Three Men in a Boat Ch 14 to 19
Answer the following questions in 150-200 words:
(a)Describe the experience of the three friends preparing the Irish stew.
It was George who suggested that an Irish stew should be cooked. The
suggestion was liked as the friends could use vegetables, cold meat and other
things in making it. George gathered wood and made a fire. Harris and the
narrator started to peel the potatoes. But peeling the potatoes turned out to be
a long, arduous task. The peeling was abandoned in favour of scraping the
potatoes. Only four potatoes came to be peeled. George said it was absurd to
have only four potatoes in the Irish stew. Harris and the narrator, then, washed
about six potatoes and put them in without peeling. They also put in a cabbage
and some peas. George stirred it all up. Then many odd things were also put in
the stew. A tin of potted salmon was emptied into the pot. The narrator brought
out a couple of eggs that had cracked. The eggs were also put in. Many other
things went into the pot. The dog, Montmorency, came out with a dead water- rat.
It was his contribution to the stew. Harris wanted to put the rat in. But
George said he had never heard of water-rats in Irish stew. The Irish stew was a
grand success. The three friends enjoyed it. The narrator felt that he had never
enjoyed a meal more than this. The stew was a dish with a new flavour. It was
nourishing, too. After the stew, the friends had tea and cherry-tart. Harris was
in an irritable mood. The narrator thought that it must have been the stew that
had upset him.
(b) Describe the fight between Harris and the swans.
Harris brought back George and the narrator on the island. The friends found
unaccountable strangeness about Harris. He looked tired, and there was a sad
expression on his face. When George and the narrator asked him if something
had happened, he said, “Swans!” Harris, then, told them that he fought with two
swans – a female swan and her old ‘man’. He was able to defeat them.
Afterwards the two swans returned with eighteen other swans.Harris said that
a bitter fight followed. George asked how many swans he said there were.
Harris replied that they were thirty-two. When George said that he had said
eighteen, Harris said he hadn’t, and that he had said twelve. Soon the friends
realized that Harris was in a drunken state. In the morning when they talked to
him on the subject, Harris said, “What swans?” The story was obviously not
true. It was Harris’s figment of imagination in his drunkenness.
(c) The description of the story of the woman who took her life is so heart-rending
that it actually raises a question against the vices prevalent in our society. Express your
opinion on the fate met by the woman.
The narrator was pulling the boat a little above Reading. Suddenly George saw
something black floating on the water. It was the dead body of a woman. Her
face was not beautiful. It was prematurely aged – looking thin and drawn. Some
men on the bank took charge of the body, much to the relief of the friends. The
friends learnt about the story of the dead woman thereafter. She had loved and
been deceived, or had deceived herself. She had sinned in giving birth to a
child while she was still unmarried. Her family and friends had closed their
doors on her. She tried to keep her child and herself alive on six shillings a
week, which was almost impossible. She made one last appeal to her friends.
When no one came to her rescue, she drowned herself in the river, leaving
behind her child. She had, thus, sinned in living and in dying.
(d) What was the reality of the trout and how was it revealed?
George and the narrator entered the parlour of a riverside inn. There on the wall
they saw an old glass-case in which there was a big trout. They had given the
impression that they were total strangers to the place. George asked an old
man how much he thought the trout in the glass-case weighed. The old man at
once said “eight pounds six ounces”. Then he told them that it was he who had
caught the fish with a minnow some sixteen years ago. After a while, he went
out. The local carrier came in. He claimed that it was he who had caught the
fish just below the lock, with a fly. He said the fish weighed twenty-six pound.
Then, after a while, another man came and said he had caught the fish with a
bleak. The landlord came and made fun of all previous claimants. He said that it
was actually he who had caught the fish when he was a boy, having bunked the
class. When the landlord went out, George climbed up on the back of a chair to
have a better view of the fish. The chair slipped, and George clutched wildly at
the trout-case to save himself. It came down with a crash, with George and the
chair on top of it. The trout lay shattered into a thousand fragments as it was
plaster-of-Paris.
(e) Once George and the narrator escaped a fatal accident at a lock. Narrate the
incident in your own words.
It was a pleasant day. The lock was crowded. A photographer was ready to
click. George who was fond of being photographed sat down in the boat in a
graceful pose. The narrator also took up a position in the prow. He arranged his
hair and changed his expression that suited him. As they stood, a voice
shouted: “Hi! Look at your nose.” The narrator stole a slide glance at George’s
nose. It was all right. He also felt his own nose, which seemed to be as it should
be. “Look at your nose, you stupid ass!” came the same voice again. Then a
voice came, “Look at your boat, sir!” It made both George and the narrator
aware of something which they had missed. The nose of their boat had got
fixed under the woodwork of the lock. The water level was rising around.
In another moment both the friends would have got drowned. They each seized
an oar instantly, and with a vigorous blow released their boat. The blow sent
them sprawling on their backs. The photograph which was clicked then showed
only their feet waving madly in the air.
(f) Describe the experience of the three friends when they were caught in incessant
rain while rowing.
When the friends started their homeward journey from Oxford, they were
caught in incessant rain. It grew chilly as the rain continued. It sounded as if a
woman were weeping low in some dark chamber. The whole scene looked dull,
as there was no sunlight. The three friends – George, Harris and the narrator
felt sad and lonely, though for some time they pretended to be enjoying the
rainfall. They said that it was a change, and that they could not expect to have
sunshine all the time. They tried to hide their true feelings. They sang songs
and played cards. George and Harris began to talk of those who fell ill while
sleeping in the damp, rainy weather. Their talks about death and diseases only
upset them. Then George was asked to play a song on the banjo. George
played the song. The sad tune had its effect on Harris and the narrator. After
the song, the three friends were able to have some sleep, though it was fitful.
