at, like
themselves, coursed round and round. As long as all were travelling at the
same rate and in the same direction the danger of a collision was
comparatively slight, but more than once when the rowers succeeded in
gaining a short distance towards the outside edge of the whirlpool, they
were forced to desist suddenly and paddle straight with the current, to
avoid a great log bearing down upon them.

Pita took a lariat from the canoe and prepared to throw it, so as to catch
one of the branches when they neared the shore. He tried several times,
but the distance was too great; and indeed it was necessary to catch the
trees at some little distance before reaching the point opposite to them,
in order to pull diagonally across the current, for a jerk when the canoe
was at right angles would have torn the raft to pieces.

"Could we launch the canoe and paddle out of the whirlpool in that?"
Stephen said.

"We might do that," Hurka replied, "but a touch from any of these logs
would sink her in a moment; and besides, we should be sorry to lose the
raft, for we have no skins to make floats, and the rushes of which we
constructed it only grow in the quiet waters of the upper river. We might
take to the canoe as a last resource, but we should be very loth to do
it."

"How long would the lariats be, tied together, with that piece of thin
rope you brought to check the raft in dangerous places?"

"The rope is a hundred and fifty yards long, senor, the lariats reach
about thirty yards."

"That would be plenty," Stephen said. "My idea is that you might fasten
the end of the rope to an arrow and shoot it among the trees. It might not
catch the first time, but no doubt it would after a few trials. The rope
will, of course, be coiled up so as to pay out easily, and we could pull
it in or pay it out as we went round and round. Each time as we approach
the shore, we could pull on it a little and edge the raft a few feet out,
slackening out again as we came to the nearest point to the trees. If
there were any logs in our way of course we should not pull; thus, by
choosing our opportunity, we might get her out little by little till we
are outside the full force of the stream."

The Indians did not quite understand Stephen's plan, but at once agreed to
try it. Pita chose his heaviest arrow and lashed the end of the rope
firmly to it, close to the feathers. Stephen knotted the lariats to the
rope, and coiled them up so that they wou