We were almost under the
monstrous wall of water thundering down from above, and speech was in
vain in the midst of such a pitiless crash of sound.
In another moment the guide disappeared behind the deluge, and bewildered
by the thunder, driven helplessly by the wind, and smitten by the arrowy
tempest of rain, I followed. All was darkness. Such a mad storming,
roaring, and bellowing of warring wind and water never crazed my ears
before. I bent my head, and seemed to receive the Atlantic on my back.
The world seemed going to destruction. I could not see anything, the
flood poured down savagely. I raised my head, with open mouth, and the
most of the American cataract went down my throat. If I had sprung a
leak now I had been lost. And at this moment I discovered that the
bridge had ceased, and we must trust for a foothold to the slippery and
precipitous rocks. I never was so scared before and survived it. But we
got through at last, and emerged into the open day, where we could stand
in front of the laced and frothy and seething world of descending water,
and look at it. When I saw how much of it there was, and how fearfully
in earnest it was, I was sorry I had gone behind it.
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