above the trunk, and was safe; he was then
able to hold double his own weight.

His next move was to throw his feet around the trunk, when it was an
easy matter for him to twist himself over on top, where he was as secure
as lying on his own trundle bed in the cabin at home.

The instant his own safety was secured his whole soul was stirred by
anxiety for Fred Linden, who, he knew, was placed at more disadvantage
than he. Since he was further from shore than was he, and since the
latter had been able to save himself only by a hair's breadth, it was
clearly beyond the power of Fred to escape in the same manner--though it
might be that there was some other remote chance for him.

The first glance that Terry cast over the muddy waters showed him his
friend, swimming manfully for shore, but so far out in the stream that
it was impossible for him to reach it before passing into the grip of
the rapids.

"It's no use," called out Fred, in a voice in which there was no tremor
or shrinking; "I'm bound for the rapids, and here goes."

And deliberately facing about, he swam coolly in the direction of the
boiling waters as though he were bathing in a still lake.

"Be the powers, but he is plucky," muttered Terence, thrilled by the
sight; "if he can get through there alive, I'll be proud of him!"

The rapids, of which I have made mention several times, were caused by a
series of irregular rocks, extending a hundred yards, in the space of
which the stream made a descent of a dozen or twenty feet. At ordinary
times the creek wound languidly around these obstructions, forming many
deep, clear pools of water, that afforded the best kind of fishing.
There was so much room for the current that there was no call for it to
make haste.

But you can understand how different it was when the creek was swollen
by violent rains. It then dashed against the rocks, was thrown back,
plunged against others, whirled about and charged upon still others, by
which time it was a mass of seething foam, with the spray flying high in
air, and a faint rainbow showing through the mist when the sun was
shining. After fighting its way between and around and over these
obstructions, the current emerged at the bottom one mass of boiling foam
and dancing bubbles, which continued for several hundred feet before
the effects of the savage churning that the water had received could be
shaken off.

Now, it would be idle to say that these rapids were as dangero