They shouted derisive inquiries for orders to the Commodore, and presently disappeared around the bend below.
Speaking unofficially and strictly in a private capacity, the Commodore admits that he had all he could do to avoid grievous wreck on the logs beneath which his companion's elusive paddle had vanished. Wading and swimming were alike irreconcilable with the conditions, for the bed of the river was full of boulders over which the water boiled without breaking. He tried the plan of holding on to his boat and floating; but after being dragged and bumped for a few yards over the stones, he gave that up and resigned himself to careful wading until he reached the shallows, where he at length succeeded in re-embarking—no easy task, by the way, in swift water—and soon joined the Cherub and Rochefort.
Down the Race.
A camping spot was selected on a bank of sawdust near which was a mighty pile of dry mill waste, and the three proceeded to light a fire and make a somewhat needful change of clothing, before getting supper and turning in for the night. After a long time the Arethusela came in sight, her crew laboriously working a half-paddle—though why a spare one stowed below decks was not used was never found out—and examining the shores and channel for the lost property. This was happily discovered close to camp, and presently a "lean-to," was covered with the soaked tent, which made a reasonably comfortable shelter.
Sawdust is not so bad to sleep on when you have a boat or a rubber-blanket under you, but it retains moisture badly, and is seldom dry more than an inch below the surface. Moreover, the dry part catches fire and burns in an exceedingly persistent and stealthy manner, tunneling unsuspected in all directions and making itself very disagreeable. The members of the expedition, however, knew its nature and provided against its vagaries by wetting thoroughly in the vicinity of the fire, where the Cook speedily had coffee and a tempting pan of scrambled eggs ready for the evening meal.
The voyagers went to sleep this night with unwonted noises in their ears, namely the close-at-hand roar of rapids rising and falling as the mysterious and imperceptible changes of the evening air bore it, now heavily, now faintly, through the thick forest of spruce. It was a wilder region than that through which they had been passing on the lake and its outlet, and the woods gave out sounds at night which often aroused one and another with the pleasing and yet uncomfortable thought of bears and lynxes in his half awakened brain.