of the sky, one feels that this force is inexhaustible
and eternal.

If our travelers expected to escape the impression they were under by
driving down to the rapids and whirlpool below, they were mistaken.
Nowhere is the river so terrible as where it rushes, as if maddened
by its narrow bondage, through the canon. Flung down the precipice and
forced into this contracted space, it fumes and tosses and rages with
vindictive fury, driving on in a passion that has almost a human quality
in it. Restrained by the walls of stone from being destructive, it seems
to rave at its own impotence, and when it reaches the whirlpool it is
like a hungry animal, returning and licking the shore for the prey it
has missed. But it has not always wanted a prey. Now and again it has a
wreck or a dead body to toss and fling about. Although it does not need
the human element of disaster to make this canon grewsome, the keepers
of the show places make the most of the late Captain Webb. So vivid
were their narratives that our sympathetic party felt his presence
continually, saw the strong swimmer tossed like a chip, saw him throw up
his hands, saw the agony in his face at the spot where he was last
seen. There are several places where he disappeared, each vouched for
by credible witnesses, so that the horror of the scene is multiplied for
the tourist. The late afternoon had turned gray and cold, and dashes of
rain fell as our party descended to the whirlpool. As they looked over
the heaped-up and foaming waters in this eddy they almost expected to
see Captain Webb or the suicide of the night before circling round in
the maelstrom. They came up out of the gorge silent, and drove back to
the hotel full of nervous apprehension.

King found no telegram from Irene, and the place seemed to him
intolerable. The artist was quite ready to go on in the morning; indeed,
the whole party, although they said it was unreasonable, confessed that
they were almost afraid to stay longer; the roar, the trembling, the
pervading sense of a blind force and rage, inspired a nameless dread.
The artist said, the next morning at the station, that he understood the
feelings of Lot.

XV. THE THOUSAND ISLES

The occupation of being a red man, a merchant of baskets and beadwork,
is taken up by so many traders with a brogue and a twang at our
watering-places that it is difficult for the traveler to keep alive any
sentiment about this race. But at a station beyond Le