at my boat had struck
a current and was beyond my control. Visions of a cataract and
inevitable death instantly shot across my mind. Made passive by intense
despair, I laid down in the bottom of the boat, to let myself drift into
whatever fate was awaiting me.

I must have lain there many hours before I realized that I was traveling
in a circle. The velocity of the current had increased, but not
sufficiently to insure immediately destruction. Hope began to revive,
and I sat up and looked about me with renewed courage. Directly before
me rose a column of mist, so thin that I could see through it, and of
the most delicate tint of green. As I gazed, it spread into a curtain
that appeared to be suspended in mid-air, and began to sway gently back
and forth, as if impelled by a slight breeze, while sparks of fire, like
countless swarms of fire-flies, darted through it and blazed out into a
thousand brilliant hues and flakes of color that chased one another
across and danced merrily up and down with bewildering swiftness.
Suddenly it drew together in a single fold, a rope of yellow mist, then
instantly shook itself out again as a curtain of rainbows fringed with
flame. Myriads of tassels, composed of threads of fire, began to dart
hither and thither through it, while the rainbow stripes deepened in hue
until they looked like gorgeous ribbons glowing with intensest radiance,
yet softened by that delicate misty appearance which is a special
quality of all atmospheric color, and which no pencil can paint, nor the
most eloquent tongue adequately describe.

The swaying motion continued. Sometimes the curtain approached near
enough, apparently, to flaunt its fiery fringe almost within my grasp.
It hung one instant in all its marvelous splendor of colors, then
suddenly rushed into a compact mass, and shot across the zenith, an arc
of crimson fire that lit up the gloomy waters with a weird, unearthly
glare. It faded quickly, and appeared to settle upon the water again in
a circular wall of amber mist, round which the current was hurrying me
with rapidly increasing speed. I saw, with alarm, that the circles were
narrowing A whirlpool was my instant conjecture, and I laid myself down
in the boat, again expecting every moment to be swept into a seething
abyss of waters. The spray dashed into my face as the boat plunged
forward with frightful swiftness. A semi-stupor, born of exhaustion and
terror, seized me in its merciful embrace.

I