Chapter Twenty Three.
A Great Danger.
So rapt were all the party in the awe-inspiring scene and in the beauty of the falls—which were broken up by island-like rocks peering out grey and green right across, so that as the adventurers drew nearer it was to gaze at the beauties of at least a dozen falls instead of one, as they had expected—that they did not notice how the wind was dropping as they advanced, nor yet the change that had taken place in the river current.
It was Brace who first marked the alteration whilst he was noticing the numbers of fish leaping and darting away in front of the boat as she glided on.
“We ought almost to stop and fish here,” observed Briscoe. “We might have better luck with a smaller bait.”
“Perhaps we had better try,” said Brace; “but I say, Mr Lynton, look here: what do you make of this?”
“Make of what?” said the mate.
“We are not sailing nearly so fast as we were a short time ago.”
“Oh, I don’t know: we’re making much about the same way.”
“But the boat does not rush through the water as she did.”