A sort of sanctity and awe environed it, owing to the consciousness of
absolute and utter loneliness. It was probable that human feet had never
before gained this recess, that human eyes had never been fixed upon
these gushing waters. The aboriginal inhabitants had no motives to lead
them into caves like this and ponder on the verge of such a precipice.
Their successors were still less likely to have wandered hither. Since
the birth of this continent, I was probably the first who had deviated
thus remotely from the customary paths of men.

While musing upon these ideas, my eye was fixed upon the foaming
current. At length I looked upon the rocks which confined and
embarrassed its course. I admired their fantastic shapes and endless
irregularities. Passing from one to the other of these, my attention
lighted, at length, as if by some magical transition, on--a human
countenance!

My surprise was so abrupt, and my sensations so tumultuous, that I
forgot for a moment the perilous nature of my situation. I loosened my
hold of a pine-branch, which had been hitherto one of my supports, and
almost started from my seat. Had my station been in a slight degree
nearer the brink than it was, I should have fallen headlong into the
abyss.

To meet a human creature, even on that side of the chasm which I
occupied, would have been wholly adverse to my expectation. My station
was accessible by no other road than that through which I had passed,
and no motives were imaginable by which others could be prompted to
explore this road. But he whom I now beheld was seated where it seemed
impossible for human efforts to have placed him.