nder the bank on
the opposite side of the river from the town of Hsintan. It was an
exciting scene. A swirling torrent with a roar like thunder was frothing
down the cataract. Above, barriers of rocks athwart the stream stretched
like a weir across the river, damming the deep still water behind it.
The shore was strewn with boulders. Groups of trackers were on the bank
squatting on the rocks to see the foreign devil and his cockleshell.
Other Chinese were standing where the side-stream is split by the
boulders into narrow races, catching fish with great dexterity, dipping
them out of the water with scoop-nets.

We rested in some smooth water under shelter and put out our towline;
three of my boys jumped ashore and laid hold of it; another with his
bamboo boat-hook stood on the bow; the laoban was at the tiller; and I
was cooped up useless in the well under the awning. The men started
hauling as we pushed out into the sea of waters. The boat quivered, the
water leapt at the bow as if it would engulf us; our three men were
obviously too few. The boat danced in the rapid. My men on board
shrieked excitedly that the towrope was fouling--it had caught in a
rock--but their voices could not be heard; our trackers were brought to
with a jerk; the hindmost saw the foul and ran back to free it, but he
was too late, for the boat had come beam on to the current. Our captain
frantically waved to let go, and the next moment we were tossed bodily
into the cataract. The boat heeled gunwale under, and suddenly, but the
bowman kept his feet like a Blondin, dropped the boat-hook, and jumped
to unlash the halyard; a wave buried the boat nose under and swamped me
in my kennel; my heart stopped beating, and, scared out of my wits, I
began to strip off my sodden clothes; but before I had half done the
sail had been set; both men had miraculously fended the boat from a
rock, which, by a moment's hesitation, would have smashed us in bits or
buried us in the boiling trough formed by the eddy below it, and, with
another desperate effort, we had slid from danger into smooth water.
Then my men laughed heartily. How it was done I do not know, but I felt
keen admiration for the calm dexterity with which it had been done.

We baled the water out of the boat, paid out a second towrope--this one
from the bow to keep the stern under control, the other being made fast
to the mast, and took on board a licensed pilot. Extra trackers, hired
for a few cash,