[XXVIII.] See an inventory of these in the Appendix.
One of these as spokesman, and with commendable gravity, told me he had read in their district newspaper about the canoe, but he little expected to have the honour of meeting its owner.
Fancy the local organ of such a place! Is it called the "News of the Wold," or the "Gros Kembs Thunderer"? Well, whatever was the title of the Gazette, it had an article about Pontius Pilate and my visit to the Titisee in the Black Forest, and this it was no doubt which made these canal people so very inquisitive on the occasion.
The route now lay through the great forest of La Hardt, with dense thickets on each side of the canal, and not a sound anywhere to be heard but the hum now and then of a dragon fly. One or two woodmen met me as they trudged silently home from work, but there was a lonely feeling about the place without any of the romance of wild country.
In the most brilliant day the scenery of a canal has at best but scant liveliness, the whole thing is so prosaic and artificial, and in fact stupid, if one can ever say that of any place where there is fresh air and clear water, and blue sky and green trees.
Still I had to push on, and sometimes, for a change, to tow the boat while I walked. The difference between a glorious river encircling you with lofty rocks and this canal with its earthen walls was something like that between walking among high mountains and being shut up by mistake in Bloomsbury-square.
No birds chirped or sung, or even flew past, only the buzzing of flies was mingled with the distant shriek of a train on the railway. It is this railway which has killed the canal, for I saw no boats moving upon it. The long continued want of rain had also reduced its powers of accommodation for traffic, and the traffic is so little at the best that it would not pay to buy water for the supply. For in times of drought canal water is very expensive. It was said that the Regent's Canal, in London, had to pay 5,000_l._ for what they required last summer, in consequence of the dryness of the season.
At length we came to a great fork of the canal in a wide basin, and I went along the branch to the town of Mulhouse, a place of great wealth, the largest French cotton town--the Manchester of France.