For an instant they were unable to comprehend even the nature of the
catastrophe. The reservoir was directly over their heads; the bursting
of its wall they had imagined would naturally bring down the water in a
dozen trickling streams or falls over the cliff above them and along the
flanks of the mountain. But that its suddenly liberated volume should
overflow the upland beyond and then descend in a pent-up flood by their
own trail and their only avenue of escape, had been beyond their wildest
fancy.

They met this smiting truth with that characteristic short laugh
with which the American usually receives the blow of Fate or the
unexpected--as if he recognized only the absurdity of the situation.
Then they ran to the women, collected them together, and dragged them
to vantages of fancied security among the bushes which flounced the long
skirts of the mountain walls. But I leave this part of the description
to the characteristic language of one of the party:--

"When the flood struck us, it did not seem to take any stock of us in
particular, but laid itself out to 'go for' that picnic for all it
was worth! It wiped it off the face of the earth in about twenty-five
seconds! It first made a clean break from stem to stern, carrying
everything along with it. The first thing I saw was old Judge Piper,
puttin' on his best licks to get away from a big can of strawberry ice
cream that was trundling after him and trying to empty itself on his
collar, whenever a bigger wave lifted it. He was followed by what was
left of the brass band; the big drum just humpin' itself to keep
abreast o' the ice cream, mixed up with camp-stools, music-stands, a few
Chinamen, and then what they call in them big San Francisco processions
'citizens generally.' The hull thing swept up the canyon inside o'