ride more buoyantly. It was after four
o'clock before we were ready to go on, and we started once more with a
fairly tight boat, dry inside. Then we had a wild ride. The descent was
steady. For eight miles there was a continuous rapid, accentuated by
eight heavy falls. The boats sped along at high speed, but the way
being clear we did not often stop, passing two places where the former
expedition made portages. We had a glimpse of a creek coming in on the
right which looked interesting, but it was left behind in a moment as
the boats shot along between the dark granite walls. At a quarter past
five we ran up to a sand-bank where a lone willow tree was growing.
Here we made a camp. The canyon spread a little and the wide sand-bank
appeared to our eyes like a prairie. Just below our camp there came in
a muddy stream, which on the other trip was clear and was then named
Bright Angel to offset the application of Dirty Devil to the river at
the foot of Narrow Canyon.

It was now the beginning of September, but the water and the air were
not so cold as they had been the year before in Cataract Canyon, and we
did not suffer from being so constantly saturated. Running on the next
day following the Bright Angel camp, we found the usual number of large
rapids, in one of which a wave struck the steering oar and knocked Jones
out of the boat all but his knees, by which he clung to the gunwale,
nearly capsizing us. We found it impossible to help him, but somehow
he got in again. The river was everywhere very swift and turbulent. One
stretch of three and a half miles we ran in fifteen minutes. There were
numerous whirlpools, but nothing to stop our triumphant progress. On the
2d of September there were two portages, and twenty rapids run, in the
fifteen miles made during the day. Many of these rapids were very heavy
descents. That night we camped above a bad-looking place, but it was
decided to run it in the morning. Three-quarters of a mile below camp
there was a general disappearance of the waters. We could see nothing
of the great rapid from the level of the boats, though we caught an
occasional glimpse of the leaping, tossing edges, or tops, of the huge
billows rolling out beyond into the farther depths of the chasm. About
eight o'clock in the morning all was ready for the start. The inflated
life-preservers, as was customary in our boat, were laid behind the
seats where we could easily reach them. The Major put his on, a most
f