and half wonder: the face of the river whitened from bank to
hank between the stone facings, and the far-away spurs went out
in spouts of foam. Mother Gunga had come bank-high in haste,
and a wall of chocolate-coloured water was her messenger. There
was a shriek above the roar of the water, the complaint of the
spans coming down on their blocks as the cribs were whirled out
from under their bellies. The stone-boats groaned and ground
each other in the eddy that swung round the abutment, and their
clumsy masts rose higher and higher against the dim sky-line.

"Before she was shut between these walls we knew what she would
do. Now she isthus cramped God only knows what she will do!"
said Peroo, watching the furious turmoil round the guard~tower.
"Ohe'! Fight, then! Fight hard, for it is thus that a woman wears
herself out."

But Mother Gunga would not fight as Peroo desired. After the
first down-stream plunge there came no more walls of water, but
the river lifted herself bodily, as a snake when she drinks in
midsummer, plucking and fingering along the revetments, and
banking up behind the piers till even Findlayson began to
recalculate the strength of his work.

When day came the village gasped. "Only last night," men said,
turning to each other, "it was as a town in the river-bed! Look
now!"

And they looked and wondered afresh at the deep water, the racing
water that licked the throat of the piers. The farther bank was
veiled by rain, into which the bridge ran out and vanished; the