The lock was quite crowded with boats when we capsized.  I went down backwards for some few feet before I started to swim, then I came spluttering upwards towards the light; but, instead of reaching the surface, I hit my head against the keel of a boat and went down again.  I struck out almost at once and came up, but before I reached the surface my head crashed against a boat for the second time, and I went right to the bottom.  I was confused and thoroughly frightened.  I was desperately in need of air, and knew that if I hit a boat for the third time I should never see the surface again.  Drowning is a horrible death, notwithstanding all that has been said to the contrary.  My past life never occurred to my mind, but I thought of many trivial things that I might not do or see again if I were drowned.  I swam up in a slanting direction, hoping to avoid the boat that I had struck.  Suddenly I saw all the boats in the lock quite clearly just above me, and every one of their curved varnished planks and the scratches and chips upon their keels.  I saw several gaps among the boats where I might have swam up to the surface, but it did not seem worthwhile to try and get there, and I had forgotten why I wanted to.  Then all the people leaned over the sides of their boats:  I saw the light flannel suits of the men and the coloured flowers in the women’s hats, and I noticed details of their dresses quite distinctly.  Everybody in the boats was looking down at me; then they all said to one another, ‘We must leave him now,’ and they and the boats went away; and there was nothing above me but the river and the sky, and on either side of me were the green weeds that grew in the mud, for I had somehow sunk back to the bottom again.  The river as it flowed by murmured not unpleasantly in my ears, and the rushes seemed to be whispering quite softly among themselves.  Presently the murmuring of the river took the form of words, and I heard it say, ’We must go on to the sea; we must leave him now.’

Then the river went away, and both its banks; and the rushes whispered, ‘Yes, we must leave him now.’  And they too departed, and I was left in a great emptiness staring up at the blue sky.  Then the great sky bent over me, and spoke quite softly like a kindly nurse soothing some little foolish child, and the sky said, ‘Goodbye.  All will be well.  Goodbye.’  And I was sorry to lose the blue sky, but the sky went away.  Then I was alone, with nothing round about me; I could see no light, but it was not dark—­there was just absolutely nothing, above me and below me and on every side.  I thought that perhaps I was dead, and that this might be eternity; when suddenly some great southern hills rose up all round about me, and I was lying on the warm, grassy slope of a valley in England.  It was a valley that I had known well when I was young, but I had not seen it now for many years.  Beside me stood the tall flower of the mint; I saw the sweet-smelling thyme flower and