Then as a sudden thought struck him he continued.

"See here, it's no good our wasting our strength clinging to this
trunk any longer. Sooner or later we shall be swept off and the
longer we wait the less reserve strength we shall have. Let us
leave go now and swim for it."

Whatever reply Harry might have tendered to this desperate proposal
he was spared making, for at that moment a wave of more than
ordinary force--caused by the backed-up water striking the log--struck
him full in the face and before he knew it the boy had been washed
from the tree trunk and was being carried like a straw down the stream.

As Harry felt himself being carried along there was only one thought
in his mind. It was not of death. When death is right upon a man
or a boy he rarely thinks of it, but casts about for the best means
of saving himself. Nor does--as some imaginative writers have told
us--a man's whole past life come before him at such moments.
No--the instinct of self-preservation is strongest when a human
being is in the direst need, and so it was that in Harry's mind one
thought kept hammering away like the strokes of a tolling bell.

"Try-and-make-the-rock. Try-and-make-the-rock."

Frank's insistence had done this much. It had caused the boy to
recollect the one hope of salvation that the desperate situation
held out. As he was swept down the torrent Harry made no effort to
swim. It would have been worse than useless and besides he needed
to husband his strength for the final struggle he knew was upon him.