Year: 1878

| - Ns-JB "AOh VIC biau BUN uhnceu ram
bows above its flashing floods. Then it
was too old a friend of mine to be
dreaded by me.


Zone day changed all this, AMI 1
knew it for the hungry monster that it
is-pitless, craving for its human prey.


at was one Wednesday in August
The hotels were full. Fish was in re-.
quest, as much as could bring. Price
didn't matter. Pleasure seekers bleed
freely. was paid we'll for what could
be charged for as they liked. had
found that nearer the rapids 1 got the
liner seemed what / caught, and the
more freely the bait was taken. had
so often gono where most were too
timid to EeGtuI5 Chat had come to be-
lieve 1 could skim anywhere


"Even now think had my paddle
been sound, l should have come off safe.


"Well, that morning was out at
sunrise, and pretty successful was. 1
steadied my course, letting the canoe
drift little by little toward the rapids
that frothed and raved some miles be-
low. l felt at any moment could shoot
it out of the strength of the current into
the smoother waters by the shore.


81 got fully employed with my lines,
for, as 1 glided down stream, my take
was rapid, and that of the finest. So
eager was that 1 failed to pay that at
tention to the drift Of my canoe which
was SO needful.


1T was with a start ut last 1 felt
was far too much in the deep current of
the river, and that its strength would
need my utmost efforts to escape from
its grasp. For the first time I felt real
dread, for the boiling and hiss of the
seething waters could almost be heard
below me. I piled the paddles strongly,
and for a while I had hopes of safety,
though l had never known the need of
the exertions 1 was now using to draw
myself out of the mighty force of the
flood that sped onward to its fearful
fall.


"Inch by inch 1 fought my way up
stream and toward the shore where I
was to sell my morning takings. Every
inch was won by strain that made the
perspiration start from every pore. 1t
was for life I fought, for dear life. It
was death that pulled against-and
such a death for it was as if curtain
was suddenly withdrawn to show me all
the danger I had 80 long been running
unconsciously. 1t flashed into my
thoughts how 1 had played in the very
jaws of destruction that now seemed to
hunger for me.


"As 1 toiled frantically against the
rushing waters, they were living things
whose clutch sought to drag me with
them to share their awful doom. I had
grown 80 used to the roar of the cataract
(as 1 now recollected, so near y that my
thoughts had ceased to be cognizant of
it; now it almost stunned me.


Minutes that had seemed hours had
passed, and still 1 was struggling fran
tically, streaming with frenzied exer.
tions. L had won some way. I had edged
some distance from the central rush of
the river, and safety would be found in
| the slower waters that skirted the bank,
could but reach them.





ST bent still more madly to the effort.
In moment 1 had lost my hold on
existence, and was rushing, helpless and
hopeless, to the dreadful fate I had been
fighting against. One of my paddles,
overstrained, had broken, and, at the
mercy of the mighty flood, I was speed
ing every minute more swiftly to what
knew SO well-what I saw as plainly
with ny minds eye as had thousands
of times seen it with my living sight.


Chow I saw all we are looking down
on herel Not sight, not a sound we
are seeing and hearing. but what was
in that moment heard and seen by me
more vividly than now. 1 was literally
bewildered with the roar I now hear so
calmly.


"I shrieked aloud in my agony as I
clasped my useless hands over my sight,
vainly, to shut out the smooth slide OF
the inland sea, as saw it flashing back
the morning sun as it leapt into the
misty gulf into whose thunder it shot.


ga few moments bore me down to the
rapids. A few minutes, and I was
through them-safely. How I escaped
wreck among them puzzles me. I was
too paralyzed with horror to use my one
paddle, to in any way steer my light
craft through the foaming currents on
which it tossed. It's lightness must have
saved it. Had it been a heavier built
boat it would have been dashed to shreds
a score of times before we reached
smooth water. AS it was, it danced
along, frolicking, as it seemed to me,
with ghastly defiance of the destiny to
which it SO surely hurried.


"Out of the kissing out of the froth.
ing foam We we're on the calm, ma
iestic mass of water-the sea tide, you
might surely call it, that was to hurl it
self and me to atoms.


"How oddly the mind acts in sucf
moments of horror Would you believe
it, a tradition of Niagara actually oc
Cured to me as / flashed along. 1t wal
an Indian legend. 1 remembered how
an Indian squaw, long the favorite of
famous chief, found young maiden wa
to supplant her in her wigwam. I re
COLLECT I suaar I saw it aa plainly as