English Summary

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Three Men in a Boat Chapter 19 Summary

Stay at Oxford. Montmorency’s idea of heaven. The pros and cons of rowing upstream. The start of the journey back home. Swapping of stories between the friends. George plays the banjo. Wet days on the boat andflight back, to solid ground. The end of the boat trip.

The three friends stayed at Oxford for two days. During that time, Montmorency fought with several dogs, which seemed to be his idea of heaven.

The author also commented on the practice of some people of taking a boat from Oxford and travelling downstream with the current. However, he was of the opinion that it was far more satisfying to row upstream, especially when George and Harris were rowing and he was steering. The author recommended taking one’s own boat for this stretch. According to him, one may also hire boats above Marlow, as they were quite unlikely to sink, but were plain and unomamented. As a result, people were not too keen to be seen in them and travelled only early in the morning or late at night. He shared his experience of hiring one such boat, called the ‘Pride of the Thames’, which actually looked more like a roman relic.

On the third day at Oxford, the weather changed and they began their home-ward journey amidst a drizzle. The author mused that as beautiful as the river looked on a sunlit day, it was equally dismal when it rained. The three friends first tried to pretend to like it, so much so that Harris and the author even tried singing songs about a gypsy’s life. George however, stayed stuck under the umbrella.

They pulled up that evening at a place called Day’s Lock and had quite a dismal evening. The rain continued, everything was clammy and damp, and their dinner was unappetizing, as they each wished to eat something they could not have. Afterwards, they played cards and George won four pence from the others.

They then mixed up some toddy and shared dismal tales. George spoke of a young man who caught a chill in a damp boat and died, Harris shared a story of a friend who slept out on such a night and was crippled for life. This led to a lively discussion of several dangerous diseases. Finally the author, in a weak moment, asked George to play them a comic song on his banjo.

He immediately played a merry tune, but made it sound so sad that the other two wanted to cry. Finally they went to bed, sleeping fitfully till about five a.m. The second day was just like the first, but the three were determined not to give up just yet. By the time they neared Pangboume, they were discussing how nice it would be to stop at a nice warm inn and restaurant, except that they had made up their minds to stay with the boat.

Twenty minutes later, the three men and the dog crept stealthily towards the railway station. They reached the Paddington station at seven, drove to a restaurant and ate heartily. Finally well fed and happy, Harris proposed a toast to the three men who were well out of a boat! Montmorency seemed to approve.

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Three Men in a Boat Chapter 18 Summary

The author’s fondness for locks on the river. The story of George and the author being photographed on the boat ‘Nuneham’—a good place to drown. The ill-effect of the river air on the most tranquil people.

They left Streatley the next morning and slept the next night in the boat, near Culham. The absence of any locks for a stretch of six and a half miles was appreciated by the rowing men, but the author himself was fond of locks. He was fond of the variation they created in the process of boating and liked chatting with the lock-keepers and their families. It was also a good place to meet other boaters and share some river-gossip.

The author shared an incident when he and George had been boating near Hampton Court. A photographer had set up his equipment and immediately everyone in their respective boats took up whatever poses they thought suited them the best. In the process, the author’s boat nearly got stuck in the woodwork of the lock and nearly tipped over. They managed to save the boat, but their poses, for the photograph, were ruined.

The author then shared some of the history of Wallingford. From Wallingford to Dorchester, the area became hillier. Dorchester, again, was a town with a lot of history, having been the capital of Wessex in Saxon times.

The next morning, the three sailors were up early and headed out towards Oxford. At Abingdon, the river passed by the streets of the little town. There was a monument in St. Helen’s Church there, recording a Mr Lee, who had had a family of one hundred and ninety seven. The author hoped that there were not many like him in this crowded, modem world.

Near the lock at Nuneham, according to the author, was a pool which was very good to drown in because of the strong undercurrents. After they crossed over Iffley, the author came to what he called the most difficult part of the river, until Oxford. This was because of the strong cross-currents in the water, which made it difficult to row in a straight line.

As a result, the author also noticed how being on a boat can make one ill-tempered. He thought that it was because the air around the river that had a negative effect on even the most sweet-tempered people.

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Three Men in a Boat Chapter 17 Summary

Stay at Streatley and its popularity as a fishing area. The author’s story of his lack of success at fishing and stories of other successful fishermen. George takes a tumble in an inn at Streatley.

The author and his friends stayed at Streatley for two days and got their clothes washed. They had tried to wash their clothes in the river earlier, but it seemed as though all the dirt of the river had collected onto their clothes instead.

