oubled their exertions. It,
however, soon became necessary for them once more to lighten the canoes.
They did so, and filled another hole, with a portion of their provisions
and ammunition.

On the 29th of June, Captain Clarke left the canoes, and went on to the
falls, accompanied by a black servant, named York, an Indian and his
wife, with her young child. On arriving there, they observed a very dark
cloud rising in the west, which threatened rain. They therefore looked
around for shelter, but could find no place where they would be secure
from being blown into the river, if the wind should prove as violent as
it sometimes does in the plains. At length, about a quarter of a mile
above the falls, they found a deep ravine, where there were some
shelving rocks; and under these they took refuge. Being now perfectly
safe from the rain, they laid down their guns and compass, and the other
articles which they had brought with them. The shower was, at first,
moderate; but it increased to a heavy rain, the effects of which they
did not feel: soon afterwards, a torrent of intermingled hail and rain
was poured from the clouds: the rain seemed to fall in a solid mass;
and, collecting in the ravine, it came rolling down, like a cataract,
carrying along with it mud and rocks, and every thing that opposed it.
Captain Clarke saw the torrent a moment before it reached them; and,
springing up, with his gun and shot-pouch in his left hand, he, with his
right, clambered up the steep cliff, pushing on before him the Indian
woman, with her child in her arms. Her husband, too, had seized her
hand, and was dragging her up the hill; but he was so terrified at the
danger, that, but for Captain Clarke, himself and his wife and child
would have been lost. So instantaneous was the rise of the water, that
before Captain Clarke had reached his gun, and had begun to ascend the
bank, the water was up to his waist; and he could scarcely get up faster
than it rose, till it reached the height of fifteen feet. Had they
waited a moment longer, it would have swept them all into the river,
just above the great cataract, down which they must inevitably have been
precipitated. They had been obliged to escape so rapidly, that Captain
Clarke lost his compass and umbrella: the Indian left his gun,
shot-pouch, and tomahawk; and the Indian woman had just time to grasp
her child, before the net, in which it had lain at her feet, was carried
down the current.

Afte