the horses tugged, and we went on again, but not far before a shrill voice shouted “Jack!” and my companion stood still till the barge came abreast of him, being steered close in, when I saw a woman lean over the side and hold out a basket, which the boy caught, and then ran after me once more, where I was mounted on the first horse.
“My dinner,” he said eagerly. “Got yourn?”
“Yes,” I said, colouring up as I pulled the remains of my bread and cheese out of my pocket, there being a large piece of the latter.
“Steak pudden to-day,” said my companion, hanging his basket on to the collar by my knee, and revealing a basin half full of savoury-odoured beef-steak pudding, which was maddening to me in my hungry state.
“I say, what a whacking great piece of cheese! I like cheese,” said my companion; “let’s go halves.”
Pride kept me back for a moment, and then I said—
“I’ll give you threepence if you’ll give me half your dinner.”
“I don’t want your threepence,” he said scornfully. “You shall have half if you give me half your new bread and cheese. Ourn’s allus stale. Look, here’s some cold apple puff too.”
So there was, and delicious it looked, sufficiently so to make my mouth water.
“Got a knife, matey?”
“Yes,” I said, “but—”
“I say, I tell you what,” said my would-be host. “Have you really got threepence?”
“Yes,” I said, and was about to say more, when Mr. Rowle’s words occurred to me and I was silent.
“Then we’ll have half a pint o’ cider at the next lock, and twopen’orth o’ apples, shall us?”
“Yes,” I said, delighted at the prospect; and the result was that we two hearty boys soon finished pudding, puff, and the last scrap of the bread and cheese, after which my new friend shouted, “Mother!” The boat was steered in close, and the shrill-voiced woman took the basket back.
“Is your name Jack?” I said, as I descended, and we trudged on together slowly beside the horses, each of which was now furnished with a tin bucket hung from the top of its head, and containing some beans and chaff.
“Yes; what’s yourn?”
“Antony.”
“Ho!”
There was silence after this, for we came up to another lock, close by which was a little public-house, where Jack was sent to get a stone bottle filled with beer, and up to whose door he summoned me, and we partook of our half-pint of cider, Jack proving most honourable as to his ideas of half.
Then the beer having been passed on board, Jack’s mother and father taking not the slightest notice of me, the barge was passed through the lock, and Jack beckoned and waved his hand.
“You give me the twopence, and I’ll buy,” he said. “If we ask Mother Burke for twopen’orth all at once she won’t give us more than she would for a penny. Stop a moment,” he said, “you only give me a penny, and we’ll keep t’other for to-morrow.”
I handed a penny to him, and we went into the lock cottage, in whose lattice window were displayed two bottles of ginger-beer, a couple of glasses of sugar-sticks, and a pile of apples.
Our penny in that out-of-the-way place bought us a dozen good apples, and these we munched behind the horses as we trudged on slowly, mile after mile.
I did not feel tired now, and we boys found so much to talk about that the time went rapidly by. Jack’s father and mother did not trouble themselves about my being there, but towards six o’clock handed the boy out his tea in a bottle, whose neck stuck out of the basket that had held his dinner, and in which were some half a dozen slices of bread and butter.
“ ’Tain’t full,” said Jack, holding the bottle up to the light; “she might ha’ filled it. There is more brem-butter. Never mind, I’ll fill it up with water. You won’t mind?”
“No,” I said; but as a lock was then coming in sight, and a decent-looking village, an idea occurred to me. “Let’s buy a pen’orth of milk and put to it,” I said.
Jack’s eyes sparkled, and hanging the basket pro tem. on the hames, he cracked his whip, and we proceeded a little more quickly towards the lock, where I bought a twopenny loaf and some milk for our tea. I say ours, for Jack literally shared his with me.
“Where are you going to sleep?” said Jack to me at last, as the evening mists were beginning to rise on the meadows.
“I don’t know,” I said rather dolefully, for the idea had not occurred to me before.
“Come and bunk along o’ me.”
“Where?” I asked.
“Under the tarpaulin in front o’ the barge,” he said; “I allus sleeps there now, cos father says my legs gets in the way in the cabin.”
“But would your father mind?”
“Not he. He’ll go ashore as soon as we make fast for the night and lets the horses loose to feed. He wouldn’t mind.”
And so it turned out, for the barge was made fast to a couple of stout posts in a wider part of the canal, close to a lock where there was a public-house. The horses were turned out to graze on the thick grass beside the tow-path, and after a little hesitation I took my bundle and shoes and crept in beneath
