We were so high up that I could not tell how big these creatures were, but several that we noticed must have been six or seven feet long, and like many vipers of the poisonous kinds, very thick in proportion.
I daresay we should have stopped there amusing ourselves for the next hour, pitching down stones and making the vipers vicious; but our childish pursuit was ended by the doctor, who clapped Jack on the shoulder.
“Come, Jack,” he said, “if we leave you there you’ll fall asleep and topple to the bottom.”
Jack drew up his legs and climbed once more to his feet, looking very hot and languid, but he shouldered his piece and stepped out as we slowly climbed along the edge of the chasm for about a quarter of a mile, when it seemed to close up after getting narrower and narrower, so that we continued our journey on what would have been its farther side had it not closed.
Higher and higher we seemed to climb, with the path getting more difficult, save when here and there we came upon a nice bare spot free from stones, and covered with a short kind of herb that had the appearance of thyme.
But now the heat grew less intense. Then it was comparatively cool, and a soft moist air fanned our heated cheeks. The roar of the falls grew louder, and at any moment we felt that we might come upon the sight, but we had to travel on nearly half a mile along what seemed to be a steep slope. It was no longer arid and barren here, for every shelf and crevice was full of growth of the most vivid green. For a long time we had not seen a tree, but here tall forest trees had wedged their roots in the cracks and crevices, curved out, and then shot straight up into the air.
The scene around was beautiful, and birds were once more plentiful, dashing from fruit to flower, and no doubt screaming and piping according to their wont, but all seemed to be strangely silent, even our own voices sounded smothered, everything being overcome by the awful deep loud roar that came from beyond a dense clump of trees.
We eagerly pressed forward now, ready, however, to find that we had a long distance to go, and the doctor leading we wound our way in and out, with the delicious shade overhead, and the refreshing moist air seeming to cool our fevered faces and dry lips.
“Why, we’re walking along by the very edge,” said Jack Penny suddenly. “This is the way;” and stepping aside he took about a dozen steps and then the undergrowth closed behind him for the moment, but as we parted it to follow him we caught sight of his tall form again and then lost it, for he uttered a shrill “Oh!” and disappeared.
“Doctor! quick!” I cried, for I was next, and I sprang forward, to stop appalled, for Jack was before me clinging to a thin sapling which he had caught as he fell, and this had bent like a fishing-rod, letting him down some ten feet below the edge of an awful precipice, the more terrible from the fact that the river seemed to be rushing straight out into the air from a narrow ravine high upon our right, and to plunge down into a vast rocky basin quite a couple of hundred feet below.