f the
reservists.

"Reservery," said he, "seems a pretty mean way to spend one's autumn
holiday."

"About as mean," returned I dejectedly, "as canoeing."

"These gentlemen travel for their pleasure?" asked the landlady, with
unconscious irony.

It was too much. The scales fell from our eyes. Another wet day, it was
determined, and we put the boats into the train.

The weather took the hint. That was our last wetting. The afternoon
faired up: grand clouds still voyaged in the sky, but now singly, and
with a depth of blue around their path; and a sunset in the daintiest
rose and gold inaugurated a thick night of stars and a month of unbroken
weather. At the same time, the river began to give us a better outlook
into the country. The banks were not so high, the willows disappeared
from along the margin, and pleasant hills stood all along its course and
marked their profile on the sky.

In a little while the canal, coming to its last lock, began to discharge
its water-houses on the Oise; so that we had no lack of company to fear.
Here were all our old friends; the _Deo Gratias_ of Conde and the _Four
Sons of Aymon_ journeyed cheerily down stream along with us; we
exchanged waterside pleasantries with the steersman perched among the
lumber, or the driver hoarse with bawling to his horses; and the
children came and looked over the side as we paddled by. We had never
known all this while how much we missed them; but it gave us a fillip to
see the smoke from their chimneys.

A little below this junction we made another meeting of yet more
account. For there we were joined by the Aisne, already a far-travelled
river and fresh out of Champagne. Here ended the adolescence of the
Oise; this was his marriage-day; thenceforward he had a stately,
brimming march, conscious of his own dignity and sundry dams. He became
a tranquil feature in the scene. The trees and towns saw themselves in
him, as in a mirror. He carried the canoes lightly on his broad breast;
there was no need to work hard against an eddy: but idleness became the
order of the day, and mere straightforward dipping of the paddle, now on
this side, now on that, without intelligence or effort. Truly we were
coming into halcyon weather upon all accounts, and were floated towards
the sea like gentlemen.

We made Compiegne as the sun was going down: a fine profile of a town
above the river. Over the bridge, a regiment was parading to the drum.
People loitered on the