We were yet on the river slowly paddling when this decision was arrived at, and the river carried me still, for I determined not to leave its pleasant easy current for a slow canal, until the last possible opportunity. A diligent study of new maps procured at Bâle, showed that a canal ran northward nearly parallel to the Rhine, and approached very near to the river at one particular spot, which indeed looked hard enough to find even on the map, but was far more dubious when we got into a maze of streamlets and little rivers circling among high osiers, so thick and close that even on shore it was impossible to see a few yards. But the line of tall poplars along the canal was visible now and then, so I made a guesswork turn, and it was not far wrong, or at any rate we got so near the canal that by winding about for a little in a pretty limpid stream, I brought the Rob Roy at last within carrying distance. A song or two (without words) and a variation of the music by whistling on the fingers would be sure to bring anybody out of the osiers who was within reach of the outlandish concert, and so it proved, for a woman's head soon peered over a break in the dense cover. She wished to help to carry the boat herself, but the skipper's gallantry had scruples as to this proposal, so she disappeared and soon fetched a man, and we bore the canoe with some trouble through hedges and bushes, and over dykes and ditches, and at last through deep grassy fields, till she was safely placed on the canal. The man was delighted by a two-franc piece. He had been well paid for listening to bad music. As for the boat she lay still and resigned, awaiting my next move, and as for me I sighed to give a last look backward, and to say with Byron-- "Adieu to thee, fair Rhine! How long delighted The stranger fain would linger on his way! Thine is a scene alike where souls united Or lonely contemplation thus might stray; And could the ceaseless vultures cease to prey On self-condemning bosoms, it were here, Where Nature, nor too sombre nor too gay, Wild but not rude, awful yet not austere, Is to the mellow earth as autumn to the year. Adieu to thee again! a vain adieu! There can be no farewell to scene like thine; The mind is colour'd by thy every hue; And if reluctantly the eyes resign Their cherish'd gaze upon thee, lovely Rhine! 'Tis with the thankful glance of parting praise; More mighty spots may rise, more glaring shine, But none unite in one attaching maze The brilliant, fair, and soft--the glories of old days.