Three Men In A Boat - Chapter 5 - Classic Fiction Audiobook Read by Dr James Gill

good evening three men in a boat Chapter five mrs. P arouses us George the sluggard of the weather forecast swindle our luggage depravity of the small boy the people gather around us we drive off in great style and arrive at Waterloo innocence of southwestern officials concerning such worldly things as trains we are afloat afloat in an open boat it was mrs. poppets who woke me up next morning she said do you know that it's nearly nine o'clock sir I know what I cried starting up nine o'clock she replied through the keyhole I thought she was over sleeping yourselves I woke Harris and told him he said I thought you wanted to get up at 6:00 so did I I answered why didn't you wake me how could I wake you when you didn't wake me he retorted now we shan't get to the water until after 12:00 I wonder if you take the trouble to get up at all I replied lucky for you that I do if I hadn't woke you up you'd have lain there the whole fortnight we snarled at one another in this train for the next few minutes when we were interrupted by defiant snore from George it reminded us for the first time since are being called of his existence there he lay the man who wanted to know what time he should wake us on his back with his mouth wide open and his knees stuck up I don't know why it should be I'm sure but the sight of another man in bed when I'm up Matins me I don't know why it should be I'm sure but the sight of another man asleep in bed when I ma Maddon's me it seems to me so shocking to see the precious hours of a man's life the priceless moments that will never come back to him again being wasted in mere mere brutish sleep there was George throwing away in a hideous sloth the inestimable time his valuable life every second of which he would have to account for here after passing away from him he might have been stuffing him with self with eggs and bacon irritating the dog or flirting with the slavery instead of sprawling there sunk in soul clogging oblivion it was a terrible form Harris and I appeared to be struck at by the same instant we determined to save him and in this noble resolve our own dispute was forgotten we flew across and flung the bedclothes off him and Harris slandered him one with a slipper whilst I shouted in his ear and he awoke Wasser valor he observed sitting up get up you fat-headed chunk Lord Harris it's quarter to ten what he shrieked jumping out of bed into the bath who the Thunder put this thing in there we told him he must have been a fool not to see the bath we finished dressing and when it came to the extras we remembered that we had packed the toothbrushes and the brush and the comb that's toothbrush of mine were the death of me I know and we had to go downstairs and fish them out of the back and when we had done that George wanted the shaving tackle we told him he would have to go without the shaving that morning as we weren't going to unpack the bag again for him or anybody like him he said don't be absurd how can I go into the city like this it was certainly rather rough on the city but what CAD we for human suffering as Harris said in his common bulghur way the city would have to lump it we went downstairs to breakfast montmarcy had divided two of the dogs to come and see him off and they were whiling away time fighting on the doorstep we calmed them with an umbrella and sat down to chops and call beef Harris said the great thing is to make a good breakfast and he started with a couple of chops saying that he would take these whilst they were hopped as the beef could wait George got hold of the paper and read us out at the boating fatalities and the weather forecast which latter prophesized cold rain wet to fine whatever more than usually ghastly thing in the weather that maybe occasional thunderstorms east wind with general depression over the Midland counties London channel bar falling I do think that of all the silly irritating Tom foolishness by which we are played this weather forecast fraud is about the most aggravating it forecasts precisely what happened yesterday or the day before and precisely the opposite of what is going to happen today I remember a holiday of mine being completely ruined one day late autumn by our paying attention to the weather report of a local newspaper heavy showers with thunderstorms may be expected today it would say on Monday and so we would give up on our picnic and stop indoors all day waiting for the rain and people would pass the house going off in waggonette and coaches as jolly and merry as could be the sun shining out and not a cloud to be seen ah we would say as we stood looking out at them through the window won't they come home soaked and we chuckled to think how wet they were going to get and came back and stirred the fire and got our books and arranged our specimens of seaweed and cockle shells by 12 o'clock with the Sun pouring into the room the heat became quite oppressive and we wondered when those heavy showers and occasional thunderstorms were going to begin how they'll come this afternoon you'll find we said to each other oh won't those people get wet what a lark at one o'clock the landlady came in to ask if we weren't going outside as it seemed