Notes on Jungle and Other U'Ud Life. 217 



itself was visible, but far below one was able to identify, if 

 dimly, two or three cataracts, swirling-, boiling" and tumbling 

 over the rocky bottom and separated from one another by half- 

 miles of comparatixely quiet water. 



About 500 feet from the floor of the ravine several small 

 waterfalls become visible, one near the Great Fall bearing that 

 universal but often appropriate name, " The Bridal V^eil." 

 And now, while the boiling, roaring maelstrom beneath is 

 swathed in a giant roll of cotton — fog", the upper half is revealed 

 in all its feathery glory, giving" a wholly new impression of the 

 repuussee wall of water. This scene persists for perhaps 

 twenty minutes, when the deeper mists roll aside and the whole 

 breadth and height of Kaieteur, pillared on either side by great 

 colunms of paper-white fog, bursts upon the astonished visitor. 

 Soon cue upper fourth of each lateral column joins its fellow, 

 making" a Roman arch that frames the tremendous wall of 

 falling water. 



Again the scene changes, and the arch becomes a round, 

 an oval, or a square frame, through which the greater part of 

 the falling water-mass is on exhibition, as in a giant picture 

 gallery. 



Another and not uncommon scene results from the 

 uniform thinning" of the cloud-veil that just previously obscured 

 the entire fall. Then the appearance reminds one strongly of 

 those stage effects obtained on looking from a darkened 

 auditorium through clieesecloth clouds; one sees dimly and in 

 weird fashion the objects beyond. Upon an infinitely grander 

 scale is a wonderful and rapidly dissolving" a])i)arition of a huge 

 yellow-brown mass of water behind the white but translucent 

 veil of mist. 



Finally, a " close-up " view of the Falls is to be obtained 

 by walking along the margin of the chasm quite to the lateral 

 table rock that almost overhangs the falling water. If your 

 n.ervous system is in good order you may lie prone upon your 

 stomach, with head and neck projecting well into space, and 

 look down, down. 900 feet along, indeed almost parallel with, 

 the immense sheet of water that rolls past to where it crashes 

 upon the jagged rocks below and rebounds from them fifty 

 leet in the air. Tt is an awful and impressive sight. Don't 

 try it unless you are sure of foot and clear of brain! At the 



