The view was certainly well worth the trouble. Just at the break of the fall the stream was divided by a small rocky islet crested with half a dozen tall pines, the "Goat Island" of this toy Niagara. In the few rays of sunlight that struggled down into the gloomy gorge the rushing river with its sheets of glittering foam, and the bright green ferns and mosses that clung to the dark cliffs around, and the shining arch of the fall itself, and the rocks starting boldly up in mid-stream, tufted with clustering leaves, made a splendid picture.
Close to the water's edge ran a kind of terrace, formed by the sliding down of the softer parts of the cliff; and along this the three walked till they came right abreast of the fall.
"Hollo!" cried Harry, suddenly, "didn't you say that nobody ever shot these rapids? Why, there's a fellow trying it now!"
There, sure enough, as he pointed up the stream, appeared a canoe with a single figure in it, shooting down the river like an arrow, and already close upon the edge of the rapids.
"Good gracious!" cried Tom, with a look of horror, "it's some fellow being swept down by the stream! See, he's broken his paddle, and can't help himself!"
Instinctively all three sprang forward at once, although the doomed voyager was manifestly beyond the reach of help. But even as they did so, the crisis came. With one leap the boat was in the midst of the rapids, banged to and fro like a shuttlecock by the white leaping waves, amid which it appeared and vanished by turns, till a final plunge sent it right toward the edge of the fall.
The lookers-on turned away their faces; but all was not over yet. By a lucky chance the boat's head had been turned straight toward the island, upon which the current drove it with such force as to dash it in among the sharp rocks, that pierced its sides and held it firm, while its occupant was flung forward on his face among the bushes.
"Phew!" said Tom, drawing a long breath, "what a shave! Ugh! wasn't it horrid, just that last minute? I'm awfully glad he's got off."
"But how's he to get ashore?" asked the practical Charlie. "It seems to me he's in just as bad a fix as ever."
Meanwhile the unlucky voyager had scrambled to his feet, and was staring wildly about him.