The old boatman, whom I have mentioned before, was at the water-side; I asked him to row me over to the island, that I might give orders how to preserve what remained belonging to the company.

My old friend, the boatman, represented to me, with great kindness, the imminent danger to which I should expose myself.

"Sir," he added, "the best swimmer in Lyons, unless he were one of the Rhone-men, could not save himself if the boat overset, and you cannot swim at all." '"Very true," I replied, "but the boat will not overset; and both my duty and my honour require that I should run every hazard for those who have put so much trust in me." My old boatman took me over safely, and left me on the island; but in returning by himself, the poor fellow's little boat was caught by a wave, and it skimmed to the bottom like a slate or an oyster-shell that is thrown obliquely into the water.

A general exclamation was uttered from the shore; but, in a few minutes, the boatman was seen sitting upon a row of piles in the middle of the river, wringing his long hair with great composure.
'I have mentioned this boatman repeatedly as an old man, and such he was to all appearance; his hair was grey, his face wrinkled, his back bent, and all his limbs and features had the appearance of those of a man of sixty, yet his real age was but twenty-seven years.

He told me that he was the oldest boatman on the Rhone; that his younger brothers had been worn out before they were twenty-five years old.' The French society at Lyons included many agreeable people; but Edgeworth singles out from among them, as his special friend, the Marquis de la Poype, who understood English, and was well acquainted with English literature.