What was the unusual item that the men found floating in the river, after they passed Reading?

This incident happens in Chapter XVI of Three Men in a Boat, and it may be the shortest chapter in the book. The men have passed the town of Reading (which is pronounced “red-ding”). The narrator describes its history and scenery. And then George notices something floating in the water. It is the dead body of a woman.

It lay very lightly on the water, and the face was sweet and calm. It was...

This incident happens in Chapter XVI of Three Men in a Boat, and it may be the shortest chapter in the book. The men have passed the town of Reading (which is pronounced “red-ding”). The narrator describes its history and scenery. And then George notices something floating in the water. It is the dead body of a woman.

It lay very lightly on the water, and the face was sweet and calm. It was not a beautiful face; it was too pre-maturely aged-looking, too thin and drawn, to be that; but it was a gentle, loving face, in spite of its stamp of pinch and poverty, and upon it was that look of restful peace that comes to the faces of the sick sometimes when at last the pain has left them.

Others on the bank see the body. Fortunately, they take responsibility for dealing with the tragedy. The three men learn later that the unmarried woman had had a difficult life and that she had committed suicide. She worked twelve hours a day and earned a little money to support herself and her child, but it wasn’t enough. She gave the child “a penny box of chocolate” as a goodbye gift, traveled to this part of the river, and allowed herself to drown in the water. The narrator concludes that the woman had “sinned in all things —sinned in living and in dying. God help her! and all other sinners, if any more there be.”