So I just stopped there and lazed, and watched other boats go past. There is a prevalent notion apparently that nothing which is said in one boat can possibly be heard in another. As each boat went past, its occupants made humorous and uncomplimentary remarks upon me. The waiters in some of the inferior London restaurants have a similar notion that nobody understands French. Without these little delusions we should not be as happy as we are. In my case there seemed to be an idea that I had got stuck in the bank and couldn’t get out again. The impression was wrong. My boat was a little tired, and went to sleep. It had come a long way, and I was not brute enough to wake it up again. I watched the other boats go past. There were very fine and noble people in some of them, but I did not see one proper loafer, and hardly any one who had elementary notions of the right way to loaf. There is no subject which is less understood. The spirit of asceticism, the spirit of extravagance for its own sake, and the spirit of utilitarianism are fast spoiling us. The popular idea that loafing is in some way connected with laziness should be removed. Loafing is the science of living without trouble. There may be a time when it is easier to work than to laze. A man, when suffering badly from Tripos, may find it less trouble to read Thucydides than to stifle his conscience. The condition of mind is unhealthy and morbid; but, where it exists, it would certainly be better loafing to work than to laze. And no one objects more than the well-trained loafer to enforced laziness. When he is in London he will have his hat ironed at the barber’s rather than at the maker’s. In the first case he will have to pay for it, but he will be shaved while it is being done; in the second case no charge is made, but more than sixpennyworth of vitality is consumed in the irritation of having to wait. It is not the waiting which the loafer minds: it is the _having_ to wait. There are many who would loaf, but fail from want of a little thought. They do not take enough trouble to avoid trouble. They arrive at some result, and half a loaf is better than no bread; but nevertheless they do not get the perfect life. Here is a problem in loafing. There were four men--A, B, C, D--who rose one morning, and all found they wanted shaving. A was too lazy, left his chin as it was, was miserable all that day, and simply _had_ to shave next day. B half-way through the morning got shaved at a barber’s. C conquered his inclinations and shaved himself at once. D, knowing that it was impossible to grow a beard at Cambridge, and being too lazy to shave or be shaved, had his things packed up, and “went down.” The vanity of the man, the strength of the beard, and the distance from a barber are the same in each case; and it is supposed that the price of a shave is so small that it may be disregarded: which was the best loafer of the four?