The author shared that the area around Streatley and Goring was known to be a fishing centre. The river was supposed to be full of pikes, eels, gudgeons and other fish and people could sit and fish all day long. However, the author felt that actually catching any fish was a different matter altogether.

He had once tried fishing, but the experienced fishers had told him that he didn’t have enough imagination to be successful at it. According to them, a successful angler is one who can not only make up good stories, but can add incidental detail to it, to make it appear authentic. Not only would he spin out a fine tale about the actual process of fishing, but would add details of what they said at home, and so on.

The author once knew a fellow who took to fly-fishing and decided never to exaggerate his stories by more than twenty-five per cent, as it was sinful to lie. Within a few months he revised his strategy and decided to exaggerate by doubling, but even this was not satisfactory. He finally decided to count each fish as ten, and had been going along very happily, ever since.

In fact, the author advises one to take the opportunity to drop in at one of the little village inns and listen to the fishy stories the anglers always share. On their second evening at Streatley, George and the author went into a little inn, and saw a large trout framed in a glass case above the chimney. One by one, four different men came into the inn, and each one claimed to have caught the trout.

Finally the inn keeper himself came and told the two friends his version of the story. Fascinated by the fish, George climbed onto a chair to get a better view, slipped and crashed down along with the trout case. It shattered into thousands of pieces, for the trout was made of plaster-of-Paris.

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Three Men in a Boat Chapter 16 Summary

The friends enjoy being towed by a steam boat from Reading till Pangbourne. The author’s turn to row and his attempt to argue his way out of it. The discovery of the dead body of a woman and her story.

They reached Reading at about eleven in the morning. The author explained that while it was not a pretty sight, it was, historically, an important place. At Reading Lock, the three friends came upon a steam launch belonging to one of their friends, which towed their boat till Streatley. The author and his friends enjoyed being towed. Contradictory to his early views on steam launches and his usual practice of not getting out of their way, the author now expressed his annoyance with small boats which did not get out of the way of the steam launches.

A little above Mapledurham, they passed by the neighbourhood of Pangbourne, where the steam launch left them. The author tried to reason that the area where he was to row the boat had already passed, but George and Harris refused to agree, which the author thought was proof that they were shirking their work again. To keep peace, the author began rowing. However, they soon stopped when they discovered the dead body of a woman floating on the river. The body was taken to shore by some men on the bank. The friends later found out the woman’s story, where she had been deceived in love, left homeless with a small child and finally had drowned herself.

The author and his friends had intended to reach Wallingford that day, but the area of Streatley and Goring was so beautiful that they decided to spend some more time there.

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Three Men in a Boat Chapter 15 Summary

Household work, duties and their general aversion to work. Observations on the changed attitudes of the younger generation. Sharing of their earlier boating experiences.

Waking up early the next morning, the author and his friends had a quick breakfast and then started cleaning up and tidying things. This gave them an insight into how a housewife is kept constantly occupied. By ten o’clock they were ready to continue on their journey. However, upon the question of who should row, the three friends could not agree. Each felt that the other two had not been doing enough work. According to the author, while he loved work and always kept around it, he was not too keen on actually doing more than observing it.

Finally it was decided that George and Harris would row and then later on the author would tow the boat past Reading. The author then discussed the strange change in the attitudes of the younger generation. According to him, the old experienced sailors always relaxed and made the new ones do all the work, all the while telling them mostly fictitious stories about how they had once rowed in far worse conditions. The author had noticed a change in the younger generation, however, as once, when he and his friends were trying out this strategy with a new sailor, instead of listening to them, he refused to believe their stories.

As the three friends rowed along, they shared their early boating experiences. The author recalled rafting in the backwaters, with the owner of the planks chasing him for stealing them. George recalled his first outing on the river-at the age of sixteen, when he and his friends hired a racing boat and had a terrible time trying to row it. Harris on the other hand, was more used to the sea than to river boating.

The author then discussed the temperament and method of the old boatman, who calmly allows all other boats to overtake him without the slightest objection. He then commented on the funny sight of two novices rowing together, as neither can keep pace with the other and they end up blaming the oars and the man who rented the boat out to them.

When George mentioned that he would like to try punting, the author related the story of a friend who went punting and sadly got stuck in the middle of the river, clinging onto his pole like a monkey. The author was now alone on the punt with no form of oars on board. He was saved by a fishing punt.

However, the author’s first experience of punting was amusing, because his friends saw another fellow on the water who they thought was him, and in their friendly manner had mocked him. They had felt very foolish later on. The author had shared his first sailing trip with a friend, when he was a boy. According to him, they did everything wrong and it was surprising that they had not fallen into the water and drowned!