and there was not another man on that side of the river within half a
mile of him. His sister knew this, and, courageously, like another Grace
Darling, proposed, at once, to accompany him in his perilous adventure.
From being so often on the water with her brother, she knew well how to
handle an oar. Often, indeed, without him she had paddled a passenger
across the ferry in her little canoe. He accepted her proposal, and we
had the satisfaction of seeing the light punt put off from the shore
opposite to that from which we were idly and uselessly looking on, and
go gallantly over the surging torrent toward the sinking men. We feared,
however, that it would not be in time to save them, as their cries for
help grew fainter and fainter, till each one, we thought, would have
been their last. We saw that the oar, with the drowning men clinging to
it, was floating rapidly down the middle of the stream, which, in this
particular locality, is more than a quarter of a mile in breadth, and
would inevitably, in two or three minutes more, be in the white water
among the breakers, when their fate must be sealed, and the boat, if it
followed, dashed to pieces among the rocks. This was the principal point
of danger, and they had to run down within a most fearful proximity of
it, to cross the course down which the drowning men were drifting, and,
as they did so, to seize hold of them without losing their own headway;
for there was not time for that. They succeeded in shooting athwart the
current, rapid as it was, just below the men. With breathless and
painful anxiety we saw them execute this dangerous manoeuver. We saw the
ferryman lean over the side of his boat, for a moment, as it passed
them, while his sister backed water with her oar.

"They are saved!" some one said, close behind me, in a whisper so deep
and earnest that I started, and turned to look at the speaker; when
another, who heard him, exclaimed, "No, no! they are gone! they are
lost! the boat has left them!" And sure enough, it had. But, in an