Paris Regatta—Absentees—Novelties—New Brunswickers—Steam yachts—Canoe race—Canoe chase—Entangled—M. Forcat—Challenge.

While the voyage in the Rob Roy’s dingey on Sunday was such as we have described, it was a busy time a little further down the river at St. Cloud, being the first day of the Paris Regatta, which continued also on the Monday, and then our British Regatta occupied the next four days. These two were under separate committees. The British Regatta was managed by experienced oarsmen, and His Royal Highness the Commodore of the Canoe Club was patron—not a merely nominal patron but presiding frequently at the committee meetings held at Marlborough House, and generously contributing to the funds. The Emperor of the French also gave us his name, and prizes to the amount of 1000l. were offered in a series of contests open to all the world. In these better days now the rowing world of France could lately count upon the patronage of their distinguished Foreign Minister, M. Waddington, who rowed in the same boat with me at Cambridge—‘ages ago.’

But this experiment of holding an international regatta in a foreign country was quite novel, and there were difficulties around it which it is not convenient to detail.

Notwithstanding the hasty predictions of people who could not approve of what was originated and carried out without requiring their advice, the regatta brought together a splendid body of the best oarsmen and canoeists in the world from England, France, and America. Three Champions of England for the first time contended at the same place. The most renowned watermen came from Thames and Tyne and Humber, and eight-oared boats raced for the first time on the Seine. The weather was magnificent, the course was in perfect order, and better than almost any other of equal length near any capital; the arrangements made were the very best that might be contrived under the peculiarly difficult circumstances which could not be controlled, even by a committee comprising the very best men for the purpose, and zealous in their work; and lastly the racing itself, for spirit and for speed, and for that exciting interest which is caused by equal excellence sustained during well-contested struggles, was never surpassed.

But this grand exhibition of water athletics was not seen by more than a few hundreds of persons, so that “Tribunes,” richly draped, and with streamers flying above, and seats below for 1000 visitors, often had not three people there at a time.

The French oarsmen must have been absent at some “better” place, and of the French public you might see more of them assembled on the roadside round a dancing dog. The Emperor could not come—perhaps Bismarck would not let him, and as the Prince of Wales had to be in his proper place as the representative of England, receiving the Sultan in London, this important duty prevented His Royal Highness from enjoying the pleasure he might well have counted upon after the trouble he had taken in connection with the British Regatta in Paris.

But after stating this disappointment bluntly, it will be remembered by all who were at St. Cloud, that there was a great deal of real amusement, as well as of hard work, and the whole had a strange novelty both in its charms and its troubles.

For crews in “hard training” to sit down to bifteck, and Medoc, omelette, and haricots verts, with strawberries and cream, and bad French jabbered round, was certainly a novelty. To see a group of London watermen, addressed in unknown tongues, but perfectly self-possessed, visiting the Exhibition in the morning and rowing a race in the afternoon, was new; and to observe the complete bewilderment of soldiers and police at the whole proceedings, which came upon them of course with surprise in a country where no one reads the papers for an advertisement, except about a new play, or an infallible pill—all this was very amusing to those who could listen and look on.

The English rowing-men soon made themselves as comfortable as they could in their new quarters, and suffered patiently the disagreeables of French lodgings. They repaired their boats, often broken by the transit from London, and behaved with good humour in proportion to their good sense. Even the grumblers were satisfied, because they were provided with a new set of grievances; and so things passed off better than was expected by those who knew the real circumstances of the venture. It was the first regatta of the kind, and doubtless it will be the last.

No particular description of the various races for eight-oars, four-oars, pair-oars, and sculling, by watermen and amateurs, would be interesting to general readers; but a few notable lessons were there to be learned, which will probably not be disregarded.

An interesting feature was added to the occasion by the arrival of four men, who came from New Brunswick, to row at this regatta. They had no coxswain to steer them, as every other boat had, but the rudder was worked by strings leading to one of the rowers’ feet.

They contended first in a race where it was not allowed to use “outrigged” boats (so called because they are so narrow that the oars cannot work on the gunwale, but are rigged out on iron frames). Moreover, they rowed in a broad, heavy, clumsy-looking craft, with common oars like those used at sea, and they pulled a short jerky stroke, and had to go round a winding French course—indeed with apparently every disadvantage; yet they came in first, beating English and French, and winning 40l.

