1 00:00:01,760 --> 00:00:06,160 Speaker 1: Hello there, tonight, I'd like to take you drifting along 2 00:00:06,240 --> 00:00:10,960 the Oxford Canal aboard a dark green narrow boat at dusk. 3 00:00:12,880 --> 00:00:16,079 The Oxford is one of the oldest canals in England, 4 00:00:16,839 --> 00:00:21,559 cut by hand more than two hundred years ago, winding 5 00:00:21,640 --> 00:00:26,640 its slow way through the Warwickshire countryside. It was built 6 00:00:26,719 --> 00:00:30,800 for coal barges, but these days it carries little more 7 00:00:30,879 --> 00:00:35,159 than a few painted boats, moving at walking pace past 8 00:00:35,320 --> 00:00:42,000 reed lined banks and low stone bridges. We'll travel only 9 00:00:42,079 --> 00:00:46,200 a short way this evening, just as the willows darken 10 00:00:46,280 --> 00:00:51,520 against a pale blue sky, the cottage windows begin to glow. 11 00:00:53,000 --> 00:00:55,799 And by the way, if you'd like more stories like 12 00:00:55,840 --> 00:00:58,399 this one, you might want to check out our app. 13 00:00:58,960 --> 00:01:02,920 It's called Night and it is fresh stories for you 14 00:01:03,119 --> 00:01:07,239 every day, so there's always something new to fall asleep to. 15 00:01:08,159 --> 00:01:11,680 Plus you can hear them in your favorite voice. It's 16 00:01:11,719 --> 00:01:17,920 a free download the links just below this video. Take 17 00:01:17,959 --> 00:01:23,040 a moment now to settle, close your eyes if you'd 18 00:01:23,159 --> 00:01:28,519 like to place a hand on your stomach if it 19 00:01:28,560 --> 00:01:36,760 feels good, and take a slow, deep breath all the 20 00:01:36,840 --> 00:01:47,239 way down. Feel the belly rise and the long, slow 21 00:01:47,359 --> 00:01:56,280 breath out a slow, low thud somewhere under your feet, 22 00:01:57,480 --> 00:02:02,640 the diesel engine of the narrow boat ticking over no 23 00:02:02,760 --> 00:02:08,680 more than a heart beat. Beneath that, the soft, near 24 00:02:08,879 --> 00:02:14,879 constant slap of water against the wooden hull. The boat 25 00:02:15,039 --> 00:02:19,560 is called Wren. Her name is painted in pale yellow 26 00:02:19,680 --> 00:02:24,319 letters on her dark green stern, with a small loop 27 00:02:24,439 --> 00:02:29,840 of red rope coiled below it. She is sixty feet 28 00:02:29,879 --> 00:02:35,439 long and seven feet across the standard narrow boat measure, 29 00:02:36,599 --> 00:02:39,680 built to fit the old narrow locks of the English 30 00:02:39,680 --> 00:02:44,719 canal system. To night, she is more than a small 31 00:02:44,960 --> 00:02:49,639 wooden landing on the Oxford Canal, somewhere in the soft 32 00:02:49,719 --> 00:02:54,960 green Warwickshire countryside, and you are setting out for the evening. 33 00:02:56,840 --> 00:03:01,560 The light is dusk, not yet dot ar, A long 34 00:03:01,919 --> 00:03:07,240 blue evening, the kind that comes in late spring never 35 00:03:07,400 --> 00:03:12,479 quite seems to finish. The sky above the willows is 36 00:03:12,520 --> 00:03:17,400 still pale. The water below is the color of old slate, 37 00:03:18,439 --> 00:03:24,120 and on it the willows lie upside down, every leaf doubled. 38 00:03:26,240 --> 00:03:29,439 You step down from the towpath onto the rear deck. 39 00:03:30,840 --> 00:03:35,439 The boat shifts a little under your weight and then settles. 40 00:03:37,560 --> 00:03:42,240 Someone has left the small cabin door propped open. A 41 00:03:42,319 --> 00:03:47,360 faint warmth comes from inside, the warmth of a small 42 00:03:47,680 --> 00:03:53,039 coal stove kept low, and the smell of strong tea. 43 00:03:54,639 --> 00:04:00,680 The tin of biscuits opens somewhere on the countering lines 44 00:04:00,680 --> 00:04:06,919 are slipped first the bow, then the stern. The boat 45 00:04:07,039 --> 00:04:15,120 begins very slowly to drift away from the bank. The 46 00:04:15,120 --> 00:04:19,839 Oxford Canal was finished in seventeen ninety. It was one 47 00:04:19,879 --> 00:04:23,800 of the early canals designed to follow the contours of 48 00:04:23,839 --> 00:04:28,439 the land rather than cut straight across it, which is 49 00:04:28,480 --> 00:04:32,839 why it wanders the way it does, in long, shallow 50 00:04:32,959 --> 00:04:38,519 curves through the fields. James Brindley had a hand in 51 00:04:38,560 --> 00:04:43,199 the early stretches. The line you are on tonight is 52 00:04:43,240 --> 00:04:49,160 the older, more meandering part, the part the engineers later 53 00:04:49,279 --> 00:04:56,560 thought too slow and tried to shorten, and never quite did. 54 00:04:57,040 --> 00:05:01,759 Ren moves at about three miles an hour walking pace, 55 00:05:03,199 --> 00:05:08,759 slower sometimes when the wind is on her bow. The 56 00:05:08,839 --> 00:05:14,240 tiller is long and worn, smooth, painted black, with a 57 00:05:14,319 --> 00:05:18,959 brass cap at the end. The hand at the tiller 58 00:05:19,680 --> 00:05:24,959 is your own. You only have to hold it. The 59 00:05:25,000 --> 00:05:30,800 boat knows the channel more or less. The deep water 60 00:05:31,040 --> 00:05:35,160 lies a little to the left of center, and that 61 00:05:35,600 --> 00:05:40,120 is where Wren wants to be, and that is where 62 00:05:40,160 --> 00:05:47,240 she goes. The first bend comes up softly. A line 63 00:05:47,279 --> 00:05:52,240 of alders on the towpath side a field of cows 64 00:05:52,680 --> 00:05:57,639 just visible through the hedge, three of them lying down already, 65 00:05:59,000 --> 00:06:04,120 the others still cropping at the grass. None of them 66 00:06:04,199 --> 00:06:08,839 lift their heads as the boat goes past. They have 67 00:06:08,879 --> 00:06:13,720 seen a great many boats. One of them flicks an 68 00:06:13,759 --> 00:06:19,600 ear at a fly. The engine note does not change, 69 00:06:20,079 --> 00:06:26,600 a low, soft sud. The water at the bow opens 70 00:06:26,639 --> 00:06:33,240 in the long pale v and closes again behind the stern. 