Wednesday, Nov. 4 —
Before the first boats leave the village, the river lies perfectly still. The limestone peaks of the Guilin country stand in a row along the far bank, rounded and heavy like sleeping animals, their shoulders furred with small dark trees. Rain fell in the small hours, and now the cloud has settled low between the hills and the water, so that every peak seems to float on a bank of white.
On the river, one raft is already out. It is only a few bamboo poles lashed together, a woven basket at one end, and a fisherman in a wide straw hat who sits with his knees drawn up and his rod held out over the water. From the tip of the rod hangs a small paper lantern, still lit, its red glow the only strong colour in the whole scene. Fishermen here once used such lights to draw their catch in the dark, and he has not yet put his out, though the sky has begun to pale.
The painting is made in the old manner of ink and wash. Edges dissolve rather than end. A mountain is suggested by a few wet strokes of grey, then allowed to fade into the mist until you cannot say where rock stops and air begins. The palette is quiet: ivory silk showing through, soft jade and celadon in the distance, deeper ink greys in the nearer rocks, and a faint warmth of pale gold where the morning is slowly arriving.
On either bank, bamboo leans over the shallows, drawn with quick, confident marks. Their reflections tremble in the water below, softer and greyer than the real thing, so that the river becomes a second, quieter painting turned upside down.
Nothing happens in this picture, and that is its pleasure. There is no wind and no sound but the small drip of water from the pole. The man waits, the lantern burns, and the mountains keep their long silence. It is the kind of morning that asks nothing of you except that you stand still for a moment and look.