888 BREYDON WATER CHAP. entertainment, and may, if he choose, spend a day in the town without having the presence of these inevitable features of a popular pleasure-resort thrust upon him. Even if he has seen enough of the church and quay and quaint old houses, there is always Breydon to turn to. Out in a boat on that wide waste of waters, where the wild fowl flock to the ooze flats and the smelt-catchers' houseboats are moored in the scanty shelter of the "walls," not the faintest murmur of Yarmouth's boisterous merry-making will reach him. It is towards Breydon I am drawn after an afternoon spent in distinguishing the old Yarmouth from the new. I know that down by the waterside, a little way above the Haven Bridge, I shall find a flight-shooter's gun-punt moored; and I am bent on seeing the sun set beyond the Breydon marshes. The tide has begun to flow, so there is scarcely need to use the oars as I float up the wide channel, marked out by gaunt, weed-green posts; and by the time I have left the boat-builders' yards behind me, the mud banks are awash, and the gulls, which have fed on them during the ebb, are flighting towards the marshes. A faint mist obscures the horizon, so that one might III NIGHT ON BREYDON 89 easily imagine Breydon were a great inland sea; its waters seem limitless. But as the hour of sunset approaches, the level verge of the marshlands becomes clearly defined, and a few windmills, and here and there a cattle-bield or marsh farmstead, stand out like silhouettes against the background of burning sky. Until the tide has wholly covered a flat on which an abandoned hulk is stranded, a heron keeps a-fishing there for flounders; but suddenly it rises, flies with slow wing-beats westwards, and vanishes in the golden sunset glow. Most of the ark-like houseboats are deserted; it is not the season for smelt-fishing and some months must elapse before the roar of a punt gun will be heard on these quiet waters. But the watergipsies' floating homes remind me of an autumn night I spent in a naturalist's houseboat on Breydon, and of how a dense fog came down upon land and water, disturbing the gulls and curlews on the flats so that they kept us awake all night by their cries. We were quite content to remain awake. The wild life of Breydon and our experiences on the inland waterways of East Anglia provided us with many subjects of interesting discourse. When morning came the fog had gone, and when we quietly opened our cabin door a heron got up within a few yards of our boat. The keen air of the marshes whetted our appetite for a breakfast cooked over a driftwood fire on the "wall," and the row back to Yarmouth quickened our pulses until we felt that the only life worth living was a life on the tidal waters. But I have no intention of spending to-night afloat; and as my return voyage must be against the tide I cannot linger late on lonesome Breydon. To avoid the strong inrush of the sea, I keep my punt close to the shore, where the current is less troublesome and I need only beware of shallow water and floating timbers. Sunset is succeeded by an amber afterglow, so it is not quite dark when I bring my boat back to its moorings. After stepping ashore, I ramble a little way along the crest of the "wall" which protects the marshes from the Breydon tides. 90 NIGHT ON BREYDON CH. III Behind me the sky is bright with the glow of the Yarmouth street lamps; before me marsh and flood are only seen by the light of the stars. At night Breydon and its banks assume an aspect almost primeval; only far away, like a fallen star, the light from a lonely marshland cottage gleams across the gloomy flood. 1760 The Quay, Yarmouth. Yarmouth from the Caister Road. CHAPTER IV CAISTER CASTLE, NORWICH, AND MOUSEHOLD HEATH BEFORE Yarmouth is quite awake to the fact that another day has dawned, and while the night mists are still gathered over Breydon, I have left the old town behind me and am watching a pair of lapwings wheeling above the marshes near the Caister road. Away to the right of me is a stretch of waste and common land, sheltered from the sea winds by a ridge of tawny sand-hills; to the left, almost as far as eye can see, are the Bure and Breydon marshes, dotted with rooks and cattle. Caister village soon comes in sight, but I pass through it without stopping, for I am bound for the "City of Churches," and Caister village has no charm for me while Caister Castle stands a mile or so beyond it. Even before I was astir this morning-while I lay and thought of the day's journey before me and planned the route I would take the tall tower of Caister Castle loomed before me, and I imagined I heard a gruff voice hailing me from the broken battlements. Since then the figure of a bluff old knight has been ever before me; and in fancy I have followed him to Agincourt, where he led 92 SIR JOHN FASTOLFF CHAP. the English archers; to the taking of Caen and the siege of Rouen; and to Patay, where, deserted by his men and unable by threats or pleadings to rally them, he was compelled to flee before a host led by and inspired by the presence of the Maid of Orleans. I have seen him at the head of an English army marching to relieve a beleaguered garrison; again as Governor of the Bastille; and yet again, as the custodian of a captive king. And then, after more than sixty years' military service for his country, during which he has seen many ups and downs of fortune, and not escaped the slanderous mutterings of jealous tongues, I have seen him building himself a lordly castle on the border of the Norfolk fens, hoping that, having well earned a period of repose, he may enjoy for a few years a quiet life in his native land. But he did not even live long enough to complete the building of the castle; and somewhere amid the ruins of a marshland abbey, where lapwings wail over the lonesome flats and the heron fishes undisturbed for days together, Sir John Fastolff's dust lies mingled with that of the monks of St. Benet's-at-Holme. He was a brave old warrior, and I for one |