THE FALLS OF KEEWASH. 35 



and so from every twig on the branching river floats gather 

 as the river gathers on its way to the sea. 



' Sometimes great piles of timber get stranded, jammed, 

 and entangled upon a shallow, near the head of a narrow 

 rapid ; and then it is no easy or safe employment to start 

 them. Men armed with axes, levers, and long slender 

 boat-hooks, start down in crazy boats, and clamber over 

 slippery stones and rocks to the float, where they wade 

 and crawl about amongst the trees, to the danger of life 

 and limb. They work with might and main at the base 

 of the stack, hacking, dragging, and pushing, till the whole 

 mound gives way, and rolls and slides rumbling and crash- 

 ing into the torrent, where it scatters and rushes onwards. 



' It is a sight worth seeing. The brown shoal of trees 

 rush like living things into the white water, and charge 

 full tilt, end on, straight at the first curve in the bank. 

 There is a hard bump and a vehement jostle ; for there 

 are no crews to paddle and steer these floats. The dashing 

 sound of raging water is varied by the deep musical notes 

 of the battle between wood and stone. Water pushes 

 wood, tree urges tree, till logs turn over and whirl round, 

 and rise up out of the water, and sometimes even snap and 

 splinter like dry reeds. 



' The rock is broken, and crushed, and dinted at the 

 water-line by a whole fleet of battering-rams, and the 

 square ends of logs are rounded j so both combatants 

 retain marks of the strife/ 



At Keewash I was told that the logs shot the fall bound 

 together in floats or rafts, whether single floats consisting 

 of 60 logs, or in long rafts consisting of ten such floats, 

 bound together, I neglected to enquire, but I presume the 

 former. I would have been glad to have seen the effect in 

 either case, but I could not await the operation. 



