ides, and just
as we shaved past them I jumped quickly on one of the rocks, holding the
canoe, while two of the men also jumped out quickly and held fast to the
boat--just in time. We were only 10 or 15 m. from the place where the
water curled over and rolled down the fall.

There was no time for arguing or scolding. Upon those rocks my men, who
were fond of talking, started a brisk war of words, saying that they
would never continue the journey if Alcides were allowed to steer again.
Alcides, on the other hand, whose only aim in life was to fight everybody
and everything, invited all the other men to a duel with their rifles. I
told them they could have the duel after we had finished the journey and
not before. We must take the ropes, climb up to the top of the bank, and,
first of all, we must tow the canoe back to a place of safety.

After a great deal of shouting, angry words and oaths, absolutely
deadened by the thundering roar of the waterfall, they took out the ropes
and eventually towed the canoe back. As soon as that was done I went with
my camera to gaze at the beautiful sight and photograph it from different
points--a job which was not easy, as the waterfall was so encased between
vertical rocky walls (foliated in horizontal strata, which varied in
thickness from a quarter of an inch to one foot) that it was impossible
to get far enough back to obtain a full view of it.

That fall, called the August Fall, was indeed a grand sight. As I have
already said, it was divided into two separate falls, between which was
an island with a great spur of rock forming a wall between the two
cascades. The water flowed over that wall in graceful steps. The fall on
the right side of which I stood was in two immense horseshoe-shaped
terraces. The continuation of those terraces on each side of the great
flow of water formed tiers of red and black volcanic rock lying in
horizontal strata so regular as to be not unlike a gigantic Etruscan
amphitheatre. The upper tier of the fall on the right formed an arc not
less than 300 m. in periphery. The lower crescent formed an arc 400 m. in
length.

Upon this lower terrace the rebounding waters were thrown up with great
force into the air--the spray forming numerous rainbows in the sun--only
to drop down once more in most contorted, diabolical curves, boiling and
roaring in their endeavour to force their way through that positive
inferno.

As the water came down in great volumes over