71 00:06:33,839 --> 00:06:37,800 A little farther on the canal narrows into a long 72 00:06:37,959 --> 00:06:44,279 cutting where the reeds grow tall on both sides. You 73 00:06:44,399 --> 00:06:48,959 hear the reeds before you really see them, a dry 74 00:06:49,560 --> 00:06:55,279 papery rustle along the hull as the boat passes, and 75 00:06:55,360 --> 00:07:01,560 somewhere among them a moor hen calling two short notes, 76 00:07:02,439 --> 00:07:08,480 and then silence. The reeds are deep green at the 77 00:07:08,519 --> 00:07:13,800 base and pale gold at the tip. A few of 78 00:07:13,839 --> 00:07:20,519 them have last year's brown seedheads still standing. A dragonfly 79 00:07:20,839 --> 00:07:24,839 lifts off one of them, hangs for a moment in 80 00:07:24,920 --> 00:07:30,000 the air beside the boat, and is gone before you 81 00:07:30,040 --> 00:07:35,439 can really look at it. The banks are close here, 82 00:07:36,680 --> 00:07:41,680 you could almost touch them. The water has narrowed to 83 00:07:41,800 --> 00:07:45,839 barely the width of the boat, and the boat seems 84 00:07:45,920 --> 00:07:49,639 to settle lower in it, as if she has found 85 00:07:49,680 --> 00:07:55,759 the place she fits best. The slap of water against 86 00:07:55,759 --> 00:08:04,040 the hull becomes a softer slap, almost a stroke. A 87 00:08:04,079 --> 00:08:07,199 pair of mallards is asleep on a flat piece of 88 00:08:07,319 --> 00:08:13,040 bank in the reeds, A male and a female heads 89 00:08:13,160 --> 00:08:19,959 tucked under their wings. They do not wake. The boat 90 00:08:20,079 --> 00:08:26,000 goes past at walking pace, four feet from them, and 91 00:08:26,120 --> 00:08:33,679 they do not wake. Ren has been polite, Wren has 92 00:08:33,720 --> 00:08:43,080 been quiet. The diesel ticks on low and steady. Your shoulders, 93 00:08:43,360 --> 00:08:49,200 without your noticing, have begun to drop. The tiller is 94 00:08:49,360 --> 00:08:53,960 light under your hand. There is nothing to steer around. 95 00:08:55,679 --> 00:09:01,120 The boat goes where the channel goes the run. The 96 00:09:01,159 --> 00:09:05,480 cutting opens and the bank on the towpath side falls 97 00:09:05,519 --> 00:09:12,240 away into a small wet meadow. There are king cups 98 00:09:12,279 --> 00:09:18,639 in the grass, yellow flowers on long stems, half closed 99 00:09:18,720 --> 00:09:24,120 for the evening. A heron is standing in the meadow 100 00:09:24,399 --> 00:09:33,080 on one leg, perfectly still. It is not fishing, it 101 00:09:33,159 --> 00:09:40,039 is just standing. As the boat goes past, it turns 102 00:09:40,080 --> 00:09:46,080 its head. The quarter turn slowly and watches round pass, 103 00:09:47,679 --> 00:09:55,720 and then turns it back beyond the meadow the first bridge. 104 00:09:55,879 --> 00:10:00,440 It is a small hump backed stone bridge, the kind 105 00:10:00,519 --> 00:10:03,600 you find every half mile or so along this canal. 106 00:10:05,679 --> 00:10:09,600 The number twenty eight is painted on the brickwork at 107 00:10:09,600 --> 00:10:15,480 the side in black on a white square, the way 108 00:10:15,480 --> 00:10:19,879 the British waterways men used to mark them, and still do. 109 00:10:22,840 --> 00:10:27,279 The arch is low as wren goes under you duck 110 00:10:27,360 --> 00:10:31,679 your head a little without thinking, and the sound of 111 00:10:31,720 --> 00:10:36,759 the engine for a moment comes echoing back off the 112 00:10:36,879 --> 00:10:45,039 curved stone, a fuller sound, a rounder thud, and then 113 00:10:45,080 --> 00:10:50,799 opens out again. On the other side. Underneath the arch, 114 00:10:51,240 --> 00:10:57,000 it is briefly cool and faintly damp, and smells of 115 00:10:57,120 --> 00:11:04,720 moss and old brick. Then you are through. On the 116 00:11:04,720 --> 00:11:08,360 far side, a lane comes down to the bridge and 117 00:11:08,519 --> 00:11:14,480 crosses it. There is no one on the lane. The 118 00:11:14,559 --> 00:11:20,120 hedges have just leafed out. A single hawthorn in flower 119 00:11:20,399 --> 00:11:26,200 stands at the corner, its blossom heavy and white in 120 00:11:26,240 --> 00:11:30,399 the half light, and the smell of it reaches you 121 00:11:30,440 --> 00:11:37,600 a beat after you see it, a soft, sweet, almost 122 00:11:37,720 --> 00:11:45,840 almond smell, the smell of an English may. You take 123 00:11:45,879 --> 00:11:50,080 a slow breath of that smell, And then it is 124 00:11:50,120 --> 00:11:56,559 