ract by taking a circuit
round it.

'What's to be done now, Toby?' said I.

'Why,' rejoined he, 'as we cannot retreat, I suppose we must keep
shoving along.'

'Very true, my dear Toby; but how do you purpose accomplishing that
desirable object?'

'By jumping from the top of the fall, if there be no other way,'
unhesitatingly replied my companion: 'it will be much the quickest way
of descent; but as you are not quite as active as I am, we will try some
other way.'

And, so saying, he crept cautiously along and peered over into the
abyss, while I remained wondering by what possible means we could
overcome this apparently insuperable obstruction. As soon as my
companion had completed his survey, I eagerly inquired the result.

'The result of my observations you wish to know, do you?' began Toby,
deliberately, with one of his odd looks: 'well, my lad, the result of my
observations is very quickly imparted. It is at present uncertain which
of our two necks will have the honour to be broken first; but about a
hundred to one would be a fair bet in favour of the man who takes the
first jump.'

'Then it is an impossible thing, is it?' inquired I gloomily.

'No, shipmate; on the contrary, it is the easiest thing in life: the
only awkward point is the sort of usage which our unhappy limbs may
receive when we arrive at the bottom, and what sort of travelling trim
we shall be in afterwards. But follow me now, and I will show you the
only chance we have.' With this he conducted me to the verge of the
cataract, and pointed along the side of the ravine to a number of
curious looking roots, some three or four inches in thickness, and
several feet long, which, after twisting among the fissures of the rock,
shot perpendicularly from it and ran tapering to a point in the air,
hanging over the gulf like so many dark icicles. They covered nearly
the entire surface of one side of the gorge, the lowest of them
reaching even to the water. Many were moss grown and decayed, with their
extremities snapped short off, and those in the immediate vicinity of
the fall were slippery with moisture.

Toby's scheme, and it was a desperate one, was to entrust ourselves
to these treacherous-looking roots, and by slipping down from one to
another to gain the bottom.

'Are you ready to venture it?' asked Toby, looking at me earnestly but
without saying a word as to the practicability of the plan.

'I am,' was my reply; for I saw it was our only