broke camp. A few minutes later they were afloat
again, and after a little time there was no need to paddle. The current
caught them and flung them towards the limestone gateway at express
speed. In an amazingly short time they had passed through the gorge,
and were watching the banks open out on either side of them.

There was no sign of life anywhere, no indication that any one had
passed that way since time began. As they sped onward a peculiar throb
and rumble began to make itself heard. It increased as they neared the
range of hills towards which they were making, and as the banks began
to grow rocky, and the water ahead broken by boulders, the Indian
looked for a good place to land.

He found it on the lee side of a bluff where an eddy had scooped a
little bay in the steep bank, and turning the canoe inside it, they
stepped ashore. Making the canoe secure they climbed to the top of the
bank and began to push their way down stream. The rapids, as Ainley
noted, grew worse. Everywhere the rocks stood up like teeth tearing the
water to tatters, and the rumble ahead grew more pronounced. Standing
still for a moment, they felt the earth trembling beneath their feet,
and the white man's face paled with apprehension. A tangle of spruce
hid the view of the river as it skirted a big rock, and as the river
evidently made a swerve at this point, they struck a bee-line through
the timber. The rumble, of which they had long been conscious, of the
suddenest seemed to become a roar, and, as they came to an open place
where they could see the water again, they understood the reason.

The river but a few feet below them, bordered by shelving terraces of
rock, suddenly disappeared. Rolling glassily for perhaps fifty yards,
with scarce a ripple on its surface, the water seemed to gather itself
together, and leap into a gorge, the bottom of which was ninety feet
below. Ainley stood looking at the long cascade for a full minute, a
wild light in his eyes, then he looked long and steadily at the gorge
through which the river ran after its great leap. His face was white
and grim, and his mouth was quivering painfully.

Then without a word he turned and began to hurry along the line of the
gorge. The Indian strode after him.

"Where go to?" he asked.

"The end of the gorge," was the brief reply.

The Indian nodded, and then looked back. "If canoe can go over there it
smash to small bits."

"Oh, I know it, don't I?" cried Ainley s