behind you, and the boat moves on a little farther on. 125 00:11:57,399 --> 00:12:02,120 You hear the lock before you see it. It is 126 00:12:02,200 --> 00:12:07,480 not a loud sound. It is the soft, hollow rush 127 00:12:07,559 --> 00:12:11,440 of water through a half open paddle in the lock 128 00:12:11,639 --> 00:12:20,360 gate somewhere ahead, around the next bend, a pouring sound, 129 00:12:21,159 --> 00:12:28,799 steady and patient, like a tap left running in another room. 130 00:12:29,320 --> 00:12:34,639 Wren slows. You ease the throttle down with the small 131 00:12:34,759 --> 00:12:39,720 lever beside the tiller, and the engine drops to a tick, 132 00:12:41,039 --> 00:12:46,960 and the boat coasts in toward the lock landing. It 133 00:12:47,039 --> 00:12:52,799 is a single lock, and narrow lock, only seven feet wide, 134 00:12:53,879 --> 00:12:59,720 the standard size on this canal. Two pairs of black 135 00:13:00,039 --> 00:13:06,200 wooden gate, one at each end, with long balance beams 136 00:13:06,279 --> 00:13:12,080 sticking out over the towpath. The lock chamber between them 137 00:13:12,600 --> 00:13:19,120 is empty tonight, or nearly so. The water inside is 138 00:13:19,279 --> 00:13:23,120 lower than the water you are floating on by perhaps 139 00:13:23,440 --> 00:13:27,960 six feet. You will have to fill it before Ren 140 00:13:28,039 --> 00:13:33,679 can go in. There is no one else here. The 141 00:13:33,720 --> 00:13:39,320 lock is yours. You tie the boat to a bollard 142 00:13:39,360 --> 00:13:46,279 on the landing loosely with a single loop. The towpath 143 00:13:46,440 --> 00:13:52,000 under your boots is fine, pale gravel. There is a 144 00:13:52,039 --> 00:13:58,759 small wooden bench beside the lock, painted dark green, and 145 00:13:58,840 --> 00:14:02,519 the noticeboard with the rolls of the canal in faded 146 00:14:02,840 --> 00:14:08,759 white letters. Someone has left a folded paper bag on 147 00:14:08,799 --> 00:14:14,559 the bench, and the half empty bottle of water, left 148 00:14:14,639 --> 00:14:22,200 perhaps by an earlier boater and forgotten. The lock takes 149 00:14:22,240 --> 00:14:30,559 its time. You take years. First, the paddles on the 150 00:14:30,639 --> 00:14:35,480 far gate. The gates at the upper end must be lowered, 151 00:14:36,440 --> 00:14:40,080 if they are not already, so that no more water 152 00:14:40,440 --> 00:14:45,720 is coming through. You walk along the lock side to 153 00:14:45,840 --> 00:14:53,679 check they are down good. Then the paddles on this 154 00:14:53,960 --> 00:14:59,480 end the lower gates must also be down to hold 155 00:14:59,480 --> 00:15:04,519 the water in. Once it begins to rise. You check 156 00:15:04,559 --> 00:15:11,840 those two down. Then the gates at this end must 157 00:15:11,879 --> 00:15:19,000 be closed. If they are not already. They are good. 158 00:15:20,759 --> 00:15:24,759 Now the upper paddles can be raised slowly to let 159 00:15:24,919 --> 00:15:30,799 water in from the higher pound above. You take the windless, 160 00:15:32,000 --> 00:15:37,879 the short cranked iron handle that every boater carries, and 161 00:15:38,000 --> 00:15:41,159 walk along the towpath to the upper end of the lock. 162 00:15:43,399 --> 00:15:46,840 You fit the windless onto the square spindle at the 163 00:15:46,879 --> 00:15:50,840 top of the paddle gear, and you begin to turn 164 00:15:50,919 --> 00:15:59,399 it slowly, one quarter turn at a time. There is 165 00:15:59,440 --> 00:16:05,279 a soft clicking inside the mechanism, a pall falling into 166 00:16:05,320 --> 00:16:11,559 a ratchet, and with each click, the paddle deep down 167 00:16:11,679 --> 00:16:16,440 in the lock wall under the water rises a fraction 168 00:16:18,559 --> 00:16:25,840 a half inch, another half inch, the water on the 169 00:16:25,840 --> 00:16:29,159 far side of the gate begins to find its way through. 170 00:16:31,559 --> 00:16:35,320 You do not raise the paddle all the way. You 171 00:16:35,399 --> 00:16:40,080 raise it about a third and you stop, and you 172 00:16:40,159 --> 00:16:47,120 walk back along the towpath to watch. The lock is filling. 173 00:16:48,960 --> 00:16:52,360 Water is rushing in through the underwater channels at the 174 00:16:52,440 --> 00:16:56,679 upper end, and you can see on the dark surface 175 00:16:57,240 --> 00:17:03,559 inside the chamber to slow circular swirls where the water 176 00:17:03,759 --> 00:17:12,079 is coming up around them, smaller eddies, a piece of 177 00:17:12,160 --> 00:17:19,920 leaf turning a feather of foam. The water is rising 178 00:17:20,000 --> 00:17:25,519 at the speed of a slow tide, not quickly, not 179 00:17:25,799 --> 00:17:33,079 all at once, but in a steady, patient lift. The 180 00:17:33,160 --> 00:17:38,200 lock walls show their wet line, dark with old water 181 00:17:39,880 --> 00:17:47,480 paler above. As the water climbs, the dark line climbs 182 00:17:47,519 --> 00:17:57,759 with it, fraction by fraction, inch by inch. The damp 183 00:17:57,839 --> 00:18:00,880 green moss at the corners of the sea stones is 184 00:18:00,920 --> 00:18:07,400 being submerged again. You lean on the balance beam and watch. 