(g) ‘George has never learnt to play the banjo to this day’. Why does the author
say this?
George tried to play the banjo but he could not learn to play it properly. When
he played it at home, the landlady would come and stop him saying, “I like you
playing banjo, but the lady upstairs is expecting a child. The doctor is afraid
that it might harm the child.” George then began to play the banjo round the
square at night. But on the complaint of the inhabitants of being disturbed, he
was caught by the police, which released him on the promise that he would not
play the banjo for six months. When the situation did not change even after six
months, he sold it at much reduced price. When the boating trip started, be
bought a new banjo, hoping to have time to learn to play it. But again, he was
discouraged. Harris objected to it. He said he had had a headache. When
George said that the music would remove headache, Harris said he would
rather have a headache than listen to his banjo. Even Montmorency would sit
and howl steadily through his performance. George got irritated and tried to hit
the dog with a boot. Thus, George gets no time to learn to play the banjo, as the
author tells us.
(h) Under what circumstances was George told to play a comic song? What was
the effect of the comic song ‘Two Lovely Black Eyes’ on others?
It had been raining incessantly. The spirits of the three friends were low. They
tried to pass their time. They sang a song about a gypsy’s life. They also spent
some time in playing cards. They also drank some toddy. George told them
how a young man died after having slept in a damp boat due to rheumatic fever.
Harris also told a similar story about a friend of his, who became a lifelong
cripple after having slept under a canvas for just one night. The narrator
wanted to listen to something pleasant. So he asked George to play the comic
song Two Lovely Black Eyes’ on his banjo. No one had asked him to play banjo
under any other circumstance. George at once brought out his banjo and began
to play the song. The sad tune had its effect on Harris and the narrator. Harris
sobbed and the dog howled. After the music, the friends managed to get some
fitful sleep.
(i) What led to the friend’s abandoning their boat in the last leg of their trip?
The boat started from Oxford upon the homeward journey. It began to rain
shortly. The three friends rowed the whole day through the rain. At first they
pretended to enjoy the rain. They sang a song about gypsy life. The rain
continued. Everything in the boat was damp. The supper was not a success.
The friends tried to have a nap and while away their time in gambling. George
told them how a man in a damp boat caught rheumatic fever and died. Harris
told about a man who slept under a canvas one night and woke up a cripple for
life. A pleasant talk about diseases followed. George played ‘Two Lovely Black
Eyes’ on his banjo. His friends liked the tune. They became quite sentimental.
The rain continued to pour down. The friends decided to continue to pull on to
Pangbourne. Then George suggested that a train leaves Pangbourne after five,
which would take them to the town in time to get a chop in the restaurant
mentioned by the narrator earlier. Having agreed to the suggestion, the friends
left the boat with a boatman at Pangbourne and walked stealthily to the railway
station.
(j) Write the character sketch of Harris.
Harris is an important character. He is quite pretentious in so far as his cooking
is concerned. He makes tall claims about preparing scrambled eggs which his
friends must not have eaten in their lifetime. The way he makes mess of
everything while preparing these eggs is quite amusing. He burns his fingers,
curses everything and dances about in confusion. He is also whimsical. Once
at Datchet he along with his friends came to an inn named the Manor House. He
rejected the inn simply because he did not like the looks of a man stooping
there. Once he gets drunk and forgets that he is to bring his friends back to the
island. In his drunkenness he makes a funny tale of his fights with ‘swans’.
When he regains his senses he asks his friends “What swans?” He is
somewhat suspicious. He slips into a gully covered with grass and comes out
in a very bad state. He is in an irritable mood. He blames his friends for the
mishap.
(k) What impression of George do you form after reading the novel? Support with
examples.
George is an important member of the rowing party. He learnt rowing quite late
and has had some bad experiences. He loves to get up late to enjoy his sleeps.
Whenever he gets early he feels very irritable. Once he had a very bad
experience of getting up early at Mrs. Gippings. He went out at 3 a.m. thinking that
it was about to be 9 a.m. He became a suspect in the eyes of the
policemen. He is not as jolly as the narrator. When the narrator wets his shirt
accidentally, he gets angry and does not view it as a funny incident. He is fond
of playing the banjo. The narrator and Harris do not have good opinion about
his ability to play the banjo well. However, they become sentimental when
George plays ‘Two Lovely Black Eyes’. In a country inn he deliberately goads a
man to make a story about the trout in the glass-case. It reveals his
mischievous nature. He is also practical. He knows that rowing in a continuous
rain may prove to be harmful. So he suggests abandoning the boat and
reaching their destination by train.
(l) What do you think of Montmorency, the dog, in the novel ‘Three Men in a Boat’?
Support with examples.
Montmorency is not portrayed as a mere dog. In fact, he is treated at par with
the human members of the rowing party. He is a fox-terrier who are clever,
adventurous and fighters. Montmorency does not like cats. Once he saw a big
black cat. He began to run after the poor cat. The cat showed no hurry. It sat
down in the middle of the road. The look of the cat was such that Montmorency
had to stop and look back at the cat. After a while, the cat went away.
Montmorency came back, embarrassed. If anybody now says “cats” to
Montmorency, he shrinks and looks up piteously at him as if to say “please
don’t”. Montmorency is adventurous. Whenever he saw the boiling kettle, it
seemed to challenge him. He got an opportunity once to seize it by the spout.
With a loud yelp it left the boat and took a round of the island, running and
stopping every now and then to bury his nose in cool mud. From that day he
began to dread the kettle. Montmorency is a fighter by nature. At Oxford he had
eleven fights on the first day and fourteen on the second. He was so happy that
he thought he had got to Heaven.
