f vegetation,
scarcely so much as a blade of grass being visible. Since they could
not account for this by cold, they concluded that the most probable
explanation lay in the tremendous hurricanes that, produced by the
planet's rapid rotation, frequently swept along its surface, like the
earth's trade-winds, but with far more violence. On reaching the
northern coast of the peninsula they increased their elevation and
changed their course to northeast, not caring to remain long over the
great body of water, which they named Cortlandt Bay. The thousands of
miles of foam fast flew beneath them, the first thing attracting their
attention being a change in the ocean's colour. In the eastern shore
of Cortlandt Bay they soon observed the mouth of a river, ten miles
across, from which this tinted water issued in a flood. On account of
its colour, which reminded them of a stream they knew so well, they
christened it the Harlem.

Believing that an expedition up its valley might reveal something of
interest, they began the ascent, remaining at an elevation of a few
hundred feet. For about three hundred miles they followed this river,
which had but few bends, while its sides became more and more
precipitous, till it flowed through a canon four and a half miles
across. Though they knew from the wide discoloration of Cortlandt Bay
that the volume of water discharged was tremendous, the stream seldom
moved at a rate of more than five miles an hour, and for a time was
free from rocks and rapids, from which they concluded that it must be
very deep. Half an hour later they saw a cloud of steam or mist, which
expanded, and almost obscured the sky as they approached. Next they
heard a sound like distant thunder, which they took for the prolonged
eruption of some giant crater, though they had not expected to find one
so far towards the interior of the continent. Presently it became one
continuous roar, the echo in the canon, whose walls were at this place
over six hundred feet high, being simply deafening, so that the near
discharge of the heaviest artillery would have been completely drowned.

"One would think the end of the world was approaching!" shouted
Cortlandt through his hands.

"Look!" Bearwarden roared back, "the wind is scattering the mist."

As he spoke, the vapoury curtain was drawn aside, revealing a waterfall
of such vast proportions as to dwarf completely anything they had ever
seen or even imagined. A somewh