I have stood and watched it, sometimes, when you could not see any water at all, but only a brilliant tangle of bright blazers, and gay caps, and saucy hats, and many-coloured parasols, and silken rugs, and cloaks, and streaming ribbons, and dainty whites; when looking down into the lock from the quay, you might fancy it was a huge box into which flowers of every hue and shade had been thrown pell-mell, and lay piled up in a rainbow heap, that covered every corner.
Je suis resté a la regarder parfois, quand la surface de l’eau n’était plus qu’un fouillis éclatant de maillots aux couleurs vives, casquettes claires, chapeaux pimpants, ombrelles multicolores, écharpes de mousseline ; manteaux de soie, flots de rubans et flanelles immaculées. Si l’on plongeait son regard dans le bas de l’écluse, on eut dit comme une grande boîte ou l’on aurait jeté pele-mele des fleurs de toutes les couleurs pour en former un tas aux chatoiements d’arc-en-ciel.