never happy unless he were on it, or in it, or beside it, or at least within
sight or sound of it.

The immensity of the sea had always silenced and overawed him, left him cold
in feeling. The river wooed him, caressed him, won his heart. It was just big
enough to love. It was full of charms and changes, of varying moods and sudden
surprises. Its voice stole in upon his ear with a melody far sweeter and more
subtle than the boom of the ocean. Yet it was not without strength, and when
it was swollen with the freshets of the spring and brimming with the bounty of
its sister streams, it could dash and roar, boom and crash, with the best of
them.

Stephen stood on the side porch, drinking in the glory of the sunrise, with
the Saco winding like a silver ribbon through the sweet loveliness of the
summer landscape.

And the river rolled on toward the sea, singing its morning song, creating and
nourishing beauty at every step of its onward path. Cradled in the heart of a
great mountain-range, it pursued its gleaming way, here lying silent in glassy
lakes, there rushing into tinkling little falls, foaming great falls, and
thundering cataracts. Scores of bridges spanned its width, but no steamers
flurried its crystal depths. Here and there a rough little rowboat, tethered
to a willow, rocked to and fro in some quiet bend of the shore. Here the
silver gleam of a rising perch, chub, or trout caught the eye; there a
pickerel lay rigid in the clear water, a fish carved in stone: here eels
coiled in the muddy bottom of some pool; and there, under the deep shadows of
the rocks, lay fat, sleepy bass, old, and incredibly wise, quite untempted by,
and wholly superior to, the rural fisherman's worm.

The river lapped the shores of peaceful meadows; it flowed along banks green