331 
A Difificult Portage 
from the second being tied to her stern. Entering her we 
clung to projections of the wall with our hands, to prevent the 
current from swinging the boat out, while the men who were 
in the lower boat carefully hauled on the stern line till at last 
we also reached the rocks. With a great deal of labour we 
then worked both boats from these rocks to some others nearer 
the right wall, from which they were manoeuvred across to a 
pile about two hundred feet away against the foot of the cliff. 
This ended our struggle for the day, as night was upon us. 
The black rocks towering so far above made the gorge darken 
early, and rain began to fall. A little damp driftwood was 
collected with which a fire was started in order that Andy 
might prepare supper. When this was almost ready peal after 
peal of thunder suddenly crashed among the cliffs, which 
seemed to collapse and fall down upon us, and a flood from 
the sky descended. The fire died without a sputter, every¬ 
thing not in rubber was soaked, and all we could do was to 
stand in the darkness, cold and hungry, and wait for the deluge 
to cease. At last we were able to start the fire once more, 
and had a half-cooked supper before hunting the soft sides of 
the rocks for beds. The next day it required hard work till 
■one o’clock to get the boats down two hundred yards farther. 
At one place to keep the bow in, I was in one of the boats, 
being lowered along the wall, while the other men were a hun¬ 
dred feet above my head, holding the end of two hundred feet 
of rope, as they clambered along a ledge. The situation all 
around was rather precarious, but we had no accident. This 
brought us to a small alcove where there was a limited talus. 
The boats were so much bruised that we were obliged to halt 
on these rocks for repairs, instead of starting out again into 
the current as we intended. This work took so long that 
darkness approached before all was done. At the same time 
we discovered that the river was rising rapidly, at the rate of 
three or four feet an hour, submerging the rocks. Fortunately, 
about twenty feet up the cliff was a narrow shelf, and to this 
the rations were passed to guard them from the rising waters. 
Then there was danger of the boats pounding to pieces, as the 
space they were on was rapidly decreasing, and waves from the 