The same crew went in next for another race, and in another boat, an outrigger they had brought with them from the Dominion of Canada, and again they were first, and won 40l. more. [128] At once “Les Canadiens” became the favourites and heroes of the day. Englishmen cheered them because they were the winners, and some Frenchmen cheered them because they supposed the men were French, whereat the hardy Canadians smiled with French politeness, but muttering the while round protestations, intelligible only to English ears.

The river Seine was made unusually lively during the summer by the movement upon it of a whole fleet of steamers of all shapes and sizes, and with flags often exceedingly ‘coquet.’ Little screw yachts or steam launches flitted up and down, sometimes so small as to admit only three or four people on board, with a bit of awning to deflect the sun; others were crowded with passengers. This style of locomotion is peculiarly adapted to Parisians. It has all the heat, bustle, and noise that can be desirable in nautical pleasures, and yet it almost avoids those highly inconvenient undulations which open water has too often the bad taste to assume. The completion of the Thames Embankment and of the purification of our river has already made water travelling more fashionable in London. Soon, perhaps, the Representative of some powerful Trades-union or incorrupt Borough, will see by the Westminster Clock that it is time to go down to the “House,” and will order his double-screw steamer round to the water steps near his terrace door; and no coachman in those days need apply for a place unless he can steer.

Even now, the number of miniature steamers, tug-boats, and private yachts on the Thames is large and increasing; while a few years ago not one was to be seen. Most of these are pretty little things, and the best of all craft to be handled safely in the crowded waterway. The multitude of them one sees at Stockholm shews what may be seen some day in Middlesex.

Several English screw yachts had come to Paris. Mr. Manners Sutton kindly lent his to the Regatta Committee, and the steam launch of the Admiralty Barge was also used, so that the umpire was able to follow each race in a proper position for seeing fair play, while the Rob Roy was anchored at the winning-post, to guard the palm of victory. Here, too, various bomb-shells were fired high into the air at the end of each race, and were supposed to correspond in number with the place of the winning boat on the programme; but somehow they so exploded as effectually to confuse the audience they were meant to enlighten as to “who had won:” which uncertainty, we all know, is one of the principal excitements of a regatta, and it can be sometimes prolonged even until the day afterwards.

The other features of these rowing matches on the Seine may be left to the reader’s imagination if he has seen a regatta before; and if he has not seen one, he could not well apprehend the thing by reading. The canoe races, however, being more novel, have another claim on attention.

One of these races was for fast canoes, and to be decided only by speed. The other was a “canoe chase,” in which dexterity and pluck were required for success.

For the canoe race three Englishmen had brought from the Thames three long boats with long paddles, and they were the three fastest canoes in England, so far as could be proved by previous trials. Against these, three French canoes were entered, all of them short, and with short paddles. One of these, propelled by an Englishman (resident in Paris), came in easily first, and the second prize was won by a Frenchman. Here, surely, was a good sound lesson to English canoe-men who wished to paddle fast on still water, in a boat useless for any other purpose, and slower at last than a skiff with two sculls. Accordingly, we accepted the beating with thanks.

The ‘Canoe Chase,’ first instituted at our Club races on the Thames, was found to be an agreeable variety in nautical sport, and very amusing. Therefore, two prizes were offered at the Paris Regatta for a canoe chase, open to all the “peoples.” Five French canoes entered, but there was only one English canoeist ready in his Rob Roy to meet all comers (the Hon. A. F. Kinnaird).

The canoes were drawn up on land alongside each other, and with their steins touching the lower step of the “Tribune” or Grand Stand. It was curious to observe the various positions taken up by the different men, as each adopted what he thought was the best manner of starting. One was at his boat’s stern; another, at the side, half carried his canoe, ready to be “off;” another grasped the bow; while the most knowing paddler held the end of his “painter” (or little rope) extended from the bow as far as it would reach.