185 00:18:09,440 --> 00:18:15,160 It will take perhaps eight minutes to fill. There is 186 00:18:15,200 --> 00:18:21,039 nowhere else to be. The engine of the boat behind 187 00:18:21,119 --> 00:18:28,359 you ticks on at its low idol. The water rushes 188 00:18:28,440 --> 00:18:33,240 softly through the paddle. A little farther up the cut, 189 00:18:34,240 --> 00:18:41,880 the blackbird is singing in a hedge, slow phrases, a pause, 190 00:18:43,640 --> 00:18:49,079 another phrase. It is the last song of the evening 191 00:18:49,400 --> 00:18:55,799 for that bird, the long late song that blackbirds sing. 192 00:18:56,039 --> 00:19:04,680 As the light goes, water in the lock rises at 193 00:19:04,680 --> 00:19:10,039 about half way. You walk back and ease the paddle 194 00:19:10,160 --> 00:19:15,799 up another quarter, and the rushing sound grows a little fuller, 195 00:19:17,519 --> 00:19:26,079 a deeper note. The swirls in the chamber widen. The 196 00:19:26,119 --> 00:19:34,519 water comes faster, but never too fast. The stone of 197 00:19:34,599 --> 00:19:41,799 the lock walls, pale local limestone, cut and laid two 198 00:19:41,880 --> 00:19:48,759 hundred years ago by men with picks and barrows, is 199 00:19:48,839 --> 00:19:52,720 warm to the touch where the last sun caught it, 200 00:19:54,160 --> 00:19:59,720 and cool where it did not. You let your hand 201 00:19:59,759 --> 00:20:05,200 writ on the top course. The stone is smooth where 202 00:20:05,279 --> 00:20:11,480 ropes have worn it over the long decades. There is 203 00:20:11,519 --> 00:20:15,119 one place where the rope grooves are deep enough to 204 00:20:15,200 --> 00:20:23,640 fit your finger. The water rises at three quarters full. 205 00:20:24,920 --> 00:20:28,839 The surface inside the lock has come almost up to 206 00:20:28,920 --> 00:20:34,440 the level of the upper pound. You ease the paddle 207 00:20:34,519 --> 00:20:42,160 down slowly, so as not to slam the mechanism. The 208 00:20:42,240 --> 00:20:51,319 clicks reverse, pall out, ratchet free, and the paddle drops 209 00:20:51,400 --> 00:21:00,000 back into place. The rushing sound dwindles, the chamber goes quiet. 210 00:21:02,200 --> 00:21:10,440 The water has settled. Now the upper gates. You walk 211 00:21:10,480 --> 00:21:14,400 across the small footbridge at the upper end of the lock, 212 00:21:16,440 --> 00:21:23,599 lean your weight onto the balance beam and push. The 213 00:21:23,640 --> 00:21:31,279 great wooden gate swings slowly on its iron pintle with 214 00:21:31,400 --> 00:21:40,119 a soft creak. You walk it open. On the other side. 215 00:21:40,319 --> 00:21:46,279 The matching gate swings open too, pushed by an unseen hand, 216 00:21:47,720 --> 00:21:53,240 or rather by the same trick of the water, which 217 00:21:53,279 --> 00:21:57,640 is now level on both sides, and lets the gate 218 00:21:57,799 --> 00:22:07,319 move freely. The lock is open. You step back down 219 00:22:07,440 --> 00:22:14,000 to ren You loose the loop from the ballard. You 220 00:22:14,119 --> 00:22:19,759 ease the throttle gently forward, and the boat noses into 221 00:22:19,799 --> 00:22:26,119 the lock chamber between the wet stone walls. And you 222 00:22:26,200 --> 00:22:30,400 bring her to a stop in the middle, and you 223 00:22:30,480 --> 00:22:35,359 cut the throttle to idle, and you climb up the 224 00:22:35,440 --> 00:22:41,079 iron ladder set into the wall, and you walk back 225 00:22:41,480 --> 00:22:49,160 to close the upper gates behind her. This too is slow. 226 00:22:51,839 --> 00:23:00,240 You lean on the beam, the gate swings closed. You 227 00:23:00,319 --> 00:23:05,440 cross the foot bridge. You lean on the other beam, 228 00:23:07,759 --> 00:23:13,960 that gate swings closed. To They meet in the middle 229 00:23:14,759 --> 00:23:23,279 with a soft wooden knock. Now the lower paddles. You 230 00:23:23,359 --> 00:23:28,160 fit the windlass onto the spindle, and you raise the 231 00:23:28,200 --> 00:23:37,200 paddle slowly, and the lock begins to empty. But here 232 00:23:37,480 --> 00:23:40,400 you are doing the opposite of what you did before. 233 00:23:42,640 --> 00:23:48,799 The water inside the chamber falls, Wren falls with it. 234 00:23:51,799 --> 00:23:57,680 You watch her sink quietly between the walls, six feet 235 00:23:57,759 --> 00:24:05,480 down into the lower pound. Her painted roof, which was 236 00:24:05,519 --> 00:24:09,960 at the level of the towpath, is now far below it. 237 00:24:12,759 --> 00:24:16,000 The water in the lock pours out through the lower 238 00:24:16,079 --> 00:24:23,720 paddle with that hollow rushing sound, and the surface drops 239 00:24:24,119 --> 00:24:30,400 inch by inch. When it has come level with the 240 00:24:30,519 --> 00:24:38,319 lower pound, you lower the paddle, You open the lower gates. 