at narrow canon.

If he was hungry the night before, how ravenous he was in the morning.
He even cut off a bit of the raw-hide lariat which he still retained,
and tried to chew it. It was so very unsatisfactory a morsel that it
helped him to realize the necessity of speedily getting out of that
place and hunting for some food more nourishing than lariats.

Chapter XXX.

DOWN THE LONELY CANON.

Glen had been conscious, ever since reaching his haven, of a dull,
distant roar coming up from the canon below him; and now, after an hour
of scrambling, climbing, slipping, but still managing to keep out of the
water, he discovered the fall that he had anticipated, and found himself
on its brink. It was a direct plunge of a hundred feet, and the body of
water very nearly occupied the whole of a narrow chasm between two
cliffs similar to those at the outlet of the lake. A few feet of the
rocky dam, where Glen stood, were bare of water; but its face fell away
as steep and smooth as that over which the stream took its plunge. Only,
in the angle formed by it and the side of the canon, a mass of debris
had collected that reached about half-way up to where Glen stood, or to
within fifty feet of the brink. On it grew a few stunted trees, the
first vegetation he had seen since taking his slide. Below that place
the way seemed more open, and as though it might be possible to
traverse. But how should he get down? He dared not leap; he could not
fly. But he still had the lariat. It was forty feet long. If he could
only fasten it where he stood, he might slide down its length and then
drop.

Vainly he searched for some projecting point of rock about which to make
his rope fast. There was none. All was smooth and water-worn. There was
a crack. If he only had a stout bit of wood to thrust into it he might
fasten the lariat to that. But he had not seen the smallest stick since
leaving his sleeping-place. Some unburned branches were still left
there; but the idea of going back over that perilous road, through the
gloom of the canon, was most unpleasant to contemplate. He hated to
consider it. Still, before long it would be much more unpleasant to
remain where he was, for he was already realizing the first pangs of
starvation.

So he wearily retraced his steps, procured a stout branch, and, after
two hours of the most arduous toil, again stood on the brink of the
waterfall. Forcing the stick as far as possible into the crack, and