174 BOOK OF A HUNDRED BEARS 



At the bottom, we found a long ridge, fifty feet 

 above the water, that envisaged the fall. For 

 myself, I was content to rest there while Dudgeon 

 and the Banker pursued a path of slippery granite 

 to the bottom of the gorge, where the water ran 

 blue and white, full of foam from its mad descent 

 above. They found that the sand along the river 

 brink was hot, from the innumerable hot springs 

 that here break out along its edge. But there 

 was nothing dangerous here. Fierce as it looked, 

 steeply as it ran, it was shallow, and, while it 

 frothed and fumed and made much of itself, it 

 was not alarming. 

 ''Says Tweed to Till 



'' 'What gars ye rin sae still? ^ 

 " Says Till to Tweed 



" 'Though ye rin wi speed 

 " 'And I rin slow 



" 'Where ye droon a man, I droon twa.' " 



For the Yellowstone seems but a shallow brook 

 there, between those vast walls, dwarfed by the 

 fall and the great canon ; and, while it has all the 

 charm of the river above, all the changing Hghts, 