241 00:24:40,079 --> 00:24:47,799 You climb back aboard. Wren in her lower country, moves 242 00:24:47,839 --> 00:24:54,720 out through the open gates onto the lower water. You 243 00:24:54,799 --> 00:25:03,480 ease the throttle forward. She begins very slowly to move 244 00:25:03,559 --> 00:25:12,839 on behind you. The lock sits empty again, the gates 245 00:25:12,960 --> 00:25:18,920 left open, as the roll of the canal asks, some 246 00:25:19,240 --> 00:25:24,960 other boat in the night or the morning will find 247 00:25:25,000 --> 00:25:33,200 it ready. The engine note settles, the slap of water 248 00:25:33,559 --> 00:25:40,880 against the hull resumes. The blackbird in the hedge is 249 00:25:40,920 --> 00:25:48,039 still singing. You have lost perhaps fifteen minutes to that lock, 250 00:25:49,400 --> 00:25:55,000 perhaps twenty, and you cannot remember being in any hurry 251 00:25:56,759 --> 00:26:03,400 about any of it. A little farther on the canal 252 00:26:03,519 --> 00:26:09,480 begins to bend toward a village. You see the church spire, 253 00:26:09,640 --> 00:26:16,960 first dark against the soft sky, rising above a stand 254 00:26:17,000 --> 00:26:23,000 of trees. Then a row of low red brick cottages 255 00:26:23,519 --> 00:26:29,119 along the towpath side, their gardens running down to the water. 256 00:26:32,000 --> 00:26:39,480 Then the warm yellow of a window, then another, then 257 00:26:39,519 --> 00:26:44,559 a third. It is the time of evening when the 258 00:26:44,640 --> 00:26:50,359 lamps inside English cottages have been let, but the curtains 259 00:26:50,599 --> 00:26:56,119 have not yet been drawn. You can see through one 260 00:26:56,160 --> 00:27:03,920 window the corner of a kitchen, a wooden dresser, a 261 00:27:04,079 --> 00:27:07,720 row of blue and white plates standing on a shelf, 262 00:27:09,759 --> 00:27:17,039 a brass kettle on a stove, Through another, the hall 263 00:27:18,079 --> 00:27:22,519 with a coat on a peg, and the stair going up. 264 00:27:25,480 --> 00:27:30,440 Through a third, only the warm shape of the lamp itself, 265 00:27:32,599 --> 00:27:38,359 an ordinary lamp on an ordinary table, with no one 266 00:27:38,839 --> 00:27:45,839 in the room. You are not looking in. You are 267 00:27:45,920 --> 00:27:52,119 passing the gardens, come down to a low brick wall 268 00:27:52,359 --> 00:27:57,319 at the water's edge. Roses are climbing on, some of 269 00:27:57,359 --> 00:28:04,720 them not yet in flower. There are wooden mooring rings 270 00:28:04,759 --> 00:28:11,559 set into the wall, painted in white and red, and 271 00:28:11,599 --> 00:28:15,279 that one of them, a small painted dinghy is tied 272 00:28:15,359 --> 00:28:22,759 up black with a yellow line round the gunne, and 273 00:28:22,839 --> 00:28:26,759 the rose and castle painting on its bow. That is 274 00:28:26,839 --> 00:28:32,799 the old canal tradition. A castle on a green hill, 275 00:28:34,680 --> 00:28:40,880 a great pink rose in the foreground, three blue blooms 276 00:28:40,960 --> 00:28:47,319 beside it. The rose and castle painting goes back at 277 00:28:47,400 --> 00:28:53,680 least to the eighteen fifties. On the working boats, no 278 00:28:53,680 --> 00:29:00,440 one is sure exactly where it began, Birmingham perhaps, or 279 00:29:00,640 --> 00:29:05,279 the boat yards of the Midlands. It was the way 280 00:29:05,400 --> 00:29:09,559 the working boatmen and their families decorated the cabins they 281 00:29:09,640 --> 00:29:18,440 lived in, Castles on the doors, roses on the water cans, 282 00:29:19,680 --> 00:29:24,599 lockets of bright color against the long gray life of 283 00:29:24,720 --> 00:29:30,880 the working canals. The dinghy at the wall is a 284 00:29:30,960 --> 00:29:37,400 small inheritance of that. Wren goes past that walking pace. 285 00:29:39,680 --> 00:29:45,200 Inside one of the cottages, a radio is on. You 286 00:29:45,279 --> 00:29:53,799 can hear briefly a piece of slow music a piano, 287 00:29:54,079 --> 00:29:59,279 and then it is gone, and the cottage is behind you. 288 00:30:02,440 --> 00:30:06,960 A little farther on a low arched bridge takes a 289 00:30:07,039 --> 00:30:12,519 lane across the cut. A man is leaning on the parapet. 290 00:30:13,519 --> 00:30:19,480 Looking down. He raises his hand as Wren goes under, 291 00:30:21,839 --> 00:30:30,640 you raise yours. Neither of you says anything. Under the bridge, 292 00:30:31,160 --> 00:30:37,000 the brick is mossed and damp. The arch echoes the 293 00:30:37,039 --> 00:30:45,000 engine for a beat, then the open water again. The 294 00:30:45,079 --> 00:30:50,880 village falls behind. The lamps in its windows shrink to 295 00:30:51,039 --> 00:30:57,799 small warm points among the trees, and then the trees close, 296 00:30:59,519 --> 00:31:06,440 and the villa is gone. You're breathing by now has 297 00:31:06,480 --> 00:31:12,960 slowed without your having asked it to. There is a 298 00:31:13,000 --> 00:31:19,720 long pound of open water ahead. The towpath runs straight 299 00:31:19,839 --> 00:31:24,559 along the left bank. The hedge on the right is 300 00:31:24,640 --> 00:31:30,079 full of cow parsley in white flower, and the sky 301 00:31:30,160 --> 00:31:35,720 above is a deeper blue, now going toward indigo at 302 00:31:35,720 --> 00:31:40,480 the top, and still pale where it meets the fields 303 00:31:40,599 --> 00:31:46,799 in the west. The slap of water against the hull, 304 00:31:48,880 --> 00:31:55,119 the low thud of the engine, the slow pale v 305 00:31:55,880 --> 00:32:01,839 at the bow. You could ride them stretch a long time. 306 00:32:04,759 --> 00:32:09,039 A pair of swans is on the water ahead, a 307 00:32:09,119 --> 00:32:15,680 male and a female, with no signets, too early in 308 00:32:15,720 --> 00:32:21,680 the year. Yet they see the boat, and they begin 309 00:32:21,839 --> 00:32:29,680 to swim unhurriedly in the same direction as Ren, keeping 310 00:32:29,799 --> 00:32:35,640 their distance. They will swim ahead of her for half 311 00:32:35,680 --> 00:32:41,880 a mile perhaps, and then take to the bank or 312 00:32:42,160 --> 00:32:48,200 turn and let her pass. There is no reason to 313 00:32:48,319 --> 00:32:55,680 rush them. The water in their wake is dark and smooth. 