The Thames is thick and slow today, and Gouen finds it unappealing, lacking in the grace and beauty that he expects of a river. But walking alongside it in the fog is pleasant, enjoying the slow burning of the gaslamps and the distant creak of wheels and clatter of hooves. This city of London lacks the elegance of a poem; if it is a dance, then it is a slowly building one, spiralling higher and higher.
But there are no winds here beside the river: only the thick dark water, pouring down towards the sea as he walks beside it.
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