The steamer leaves the quay with a whistle that sounds like a decision. We cross the lake at a speed that would embarrass a bicycle, and somehow this is the fastest anyone on board wants to go. Villages come and go like chapters: a chapel, a jetty, a man unloading crates, a boy jumping off a pontoon with the complete confidence of a lake person. The mountains do their slow rotations. The steamer has been running since 1872, which means it has now carried several entire lifetimes of passengers to the same small destinations. Progress, the boat seems to say, is a rumor. The lake is still here.