314 00:32:58,240 --> 00:33:03,440 The canal narrows briefly where an old bridge has crumbled 315 00:33:03,599 --> 00:33:08,440 to a single stone arch, and then opens out again 316 00:33:09,200 --> 00:33:16,000 onto a long embankment. Here the cut is carried above 317 00:33:16,079 --> 00:33:19,880 the level of the fields on a raised bank of 318 00:33:19,960 --> 00:33:25,319 earth built up two hundred years ago by men with 319 00:33:25,480 --> 00:33:33,200 shovels and barrows. To either side, the ground falls away 320 00:33:33,279 --> 00:33:41,519 gently into a wide, shallow valley. Beyond the valley, the 321 00:33:41,680 --> 00:33:48,839 soft blue shapes of low hills, a wood dark against 322 00:33:48,839 --> 00:33:57,599 the sky, A single white farmhouse very far off, with 323 00:33:57,759 --> 00:34:05,880 one window lit closer in a field of young barley. 324 00:34:07,920 --> 00:34:14,760 The green shoots only six inches tall, moving very slightly 325 00:34:15,360 --> 00:34:19,360 in a breath of wind that does not reach the water. 326 00:34:19,679 --> 00:34:25,360 On the embankment. A few rooks are coming home to 327 00:34:25,440 --> 00:34:32,480 the wood. You hear them before you see them, that 328 00:34:32,719 --> 00:34:40,960 dry cracked call distant, and then a long slow line 329 00:34:41,039 --> 00:34:48,079 of black birds flying low across the valley, one after 330 00:34:48,159 --> 00:34:55,880 another into the trees. The rooks have been coming home 331 00:34:55,920 --> 00:34:59,239 to that wood for longer than the canal has run 332 00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:07,480 beside it. The canal is two hundred years old. The 333 00:35:07,599 --> 00:35:19,679 rookery is older. The wind dies, the barley settles, the 334 00:35:19,800 --> 00:35:25,880 roofs are in a little farther on, you see the 335 00:35:25,920 --> 00:35:29,559 white smoke of a chimney rising straight up out of 336 00:35:29,559 --> 00:35:37,000 a copse, perhaps a quarter mile off, someone's wood fire, 337 00:35:38,760 --> 00:35:45,440 just laid for the evening. You smell it a moment later, 338 00:35:46,559 --> 00:35:56,719 faintly wood smoke drifting across the fields. It is a 339 00:35:56,760 --> 00:36:00,559 smell that does not change very much from one century 340 00:36:00,599 --> 00:36:12,079 to the next, applewood perhaps, or oak, something slow and clean. 341 00:36:14,880 --> 00:36:25,639 The smoke rises, the smell passes, wren goes on, The 342 00:36:25,679 --> 00:36:30,880 embankment ends, the land closes in around the cut again, 343 00:36:32,039 --> 00:36:38,000 and the canal goes back into woodland. Old beaches with 344 00:36:38,119 --> 00:36:44,159 their long, pale trunks and patches of bluebells still showing 345 00:36:44,239 --> 00:36:52,599 in the undergrowth, only just past their best, the bluebells 346 00:36:52,719 --> 00:36:57,639 or the color of the deeper sky in the wood. 347 00:36:58,760 --> 00:37:03,880 It is darker. The dusk has come on faster here 348 00:37:04,079 --> 00:37:09,559 than it did on the open embankment. You reach down 349 00:37:09,639 --> 00:37:13,840 to a small switch beside the tiller and turn on 350 00:37:13,960 --> 00:37:19,760 the boat's head lamp, A single small lamp at the bow, 351 00:37:21,639 --> 00:37:28,079 throwing a pale yellow cone onto the water ahead. It 352 00:37:28,159 --> 00:37:32,880 picks out the line of the bank, the dark fringe 353 00:37:32,920 --> 00:37:38,239 of the reeds, the gleam of an oar blade left 354 00:37:38,360 --> 00:37:45,559 leaning against a tree by some long ago boater. The 355 00:37:45,639 --> 00:37:52,280 engine takes on a little farther on the canal goes 356 00:37:52,320 --> 00:37:57,360 into a short tunnel. You have time to see the 357 00:37:57,480 --> 00:38:02,559 dark mouth of it ahead, a low brick arch in 358 00:38:02,639 --> 00:38:08,440 a hillside with a stone date plaque above it. The 359 00:38:08,519 --> 00:38:15,760 numbers worn, and then Wren is at the entrance, and 360 00:38:15,840 --> 00:38:24,239 you ease the throttle down and she slides in. The 361 00:38:24,280 --> 00:38:31,440 tunnel is not long, perhaps a hundred yards, but inside 362 00:38:31,480 --> 00:38:37,800 it the world becomes very small. The brick walls are 363 00:38:37,880 --> 00:38:42,480 rynches from the boat on either side, and the roof 364 00:38:42,679 --> 00:38:47,639 is just above the cabin top, and the head lamp 365 00:38:47,840 --> 00:38:55,480 throws a long, pale halo on the water ahead. The 366 00:38:55,519 --> 00:39:02,679 engine note doubles, then trebles. Every sound bounces off the 367 00:39:02,800 --> 00:39:11,159 curved walls and comes back fuller, deeper, almost a cord. 