such a lovely day oh no we replied with the nine truckle not we we don't mean to get wet no no and when the afternoon was nearly gone and still there was no sign of rain we tried to cheer ourselves up with the idea that it would come down all at once just as the people started for home and were out of reach of any shelter and that they would thus get more drenched than ever but not a drop ever fell and it finished at grande and a lovely night after it the next morning we would read that it was going to be a warm fine and set-to fair day much heat and we would dress ourselves and flimsy flimsy things and go out and half an hour after we started it would commence to rain hard and a bitterly cold wind would spring up and both would keep on steadily for the whole day and we would come home with colds and rheumatism all over us and go to bed the weather is a thing that is beyond me altogether I can never understand it the barometer is useless it is as misleading as the what newspaper forecast there is one hanging up in the hotel at Oxford at which I was staying last spring and when I got there it was pointing to a set of fair it was simply pouring with rain outside and had been all day I couldn't quite make matters out I tapped the barometer and it jumped up and pointed to very dry the boot stopped us as he was passing and said he expected it meant tomorrow I fancied that maybe it was thinking of the week before last but boots said no he thought not I tapped it again next morning and it went up still higher and the rain came down faster than ever on Wednesday I went and hit it again and the pointer went around towards set fair very dry and much heat until it was stopped by the peg and couldn't go any further it tried its best but the instrument was built so it couldn't prophesy fine weather any harder than it did without breaking itself it evidently wanted to go on and prognosticate drought and water famine and sunstroke and summer tombs and such things but the peg prevented it and it had to be content with pointing to the mayor commonplace very dry meanwhile the rain came down in a steady torrent and the lower part of the town was under water into the river having overflowed buuut said it was evident that we were going to have a prolonged spell of grande weather some time and read out a poem which is printed over the top of the Oracle about long foretold long past short noticed soon passed the fine weather never came that summer I expect that machine must have been referring to the following spring then there are those new style of barometers the long straight ones I can never make head nor tail of those there is one side for 10:00 a.m. yesterday and one side for 10:00 a.m. today but you can't always get there as early as 10:00 you know it rises or Falls for rain and fine with much or less wind one end is nearly and the other is Ely what's easily got to do with it and if you tap it it doesn't tell you anything and you've got to correct it for sea-level and reduce it to Fahrenheit and even then I don't know the answer but who wants to be foretold the weather it is bad enough when it comes without our having the misery of knowing about it beforehand the profit we like is the old man who on a particularly gloomy looking morning of someday when we particularly want it to be fine looks around to the horizon with a particularly knowing eye and says no sir I think Woodill clear up alright it will break right enough sir he knows we say as we wish him good morning and start off wonderful how these fellows can tell and we feel an affection for the man which is not at all lessened by the circumstances of it not clearing up but continuing to rain steadily all day ah well we feel he did his best for the man that prophesized bad weather on us on the contrary we entertain only bitter and revengeful thoughts going to clear up do you think we shout cheerily as we pass no sir I'm afraid it's settled down for the day he said replying shaking his head stupid old fool would mutter what's he know about it and if his portent proves correct we come back feeling still more angry against him and with the vague notion that somehow he has something to do with it it was too bright and sunny on this especially morning for George's blood-curdling readings about bar falling atmospheric disturbance passing in an oblique line over southern Europe and pressure increasing very much to upset us and so finally he could not make us wretched and was only wasting his time he sneaked the cigarette I had carefully ruled for myself and went when Harris and I haven't finished up the few things left on the table carted our luggage to the doorstep and waited for the cab there seemed a good deal of luggage one we put it all together there was the Gladstone bag the small handbag and two hampers a large roll of rugs and some four or five overcoats and Macintoshes and a few umbrellas and then there was the melon by itself in a bag because it was too bulky to go anywhere and a couple of pounds of grapes in another bag and a Japanese paper umbrella and a frying pan which been too long to pack we wrapped around with brown paper it did look a lot and Harris and I began to feel rather ashamed of it though why we should I couldn't see no cab babe no cab