All dashed off together on being started, and ran with their boats to the water. The Frenchmen soon got entangled together by trying to get into their boats dry; but the Englishman had made up his mind for a wetting, and it might as well come now, at once, as in a few minutes after, so he rushed straight into the river up to his waist, and therefore being free from the crowding of others, he got into his boat all dripping wet, but foremost of all, and then paddled swiftly away. The rest soon followed; and all of them were making to the flag-boat anchored a little way off, round which the canoes must first make a turn. Here the Englishman, misled by the various voices on shore telling him the (wrong) side he was to take, lost all the advantage of his start so that all the six boats arrived at the flag-boat together, each struggling to get round it, but locked with some other-opponent in a general scramble. Next, their course was back to the shore, where they jumped out and ran along, each one dragging his boat round another flag on dry land, amid the cheers and laughter of the dense group of spectators, who had evidently not anticipated a contest so new in its kind, and so completely visible from beginning to end. Again, dashing into the water the little struggling fleet paddled away to another flag-boat, but not now in such close array. Some stuck in the willows or rushes, or were overturned and had to swim; and the chance of who might win was still open to the man of strength and spirit, with reasonably good luck. Once more the competing canoes came swiftly back to shore, and were dragged round the flag, and another time paddled round the flag-boat; and now he was to be winner who could first reach the shore again and bring his canoe to the Tribune: a well-earned victory, won by the Hon. A. F. Kinnaird, far ahead of the rest.

The struggle

The whole affair lasted not much longer than might be required to write its history; but the strain was severe upon pluck and muscle, and called forth several qualities very useful in life at sea, but which mere rowing in a straight race does not require and cannot therefore exhibit. Instantly after this exciting contest, a Frenchman challenged the winner to another chase over the same course. But as the challenger had not thought fit to enter the lists and test his powers in the chase, which was open to him like the rest, it would, of course, have been quite unfair to allow him, quite fresh, to have a special race with the hard-worked winner, though the Englishman was at once ready to accept the gage.

Among the visitors to the regatta was M. Forcat, whose peculiar system of propelling boats I have mentioned in the account of a former voyage; and he brought up for exhibition, and for the practical trial by the winner of the canoe chase, a very narrow and crank boat, rowed by oars jointed to a short mast in front of the sitter, and thus obtaining one of the advantages possessed by canoeists, that their faces are turned to the bow, and so they see where they are going.

It is no doubt an enormous disadvantage that in ordinary rowing your back is turned upon the course, with all its dangers and beauties; and this inconvenience is only put up with because you can go faster as you row with your back foremost, and the scenery is of no account if a river serves only to float the skiff but not to please the eye. As for travelling on new and lovely waters in this style, with face to the stern, it is just as if you were to walk backwards along a road, and to think you could appreciate the picturesque either by a stare at the retreating beauties you are leaving, or by a glance now and then over your shoulder at what is coming. But though M. Forcat’s boat had the rower’s face to the bow, the form and size of the nondescript novelty were not to be understood in a moment, and we tried to dissuade our young canoeist from entering hastily a new sort of boat, very easily capsized. He had his own will, however, and his own way, because he was a Scot, and only “English” in the sense we use that word for “British,”—too frequently thereby giving dire offence to the blue lion of the North, whose armorial tail is so punctiliously correct as to the precise curl and make up of its “back hair.”

“He’s upset,” they cried in a minute or so. But we might well let so good a swimmer take his chance; he merely pushed the boat ashore, and then took a pleasant swim, until he was finally captured and put into the Rob Roy’s cabin, to change his wet clothes as well as a modest man might do behind a plaid screen and before the curious world.

Therefore in boats, as well as in business and politics, we may learn lessons from one another, both on the water and on the land: from Canada, as to the steering and the stroke; from France, as to the fast, quick turning canoe in still water; and from England, as to the man.

It was to see this regatta and to help in it that the Rob Roy had pushed her way to Paris; and for this six hundred miles of river navigation in a sea-going boat were justifiable, yet often did I feel much the sea-trim lifeboat yawl was out of place upon a calm inland water like the Seine.

Before the arrival of my little yacht, a challenge had been sent to her to sail on the Seine against a French yacht there. To this I replied that it would be scarcely a fair match for the Rob Roy, a sea craft, to race on a river known only to one of the competitors; but that the yawl would gladly sail a match with any French yacht having only one man on board,—the course to be at sea either one hundred miles for speed, or one week for distance, and communication not allowed with any other boat or shore. No answer came.