368 00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:21,639 Water drips from the roof in places, old drips, fed 369 00:39:21,679 --> 00:39:26,320 by springs in the hillside above that have been falling 370 00:39:26,599 --> 00:39:32,800 since the tunnel was cut. They patter on the cabin roof. 371 00:39:36,039 --> 00:39:41,880 One falls cold on the back of your hand. The 372 00:39:41,960 --> 00:39:48,239 walls are slick with moss and lime, pale green where 373 00:39:48,239 --> 00:39:57,599 the head lamp catches them black Between you see at 374 00:39:57,639 --> 00:40:02,400 the far end the small bright circle of the world again, 375 00:40:04,719 --> 00:40:10,400 a coin of pale dusk, growing slowly as the boat 376 00:40:10,639 --> 00:40:21,039 moves through. The bricks pass, the drips pass, the cold 377 00:40:21,119 --> 00:40:30,400 smell of the tunnel, wet stone, iron, fairy, old water 378 00:40:31,599 --> 00:40:37,239 fills the deck for a long moment, and then thins, 379 00:40:39,440 --> 00:40:43,400 and then the boat is out and the engine note 380 00:40:43,519 --> 00:40:52,719 opens in The evening is back around you, fuller and 381 00:40:52,960 --> 00:41:02,480 bluer than before you switched the headlamp off again. The 382 00:41:02,599 --> 00:41:09,119 dusk is still bright enough to steer by. The canal 383 00:41:09,239 --> 00:41:15,679 opens into a long, straight, quiet pound the longest of 384 00:41:15,760 --> 00:41:21,960 the evening. The towpath here is empty as far as 385 00:41:22,000 --> 00:41:29,920 you can see. The hedges have gone wild, hawthorn and 386 00:41:30,079 --> 00:41:38,719 elder and bramble knotted together, a soft dark wall on 387 00:41:38,840 --> 00:41:49,079 either side. Above the hedges the sky. The sky is 388 00:41:49,119 --> 00:41:53,119 the color of a deep blue cloth held up to 389 00:41:53,199 --> 00:41:59,320 a lamp. There is one bright planet low in the 390 00:41:59,360 --> 00:42:09,880 west Venus. Perhaps it has not been there long as 391 00:42:09,920 --> 00:42:14,840 you watch two or three smaller stars come into the 392 00:42:14,840 --> 00:42:26,480 cloth above it, very small and very pale. Your shoulders 393 00:42:26,639 --> 00:42:34,519 have softened. Your hand on the tiller is light. The 394 00:42:34,559 --> 00:42:39,519 boat goes where the channel goes. You only have to 395 00:42:39,559 --> 00:42:46,320 hold it. It is time you find to think about 396 00:42:46,400 --> 00:42:52,280 mooring up. A little farther on, the canal widens into 397 00:42:52,320 --> 00:42:57,000 a small pool where a stand of willows leans out 398 00:42:57,159 --> 00:43:01,559 over the water on the off side bank and the 399 00:43:01,599 --> 00:43:06,800 towpath side has a soft green verge with three or 400 00:43:06,960 --> 00:43:14,679 four iron mooring rings set into it. Someone has chosen 401 00:43:14,719 --> 00:43:22,559 this spot before. It is a good spot. You ease 402 00:43:22,719 --> 00:43:29,119 ran in toward the bank very slowly, and the boat 403 00:43:29,360 --> 00:43:35,239 coasts the last few feet on her own momentum with 404 00:43:35,320 --> 00:43:41,519 the engine a tdle, and she touches the grass softly, 405 00:43:43,920 --> 00:43:50,199 hardly a touch at all. You step off with the 406 00:43:50,239 --> 00:43:55,599 bowline and lip it through a ring and tie it 407 00:43:55,760 --> 00:44:02,119 with a slow, deliberate knot the kind canal boaters use 408 00:44:03,119 --> 00:44:06,159 that comes loose with a single pull in the morning. 409 00:44:09,519 --> 00:44:18,039 Then the stern line, then the center line. Wren is moored. 410 00:44:20,920 --> 00:44:25,239 You go back to the rear deck. You reach down 411 00:44:25,320 --> 00:44:30,679 to the small brass key and you turn the engine off. 412 00:44:33,159 --> 00:44:38,239 The silence that comes in. Is not really silence. It 413 00:44:38,320 --> 00:44:42,159 is everything that was under the engine suddenly free to 414 00:44:42,239 --> 00:44:49,719 be heard. The slow click of the cooling iron, the 415 00:44:49,760 --> 00:44:56,679 soft slap of water against the hull, still there, smaller now, 416 00:44:58,199 --> 00:45:07,000 almost private. A late blackbird somewhere very far off, still 417 00:45:07,079 --> 00:45:13,639 finishing his song. The drip of dew of a willow 418 00:45:13,719 --> 00:45:18,880 leaf into the canal. You stand on the deck for 419 00:45:18,920 --> 00:45:25,559 a long moment in that not silence. The sky is 420 00:45:25,679 --> 00:45:31,440 darker now, the blue has deepened almost to black at 421 00:45:31,440 --> 00:45:36,320 the top, and only a soft band of pale gold 422 00:45:36,519 --> 00:45:42,000 remains in the west. Low along the line of the fields. 423 00:45:44,519 --> 00:45:50,719 The boat sits perfectly still on the water. A small 424 00:45:50,800 --> 00:45:57,239 ripple from somewhere, a moor hen, perhaps settling on the 425 00:45:57,320 --> 00:46:04,159 far bank, moves slowly across the pool and folds itself 426 00:46:04,199 --> 00:46:10,519 into the reeds and is gone. You step down into 427 00:46:10,559 --> 00:46:18,039 the cabin. Inside, the small coal stove is still glowing low. 428 00:46:20,400 --> 00:46:25,480 Someone has set it earlier and banked it, and it 429 00:46:25,519 --> 00:46:34,039 will burn quietly all night. The cabin is warm. It 430 00:46:34,119 --> 00:46:38,639 smells of coal, smoke and tea, and a little of 431 00:46:38,719 --> 00:46:45,639 beeswax from the old wood of the cabin walls. The 432 00:46:45,679 --> 00:46:51,280 walls are tongue and groove, pine varnished to a soft amber. 