t and confusion: the
flapping of the sails, the whistling and rushing of the wind, the
bawling of the captain and crew, the shrieking of the passengers, all
mingled with the rolling and bellowing of the thunder. In the midst of
the uproar, the sloop righted; at the same time the mainsail shifted,
the boom came sweeping the quarter-deck, and Dolph, who was gazing
unguardedly at the clouds, found himself, in a moment, floundering in
the river.

[Footnote 15: This must have been the bend at West-Point.]

For once in his life, one of his idle accomplishments was of use to
him. The many truant hours which he had devoted to sporting in the
Hudson, had made him an expert swimmer, yet, with all his strength and
skill, he found great difficulty in reaching the shore. His
disappearance from the deck had not been noticed by the crew, who were
all occupied by their own danger. The sloop was driven along with
inconceivable rapidity. She had hard work to weather a long promontory
on the eastern shore, round which the river turned, and which
completely shut her from Dolph's view.

It was on a point of the western shore that he landed, and, scrambling
up the rocks, he threw himself, faint and exhausted, at the foot of a
tree. By degrees, the thunder-gust passed over. The clouds rolled away
to the east, where they lay piled in feathery masses, tinted with the
last rosy rays of the sun. The distant play of the lightning might be
seen about the dark bases, and now and then might be heard the faint
muttering of the thunder. Dolph rose, and sought about to see if any
path led from the shore; but all was savage and trackless. The rocks
were piled upon each other; great trunks of trees lay shattered about,
as they had been blown down by the strong winds which draw through
these mountains, or had fallen through age. The rocks, too, were
overhung with wild vines and briers, which completely matted
themselves together, and opposed a barrier to all ingress; every
movement that he made, shook down a shower from the dripping foliage.
He attempted to scale one of these almost perpendicular heights; but,
though strong and agile, he found it an Herculean undertaking. Often
he was supported merely by crumbling projections of the rock, and
sometimes he clung to roots and branches of trees, and hung almost
suspended in the air. The wood-pigeon came cleaving his whistling
flight by him, and the eagle screamed from the brow of the impending
cliff. As h