Everything that would
sink was lost.
We all got into the two canoes and went down to Walton, where we camped
and staid all night for Walton's benefit. While we were waiting I took
my gun and tried to climb up high enough to see how much longer this
horrible canon was going to last, but after many attempts, I could not
get high enough to see in any direction. The mountain was all bare rocks
in terraces, but it was impossible to climb from one to the other, and
the benches were all filled with broken rocks that had fallen from
above.
By the time I got back to camp, Walton was dry and warm and could talk.
He said he felt better, and pretty good over his rescue. When he was
going under the water, it seemed sometimes as if he never would come to
the top again, but he held on and eventually came out all right. He
never knew how he got to shore, he was so nearly dead when rescued.
The next morning Walton was so well we started on. We were now very
poorly armed. My rifle and McMahon's shotgun were all the arms we had
for seven of us, and we could make but a poor defence if attacked by man
or beast, to say nothing of providing ourselves with food. The mountains
on each side were very bare of timber, those on the east side
particularly so, and very high and barren. Toward night we were floating
along in a piece of slack water, the river below made a short turn
around a high and rocky point almost perpendicular from the water. There
was a terrace along the side of this point about fifty feet up, and the
bench grew narrower as it approached the river.
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