433 00:46:54,199 --> 00:46:58,559 A brass oil lamp hangs from the ceiling, already lit 434 00:46:59,760 --> 00:47:06,480 turn and very low. There is a small table folded 435 00:47:06,519 --> 00:47:10,480 out from the wall, with a blue and white striped 436 00:47:10,599 --> 00:47:16,119 cloth on it. There is a kettle on the stovetop, 437 00:47:17,239 --> 00:47:21,719 just off the boil. You can hear it ticking down. 438 00:47:24,880 --> 00:47:28,880 There is a brown teapot beside it, and a single 439 00:47:28,960 --> 00:47:33,559 cup and a small jug of milk under a beaded cover. 440 00:47:36,639 --> 00:47:43,840 You pour the tea slowly. You watch the steam rise 441 00:47:43,920 --> 00:47:51,559 from the cup in the lamp, light, slow and pale. 442 00:47:51,880 --> 00:47:55,920 The windows of the cabin are small, with little curtains 443 00:47:55,960 --> 00:48:02,280 pushed back to either side. Through them, you can see 444 00:48:02,320 --> 00:48:10,039 the willows, dark now against the last gold of the sky. 445 00:48:10,800 --> 00:48:17,199 A moth somewhere outside brushes against the glass once and 446 00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:25,199 gives up and is gone. There is a low cushioned 447 00:48:25,239 --> 00:48:29,719 bench along one side of the cabin, long enough to 448 00:48:29,840 --> 00:48:35,679 lie on, with a folded wool blanket at one end. 449 00:48:37,000 --> 00:48:41,559 There are books on a shelf above it, a guide 450 00:48:41,639 --> 00:48:47,960 to the Oxford Canal in pale green cloth, a small 451 00:48:47,960 --> 00:48:53,719 book of birds, a novel with its spine cracked along 452 00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:59,760 the top from many readings a leather case for windlasses 453 00:49:00,880 --> 00:49:07,000 hanging on a hook by the door. A bus timetable 454 00:49:07,119 --> 00:49:13,440 for the local village tucked behind the lamp. Quite practical, 455 00:49:14,440 --> 00:49:19,960 quite unromantic, kept there in case anyone needs to walk 456 00:49:20,079 --> 00:49:26,119 to the shop in the morning. The tea is hot. 457 00:49:28,639 --> 00:49:33,800 You hold the cup in both hands, the stove ticks, 458 00:49:35,519 --> 00:49:45,400 the lamp glows outside. The canal lies perfectly flat, and 459 00:49:45,559 --> 00:49:53,960 run on it and the willows above her. The Oxford 460 00:49:54,000 --> 00:49:59,639 Canal was built to carry coal coal from the Warwickshire 461 00:49:59,679 --> 00:50:04,639 field to Oxford and on to London by way of 462 00:50:04,679 --> 00:50:10,760 the Thames. For a hundred years it carried that coal 463 00:50:10,960 --> 00:50:18,360 at this speed, three miles an hour walking pace by 464 00:50:18,519 --> 00:50:26,840 horse on the towpath. Whole families lived on the working boats. 465 00:50:27,760 --> 00:50:33,559 They painted their cabins with castles and roses. They cooked 466 00:50:33,639 --> 00:50:39,639 on small black stoves like this one. They moored in 467 00:50:39,679 --> 00:50:44,559 the evening in places much like this place, on the 468 00:50:44,679 --> 00:50:49,800 long quiet ponds between the locks, and let the night 469 00:50:50,039 --> 00:50:58,639 come on. The coal trade is long gone. The canal 470 00:50:58,960 --> 00:51:09,840 is still here, Wren is still here. You are still here. 471 00:51:10,920 --> 00:51:15,480 You set the cup down on the table, You sit 472 00:51:15,800 --> 00:51:22,400 on the cushioned bench. The wool blanket is heavy across 473 00:51:22,440 --> 00:51:27,719 your knees. The lamp above the table is the only 474 00:51:27,880 --> 00:51:34,000 light in the cabin. The light is yellow and small. 475 00:51:36,920 --> 00:51:43,239 It reaches the corners of the room and stops outside. 476 00:51:43,960 --> 00:51:49,880 And owl calls once from the wood beyond the willows, 477 00:51:52,360 --> 00:52:09,239 a long, soft note, a pause, another, then nothing. The 478 00:52:09,280 --> 00:52:17,840 stove ticks, The kettle is quiet now. The slap of 479 00:52:17,960 --> 00:52:21,840 water against the hull is so small that you have 480 00:52:21,920 --> 00:52:28,320 to listen for it, And when you listen, it is there. 481 00:52:30,480 --> 00:52:40,320 The slap of water, the tick of the stove, the 482 00:52:40,440 --> 00:52:50,159 hush of the canal, just the canal, just the boat, 483 00:52:53,519 --> 00:53:02,000 just the long, blue, quiet evening on the water. The 484 00:53:02,119 --> 00:53:07,480 lamp is turned a little lower. The willows lean over 485 00:53:07,679 --> 00:53:12,280 Wren in the dark, and Wren rests against the soft 486 00:53:12,440 --> 00:53:18,480 grass bank, and the slow water moves under her the 487 00:53:18,519 --> 00:53:25,320 way it has moved for two hundred years. Just the 488 00:53:25,400 --> 00:53:37,480 water against the hull, slow and quiet and steady, and 489 00:53:37,639 --> 00:53:43,440 the long dark canal going on into the night.