A CAPITAL luncheon I've had at the "Lion,"
I've drifted down here with the light Summer breeze;
I land at the bank, where the turf's brown and dry on,
And lazily list to the music of trees!
O, sweet is the air, with a perfume of clover,
O, sleepy the cattle in Remenham meads!
The lull of the lasher is soothing, moreover,
The wind whistles low in the stream-stricken reeds!
With sail closely furled, and a weed incandescent —
Made fast to a post is the swift Shuttlecock—
I think you will own 'tis uncommonly pleasant
To dream and do nothing by Hambleden Lock!
See a barge blunder through, overbearing and shabby,
With its captain asleep, and his wife in command;
Then a boatful of beauties for Medmenham Abbey,
And a cargo of campers all tired and tanned.
Two duffers collide, they don't know what they're doing —
They're both in the ways of the water unskilled —
But here is the Infant, so great at canoeing,
Sweet, saucy, short-skirted, and snowily frilled.
I notice the tint of a ribbon or feather,
The ripple of ruffle, the fashion of frock;
I languidly laze in the sweet Summer weather,
And muse o'er the maidens by Hambleden Lock!
What value they give to the bright panorama —
O, had I the pencil of Millais or Sandys! —
The lasses with sunshades from far Yokohama,
The pretty girl-scullers with pretty brown hands!
Next the Syren steams in; see the kind-eyed old colley,
On the deck, in the sun, how he loves to recline!
Note the well-ordered craft and its Skipper so jolly,
With friends, down to Marlow, he's taking to dine.
In the snug-curtained cabin, I can't help espying
A dew-clouded tankard of seltzer-and-hock,
And a plateful of peaches big babies are trying,
I note, as they glide out of Hambleden Lock!
A punt passes in, with Waltonians laden,
And boatman rugose of mahogany hue;
And then comes a youth and a sunny-haired maiden
Who sit vis-à-vis in their bass-wood canoe.
Now look at the Admiral steering the Fairy,
O, where could he find a much better crew than
His dutiful daughters, Flo, Nina, and Mary,
Who row with such grace in his trim-built randan?
I muse while the water is ebbing and flowing,
I silently smoke and serenely take stock
Of countless Thames toilers, now coming, now going,
Who take a pink ticket at Hambleden Lock!
