The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1879-01-09

tore past me, from the cataract tha1
| fell almost within reach of my touch
"Oh, Heaven! What had saved life
for? For a prolonged agony? for sucl
misery as must end in starvation, mad
ness. suicide? Could my mind long
bear the strain now upon ite How
long? !
"Let your eyes skirt tho rounding
edge of this nearest fall. You can SEE
the very rock was on. 1t looks bu
yards from the larger space of Goa
Island, but those yards were as BAG
as mics. They were an impossible
gulf between me and the stretch o.
rock that seems SO near.
"What were my chances of escape!
Dare l hope there were any? Twas al
most too wild with terror to think a
all. Yet the brain seemed fervid will
life in such moments.
Even while she was for an instant
flashing through my bewildered brain
was entering the very heart of the
thunder of the fall. Moments only
separated me from my release from
agony. But the Indian stoicism wa.
foreign to me; l could have yelled
aloud in the terror that possessed me
81 dared not await seated the awfu
last moment that was so near. l faceG
my fate; turned; stood up. looked
straight ahead to where the curving wa
tiers were to launch me to peace eternal
"The flood had scarcely a ripple or
its surface
"Was it real? Within few yards
of the awful brink the canoe had sho,
by flat speck of rock that off the
shores of Goat Island lay stirless on the
very edge of the abyss.
with hardly conscious effort in
passing had sprung to its slippery
surface. That moment had saved me
from instant humiliation. The canoe
was gone. l was standing, as yet,
alive, while, almost washing my very
feet, the sea of waters hurried on-on
ON either side of me and disappeared.
"Out of the Kissing, out of the froth.
ing foam! I'VE were on the calm, ma.
jestic mass of waters-the sea tide, you
might surely call it, that was to hur]
itself and me to atoms.
elbow oddly the mind works in such
moments Of horror! Would you be.
lieve it? a tradition of Niagara actually
occurred to me rs l flashed along. II
was an Indian legend. / remembered
how an Indian squaw, long the favorite
of famous Chief, found a young
maiden was to supplant her in her wig
wam-I swear saw it rs plainly as il
imagination and reality were ons-she
bore the bestowed she had borne to its
father from her forest home, till she
reached canoe. Then she padded
herself and her boy into the full stream,
and cast the paddles from her. and,
with heavy heart nerved by hate and
revenge and misery enendurable, stood
up chanting her death song that re-
counted her wrong and her misery, and
welcomed her coming escape from it,
till they shot into eternity amid the
hell of waters below. e
''Shou1d l be starved? Should l
slide into the rushing tide from cold
and exhaustion? Would sheer, I'M
bearable terror fling ME to death, from
my utter inability to endure the horror
that possessed me?
"What could be done for me? Was
rescue possible? Could a boat be
tloated in any way down to me? Even
if it could be guided to so small a
point, could l dare to trust myself
to it? >,
"Would any rope be strong enough
to bear the force that the mighty flood
would require it to endure and over
come?
IAN instant S relaxation of the strain
on the rope that might hold it till it
towed it to shore, and l, if not it,
would be where my own canoe had
gone.
"Would human strength, could hui
man endeavor, snatch me from the
doom that had so nearly already en-
quilted me?
"All these thoughts were in my
brain in that instant, even while the
very power to think seemed frozen in
me.
Chow could l dare to seee 1 shrieked
to be senselcss. Oh, for madness, if
madness would rid me of the terror in
my brain, in my very blood, that was,
as it seemed, my life-that so possessed
me, that existence had room for moth
ing but unutterable horror!
81 looked to this very rock on which
we stand. Here on this spot 1 saw a
throng of excited spectators. I was
seen; and who could see human being
in such peril, and not family share the
terror that felt?
IL could hear the calls of men to me
to have heart. could catch cries to
me that should be saved. / could see
women wild with pity. All, what
could their pity do for me! Yet that
perhaps was the saving of my life.
Anything-anything to make me for
get the everlasting waters that un-
ceasingly flashed by my feet and disap-
peared.
"Men were crowding the river bank.
They were consulting, l could see, ex-
citedly, debating what should he done.
"There is rush of some from the
crowd. Time passes, ages to me. in
my agony. At last boat comes,
borne on the shoulders of boatmen at
run. They lay it at the water s
edge. Delay! delay! o God! o God!
There is rush of others with coil of
cable, not rope; rope they knew would
be murder. - --.0.y
''The boat is towed along the still
side water far up the stream. The
crowd follow it. What will they do!
God! what will they do? What sane
being will venture his life to save
mine! Delay! delay! They have
stopped. Talk! chatter! will they new
er act? Oh, dear God, help MINDLESS
him! A canoe pulls out from the
shore with the boat in tow. The canoe,
as we'll as the boat, has cable secured