ee
to go on.

_August 28._ At last daybreak comes, and we have breakfast, without a
word being said about the future. The meal is as solemn as a funeral.
After breakfast I ask the three men if they still think it best to leave
us. The elder Howland thinks it is, and Dunn agrees with him. The
younger Howland tries to persuade them to go on with the party, failing
in which, he decides to go with his brother.

Then we cross the river. The small boat is very much disabled, and
unseaworthy. With the loss of hands, consequent on the departure of the
three men, we shall not be able to run all of the boats, so I decide to
leave my _Emma Dean_.

Two rifles and a shotgun are given to the men who are going out. I ask
them to help themselves to the rations, and take what they think to be a
fair share. This they refuse to do, saying they have no fear but what
they can get something to eat; but Billy, the cook, has a pan of
biscuits prepared for dinner, and these he leaves on a rock.

Before starting, we take our barometers, fossils, the minerals, and some
ammunition from the boat and leave them on the rocks. We are going over
this place as light as possible. The three men help us lift our boats
over a rock twenty-five or thirty feet high, and let them down again
over the first fall, and now we are all ready to start.

The last thing before leaving, I write a letter to my wife, and give it
to Howland. Sumner gives him his watch, directing that it be sent to his
sister, should he not be heard from again. The records of the expedition
have been kept in duplicate. One set of these is given to Howland, and
now we are ready. For the last, time, they entreat us not to go on, and
tell us that it is madness to set out in this place; that we can never
get safely through it; and, further, that the river turns again to the
south into the granite, and a few miles of such rapids and falls will
exhaust our entire stock of rations, and then it will be too late to
climb out. Some tears are shed; it is a rather solemn parting; each
party thinks the other is taking the dangerous course.

My old boat left, I go on board of the _Maid of the Canon_. The three
men climb a crag, that overhangs the river, to watch us off. The _Maid
of the Canon_ pushes out. We glide rapidly along the foot of the wall,
just grazing one great rock, then pull out a little into the chute of
the second fall, and plunge over it. The open compartment is filled when
we strik