Their banks are bright with tormentil,
blue with forget-me-not, rich in treasures of starry moss; the
water is clear, cool in the hottest summer--they rise under the
shadow of the everlasting hills, and their goal is the sea.
* * * * *
There are other times when I must leave the clean waters and the
good brown earth, to live, for a while, in London: and there I go
on pilgrimage that I may listen to the river's voice.
I stand sometimes at a wharf where the ships are being unloaded of
the riches of every country, of fruits of labour by my unknown
brothers in strange lands; and the river speaks of citizenship in
the great world of God, wherein all men have place, each man have
his own place, and every one should be neighbour to him who may
have need.
I pass on to London Bridge, our Bridge of Sighs. How many of these
my brethren have sought refuge in the cold grey arms of the river
from something worse than death? What drove them to this dreadful
resting-place? What spectre hurried them to the leap? These
things, too, are my concern, the river says.
Life is very grim in London: it is not painted in the fair,
glowing colours of grass and sky and trees, and shining streams
that bring peace. It is drawn in hard black and white; but the
voice of its dark waters must be heard all the same.
* * * * *
I would not leave my rivers in the shadow. After all, this life is
only a prelude, a beginning: we pass on to where "the rivers and
streams make glad the city of God.
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