You can here snap your fingers at the terrors of
the cruel water. Here the mocking waves cannot "curl their monstrous
heads" as on the sea, when with blind fury they dash against the
helpless ship their ponderous and shapeless forms, while sailors and
passengers alike are every moment expecting the final stroke that shall
sink them beneath the waves. On the canal you cannot be drowned, on the
canal you cannot be wrecked. The shore is so delightfully near! You
exult in the friendly companionship of the rocky wall that towers above
you, and in the assuring presence of the flowers and shrubs that cling
there or reach out to you their thin elvish hands. You feel that here
untamed Nature (that great wolf) cannot get her claws upon you. Upon
this thread of water you are soothed by the thought that you are under
the friendly and beneficent protection of man.
About nine or ten o'clock each evening the boats tie up at some lock.
At all of these locks there are refreshment-stands and neat taverns of
which the traveller must avail himself, since there are no
accommodations for visitors on the boats. On the fourth day, wishing to
vary my experience, I boarded another boat.
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