To his astonishment, he was in a great circular amphitheater, a hundred feet in diameter, domed to an enormous height, with the blue sky showing through a rift at the top. The little spring trickled down the wall, now dropping sheer in spray, now trickling in a delicate, glistening sheet. But the greatest wonder of the cave was in the texture of its walls, which appeared to Enoch to be of purest marble of a deep shell pink and translucent creamy white. Moisture had collected on the walls and each tiny globule of water seemed to hold a miniature rainbow in its heart. There was a holy sort of loveliness about the spot, and before he returned to the rugged adventure outside, Enoch pulled off his hat and christened the place Diana's Chapel. Nor did he, on his arrival at the camp, tell of his find.
Shortly after two o'clock Milton ordered all hands aboard. But before this he had shown them all the map, adding a rough sketch of his own. The next rapid appeared to be no more dangerous than the previous one. But below it the river widened out into a circular bay, a great tureen within which the waters moved with an oil-like smoothness. But when Milton threw a stick into this strange basin, it was whirled the entire circumference of the bay with a velocity that all the men agreed boded ill for any boat that did not cling to the wall. The west end of the bay, where it was all but blocked by the closing in of the Canyon sides, could not be seen from the rocks where the men stood. But the old maps reported a steep fall which must be portaged.
"Cling to the right-hand wall," ordered Milton. "If you steer out, Harden, for the sake of the short cut, you may be lost. The reports show that two other boats were lost here. Cling to the wall! When we reach the mouth we must go ashore again and examine the falls. Be sure your life preservers are strapped securely."
"Mr. Milton," said Jonas, "you better let me get my hands on a oar. If
I got to die, I'm going to die fighting."
"Good stuff, Jonas!" exclaimed Harden. "Can you row?"
"Brought up on the Potomac," replied Jonas.
"All right, folks," cried Milton. "We're off."
The Ida would have shot the rapid successfully, but for one important point. It was necessary, in order to land on the right side of the whirlpool, to steer to the right of a tall, finger-like rock, that protruded from the water at the bottom of the rapids. About a boat's length from this rock, however, a sudden wave shot six feet into the air, throwing the Ida off its course, and drenching the crew, so that they entered the churning tureen at a speed of twenty miles an hour and almost at the middle of the stream.
"Pull to the right wall! To the right!" roared Milton. But he might as well have roared to the wind. Enoch and Forrester rose from their seats and threw the whole weight of their bodies on their oars. But the noiseless power of the whirlpool thrust the Ida mercilessly toward the center.
"Harder!" panted Milton, straining with all his might at the steering oar. "Put your back into her, Judge! Bend to it, Forr!"