THK PARALLEL ROADS OF GLEN ROT. 155 



will then be transformed into a dry precipice, forming a 

 simple continuation of the cliffy boundary of the Niagara 

 gorge. At the place occupied by the fall at this moment 

 we shall have the gorge enclosing a right angle, a second 

 whirlpool being the consequence. To those who visit 

 Niagara a few millenniums hence I leave the verification 

 of this prediction. All that can be said is, that if the 

 causes now in action continue to act, it will prove itself 

 literally true 



POSTSCRIPT. 



A year or so after I had quitted the United States, a 

 man sixty years of age, while engaged in painting one of 

 the bridges which connect Goat Island with the Three 

 Sisters, slipped through the rails of the bridge into the 

 rapids, and was carried impetuously toward the Horseshoe 

 Fall. He was urged against a rock which rose above the 

 water, and with the grasp of desperation he clung to it. 

 The population of the village of Niagara Falls was soon 

 upon the island, and ropes were brought, but there was 

 none to use them. In the midst of the excitement, a tall 

 powerful young fellow was observed making his way silently 

 through the crowd. He reached a rope; selected from 

 the bystanders a number of men, and placed one end of 

 the rope in their hands. The other end he fastened round 

 himself, and choosing a point considerably above that to 

 which the man clung, he plunged into the rapids. He 

 was carried violently downward, but he caught the rock, 

 secured the old painter and saved him. Newspapers from 

 all parts of the Union poured in upon me, describing this 

 gallant act of my guide Conroy. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



THE PARALLEL ROADS OF GLEN ROY.* 



THE FIRST published allusion to the Parallel Roads of 

 Glen Roy occurs in the appendix to the third volume of 

 Pennant's " Tour in Scotland," a work published in 1776. 



* A discourse delivered at the Royal Institution of (Jreat Britain on 

 June 9, 1876, 