came by but the street boys did and got interested in the show apparently and stopped Vic's boy was the first to come around Biggs is our green grocer and his chief talent lies in securing the services of the most abandoned and unprincipled errand boys that civilization has yet produced if anything more than usually villainous and the boy line crops up in our neighborhood we know that is as bigs latest I was told at the time of the great coram street murder it was promptly included by our street that the bigs boy for that period was the bottom of it and he had not been able in reply to a severe cross-examination to which she was subjected to by number nine when called therefore orders the other morning after the crime assisted by number 21 who happened to be on the step at the time to prove a complete alibi it would have gone hard with him I don't know the biggest boy at the time but from what I've seen of him since I should not have attached much importance to that alibi and myself the big boy as I have said came around the corner he was evident in a great hurry when he first dawned upon the vision but upon catching sight of Harris and me and Montmorency and the things he eased up and stared Harris and I frowned at him this might have wounded a more sensitive nature but the bigs boys or not as a rule touchy he came to a dead stop a yard from our step and leaning against the railings and selecting a straw to chew fixed us with his eye he evidently meant to see things out in another moment the grocer's boy passed on the opposite side of the street Biggs boy held him high ground flora 42 is a moving the grocer's boy came across and took up a position on the other side of the step then the young gentleman from the boot shop stopped and joined the big boys while the empty can superintendent from the blue posts took up an independent position on the curb they ain't gonna starve are they said the gentleman from the boot shop you'd want to take a few things with you retorted as blue posts if he was a girl across the Atlantic in a small boat they ain't crossed me antek struck in big boy they're gonna find Stanley by this time quite a crowd had collected and people were asking each other what was the matter one party the young and giddy portion of the crowd held that it was a wedding and pointed out Harris as the bridegroom while the elder a more thoughtful of the populace inclined to the idea it was a funeral and I was probably the corpse his brother at last an empty cab turned up as this is the street where as a rule when they are not wanted empty caps pass at a rate of three a minute and hang about and get in your way and packing ourselves and our belongings into it and shooing out a couple of not Lawrence's friends could evidently sworn never to passaic him we drove away against the cheers of the crowd bigs boys shying a carrot after us for luck we got to Waterloo at eleven and asked where the eleven five started from of course nobody knew nobody at Waterloo ever doesn't know where a train is going to start from or were a train when it does start is going to or anything about it the porter who took our things thought he would go from number to platform while another porter with whom we discussed the question had heard a rumor that he would go from number one the stationmaster on the other hand was convinced it would start from the local to put an end to the matter we went upstairs and asked the traffic superintendent who told us he had just met a man who said he had seen it at platform number three we went to platform number three but the authorities there so that they rather thought the train was the Southampton Express or else the Windsor loop but they were sure it wasn't the Kingston train though why they were so sure they weren't able to say then our water said he thought it must be on the high-level platform said he thought he knew the Train so we went to the high-level platform and saw the engine driver asked him if he was going to Kingston he said he couldn't say for certain of course but he rather thought he was anyhow if he wasn't the 11-5 for Kingston he was pretty confident he was the 9:32 for Virginia water or the 10:00 a.m. Express for the Isle of Wight or somewhere in that direction we should all know when we got there we slipped half a crown into his hand and begged him to the 11-5 in Kingston nobody will ever know on this line we said what you are or where you're going you know the way you slip off quietly and go to Kingston well I don't know gent replied the noble fellow but I suppose some trains got to go to Kate go to Kingston and I'll do it give me half the ground thus we got a kingston by London a South Western Railway we learned afterwards that the train would come by was really the Exeter male and that they had spent hours at Waterloo looking for it and nobody knew what had become of it our boat was waiting for us at Kingston just below the bridge and to it we wend it our way and round it we stored our luggage and into it we stepped I all right sir said the man right it is we answered and with that Harris at the skulls and I at the tiller and montmarcy unhappy and deeply suspicious in the prowl out was shot on to the waters which for a fortnight were to be our home end of chapter 5