Question

How did Jerome find the tow-line very strange and unaccountable? What happened with the two men at Boveney

Answer 1

In the evening when the narrator, Harris, and George were discussing about towlines, George narrated them the following funny incident.  Once, he and three other men were sculling a very heavily laden boat one evening, and a little above Cookham lock they notice a fellow and a girl, walking along the towpath, absorbed in interesting conversation. They were carrying a boat-hook between them, and, attached to the boat hook was a tow-line, which trailed behind them. It meant there must have been a boat attached to it. But what had become of it nobody knew. George played a prank with the couple. George pulled their towline with a hitcher, and tied his own boat with it and sat at the stern to smoke. The couple towed George’s heavy boat up to Marlow. And when the couple realized their mistake, the man became angry but restrained himself; however, the girl was shocked. She did not know where her auntie’s boat was that they were towing.

At Boveney, a funny incident related to towing had happened. The narrator and his friends were rowing downstream; as they came round the bend, they saw a crowd of men on the bank. They were looking at each other with as bewildered and helpless expression; they were holding a long tow-line between them. The narrator and his friends asked them what had happened.

They replied their boat had entangled in a towline; and as they had got out to disentangle the tow-line, in hurry they forgot to tie the boat; and when they looked round, the boat was gone!