Cowes has not inaptly been called “the Mecca of yachtsmen,” and in the season at one time or another, to use a common phrase, “everybody who is anybody” will generally be found in its streets, or on the yachts in Cowes Roads. Along from Wootton Creek the shore is picturesque, and as one passes Norris Castle (with the twin towers of Osborne in the background) and rounds Old Castle Point pretty West Cowes and the ivy-mantled Royal Yacht Squadron Club House come suddenly into view. Cowes is a distinctly picturesque and interesting-looking place from the water; has a much greater air of antiquity than its more bustling rival Ryde; and with the Medina cutting the town in half has the real air of a port. The water, too, seems along this little piece of island coast to melt into the land, so frequently is the shore shaded and beautiful with leafy dells, and giant trees waving their branches skyward in the ambient air of summer. Across the Solent, though distant, there is the not less lovely prospect of the Hampshire highlands, and the many tinted stretches of green and grey-green woodlands which mark the New Forest on the horizon. It is not easy to get a snug berth at any time during the summer months at Cowes. During “the week” late comers will have to put up with what they can get, or go elsewhere; or anchor far outside the charmed circle of beautiful craft, which makes Cowes Roads during Regatta week a unique water pageant, and a thing to be remembered. If one is going to spend a week at Cowes it is delightful to do so in the river somewhere off the Folly Inn on the Eastern side of the Medina; or a little further up off Roche’s or the old Mill. One is out of the way of harm (and there is plenty of that going round in the river when the tide makes out like a mill race) and one is yet not too far out of the way. Roche’s Mills have not always been as peaceful as to-day. Here, as at Porchester and elsewhere, were confined numerous French prisoners of war, though how the buildings were adapted for the purpose of a gaol it is a puzzle to imagine.