Studio: international art (8.1896)

Maldon as a Sketching Ground

limited to vessels of certain tonnage and those of blue with red soft hats scurry along the shore
purely a mercantile class, it is all the better so, planks like acrobats. Look out in mid channel,
because it creates a style of its own, and you will There may be a small procession of barges racing
find you cannot overstep the boundary of your own down the waterway with the wind dead aft, each a
conceptions simply because it is impossible to study in itself, or, taken as a whole, a grand picture
reach it. of riverside energy. Later, with the flowing tide,

You can watch the bustle of a brigantine coming fishing boats hail to their mooring grounds. There
to her moorings and the rattle of her running is just enough wind to carry them in, though here
rigging as her sails are clewed up. You see her and there the sweeps are out to lend a helping
push the smaller craft aside as she elbows her way hand. And every smack has a tired-out look, like
to the quay, where a motley line of interested a man who has been on his legs all day and is glad
loungers contrasts with the nimble hands aboard, to lie down and rest. As each arrives at a certain
till at last she is snug and comparative quiet takes point the sails come " down in the folds," and by-
the place of all the hubbub, and then you can settle and-by when all are safely housed, the creaking in
down to a fine piece of composition and colour as the blocks again tells of the nets run up to the
she groups with her entourage, the olla-podrida of masts to be spread abroad for the drying,
river and wharf, a melange of leisure and toil. And then there are the pleasure boats. One

At another spot you will find a barge—say of the chief recreations of the Maldon man of
the Sunbeam, or may be the Diligent—under business is to go for a sail or a row, so that during
repair, with her mainmast unstepped and her leisure hours the river becomes a busy scene,
shrouds lying across the deck in a twisted mass. Not much need I tell you about it on the score of
There is much scraping of spars, and painters in paintable material, but the little craft flying about

add another variation to the
multitude of incidents. There
is a neatness, a brightness, a
vivacity about them born only
of enjoyment : touches of
frivolity, laughing when au-
sterely snubbed by the hard-
worked brigantine, and caring
not a jot for the sneers of
the dull old barge. Steamers
are seldom seen so high up
the Black water, but every
now and then one does land
a party of excursionists,
though their visits, I am
pleased to say (speaking from
a selfish artist's point of
view), are few and far be-
tween. There is practically
no business done with the aid
of steamships to or from the
Port of Maldon. The lead-
ing trades upon the river
consist in hay and straw,
grain, timber, stones, coal,
chalk and lime, and by reason
of some of these you get
those loaded decks which
often give the vessels a top
heavy appearance, though an
the towing path by the canal, maldon appearance only, for rarely

from a drawing by e. w. charlton, a.r.e one hears of a barge capsiz-

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