It was an undignified position for him. A rude
boy on the bank immediately yelled out to a lagging chum to "hurry up and
see real monkey on a stick."
I could not go to his assistance, because, as ill-luck would have it, we
had not taken the proper precaution to bring out a spare pole with us. I
could only sit and look at him. His expression as the pole slowly sank
with him I shall never forget; there was so much thought in it.
I watched him gently let down into the water, and saw him scramble out,
sad and wet. I could not help laughing, he looked such a ridiculous
figure. I continued to chuckle to myself about it for some time, and
then it was suddenly forced in upon me that really I had got very little
to laugh at when I came to think of it. Here was I, alone in a punt,
without a pole, drifting helplessly down mid-stream - possibly towards a
weir.
I began to feel very indignant with my friend for having stepped
overboard and gone off in that way. He might, at all events, have left
me the pole.
I drifted on for about a quarter of a mile, and then I came in sight of a
fishing-punt moored in mid-stream, in which sat two old fishermen. They
saw me bearing down upon them, and they called out to me to keep out of
their way.
"I can't," I shouted back.
"But you don't try," they answered.
I explained the matter to them when I got nearer, and they caught me and
lent me a pole. The weir was just fifty yards below. I am glad they
happened to be there.
The first time I went punting was in company with three other fellows;
they were going to show me how to do it. We could not all start
together, so I said I would go down first and get out the punt, and then
I could potter about and practice a bit until they came.
I could not get a punt out that afternoon, they were all engaged; so I
had nothing else to do but to sit down on the bank, watching the river,
and waiting for my friends.
I had not been sitting there long before my attention became attracted to
a man in a punt who, I noticed with some surprise, wore a jacket and cap
exactly like mine. He was evidently a novice at punting, and his
performance was most interesting. You never knew what was going to
happen when he put the pole in; he evidently did not know himself.
