Then he told of cases where at the last moment he had seen some mad risk in going down, and had turned his steamer in the very throat of the torrent, and, with groaning wheels and straining timbers, fought his way back foot by foot to safety. Once a fog dropped about them suddenly, and once the starboard rudder-chain broke. This last was all but a disaster, for they were down so far that the river must surely have conquered the engines had they tried to head up-stream. Ouillette saw there was only one way to save his boat and the lives she carried, and, putting the wheel hard aport, for the port chain held, he ran her on the rocks. And there she lay, the good steamboat Spartan, all that night, with passengers in an anguish of excitement, while Indian pilots from Caughnawaga made it quite clear what they were good for—put off swiftly in their little barks straight into that reeling flood, straight out to the helpless boat, then back to shore, each bearing two or three of the fear-struck company. Then out again and back again until darkness came. Then out again and back again when darkness had fallen. Think of that! Hour after hour, with paddles alone, these dauntless sons of Iroquois braves fought the rapids, triumphed over the rapids, and brought to land through the night and the rage of waters every soul on that imperiled vessel!
Another instance he gave, showing the admirable alertness of these Indians, as well as their skill with the canoe. It was in the summer of 1900, late of an afternoon, and so heavy was the August heat that even on the river the passengers were gasping for air. Shortly after they entered the cataract several persons saw a large man climb to the top of a water-tank on the hurricane-deck, and seat himself there in one of the folding deck-chairs. The man's purpose was, evidently, to seek a cooler spot than he had found below, and the boat was running so steadily that no one thought of danger. Indeed, there would have been no danger had not the gentleman fallen into a comfortable doze just as Ouillette steadied the boat for her first downward leap and then brought her over to starboard with a jerk, which jerk so effectually disturbed the large man's slumbers that the first thing he knew he was shot off his rickety chair, over the side of the water-tank, clean over the steamboat's decks, down, splash! into the St. Lawrence at a point where it is not good for any man to be. He was right in the main sweep of the river, where one may live for twenty minutes if he can keep afloat so long, but scarcely longer, since twenty minutes will bring him to the last rush of rapids, where swimmers do not live.
"MAN OVERBOARD!" AN INDIAN CANOE TO THE RESCUE.
What happened after this I have from an eye-witness, who rushed back with others at the cry, "Man overboard!" and joined in a reckless throwing over of chairs, boxes, and life-preservers that profited little, for the man was left far behind by the steamboat, which could do nothing—and Ouillette could do nothing—but whistle a hoarse danger-warning and go its way. A magnificent swimmer he must have been, this rudely awakened tourist, for the passengers, crowded astern, could follow the black speck that was his head bobbing along steadily, undisturbed, one would say, by dangers, apparently going up-stream as the steamboat gained on him—really coming down-stream with the full force of the current, and yielding to it entirely, all strength saved for steering. Not a man on the boat believed that the swimmer would come out alive, and, helpless to save, they stood there in sickening fascination, watching him sweep down to his death.
Then suddenly rang out a cry: "Look! There! A canoe!" And out from the shadows and shallows off-shore shot a slender prow with a figure in bow and stern. The Indians were coming to the rescue! They must have started even as the man fell,—such a thing it is to be an Indian!—and, with a knowledge of the rapids that is theirs alone, they had aimed the swift craft in a long slant that would let them overtake the swimmer just here, at this very place where now they were about to overtake him, at this very place where presently they did overtake him and draw him up, all but exhausted, from as close to the brink of the Great Rapids as ever he will get until he passes over them. Then they paddled back.