clumsy craft was jerked around with such violence that Harry nearly
tumbled into the creek.

He heard Lewston and Harvey shouting to him, but he paid no attention to
them. He was working with all his strength to get the boat out of the
current and into shallower water. But as he found that he was not able
to do that, he made desperate efforts to stop the boat by thrusting his
pole into the bottom. It was not easy to get the pole into the mud, the
current was so strong; but he succeeded at last, by pushing it out in
front of him, in forcing it into the bottom; and then, in a moment, it
was jerked out of his hand, as the boat swept on, and, a second time, he
came near tumbling overboard.

Now he was helpless. No, there was the short pole that Lewston had left
in the boat.

He picked it up, but he could do nothing with it. If it had been an oar,
now, it might have been of some use. He tried to pull up the seat, but
it was nailed fast.

On he rapidly floated, down the middle of the stream; the boat sometimes
sidewise, sometimes with one end foremost, and sometimes the other. Very
soon he lost sight of Lewston and Harvey, and the last he saw of them
they were hurrying by the edge of the water, in the woods. Now he sat
down, and looked about him. The creek appeared to be getting wider and
wider, and he thought that if he went on at that rate he must soon come
to the river. The country seemed unfamiliar to him. He had never seen
it, from the water, when it was overflowed in this way.

He passed a wide stretch of cultivated fields, mostly planted in