Chapter XII: Back to Yarmouth

[Picture: Decorative drop capital] It was two o'clock when we hoisted a reefed sail on the cutter, leaving the lateener in charge of the owner, who had joined us, and it was three o'clock when we reached Acle bridge, having done the seven miles in the hour, wind and tide with us. We left Acle at four, being much delayed in lowering and raising the mast, and reached Yarmouth (12 miles) by half-past five; so we made a pretty quick passage. We laid by the "Ale Stores" for the night, and were very careful to have the yacht strongly moored, for the tide runs fast. We were interested in the way the wherries dropped down out of the North River, with lowered masts, and a chain or weight out over the bows, so as to retard their speed, as they drifted stern first, steering, of course, by the pressure of the faster-flowing tide against the rudder. We had intended to drop down in a similar way, through the swing bridge just below us, and to go, by sea, to Lowestoft, a distance of only eight miles; but as the wind kept getting up, and Breydon was white with foam, we put off making up our minds until the morning, for the disproportionate bowsprits and open wells of the river yachts are not very suitable for sea work.

Of course, we strolled upon the pier, and then returned to the quay-side by moonlight. We found that it was dead low water, and that the yacht had receded so much below the level of the quay, that no plank within reach would touch her. The man was in the forepeak fast asleep, and it was a long time before we could wake him, and then we jumped on to some wherries lying near, and he brought the jolly to us.

[Picture: Perch] We woke at times during the night, and felt the boat swaying, and heard the wind howling in the rigging to a very pretty tune. In the morning there was no abatement, and although it was off the land, we shirked the wetting we should get at sea, and decided to go over Breydon, and up the Waveney. As the tide would not make until the middle of the morning, we took the jolly and rowed down to the harbour mouth at Gorleston. It is interesting to note how, for three miles, the river flows parallel with the sea, and, on the average, under half a mile from it, the dividing land being nothing more substantial than shingle and sand. Deeply interesting is it, also, to read of the early struggles of the inhabitants of Yarmouth to maintain a navigable waterway. Sometimes the river would open a new outlet for itself, and sometimes they made a new one for it; and, time after time, the river mouth got silted up with the wearing away of this soft eastern shore. Even now there is often insufficient water at the bar for deeply-laden vessels of ordinary size, and the entrance is particularly unsafe for sailing vessels to enter unassisted at certain times. Picturesque sights abound on the river, and the quays. Fishing smacks taking their brown nets on board from carts ranged alongside; boats of every form and size hauled up on the beach; vessels building; and vessels in dry docks, undergoing repairs; a regular covey of smacks, in tow of a powerful steam tug, and hundreds of similar sights of deep interest to a man bitten with the joint love of the water and the picturesque.

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