the rapids we went, swifter than an eagle in his stoop, down over the boilin’ eddies, down over the foamin’ surge, down the perpendicular falls, as if the old Nick himself was kickin’ us on end.  How we got down I won’t undertake to say, but when I got breath and looked out over the side of the boat I saw the old woods and rocks along the shore below the falls, rushin’ up stream like a racehorse.

“Wal, we entered Round Lake, crossed it in five minutes, and down the river we rushed over the little falls at a bound, and into the Lower Saranac.  I’d got a little used to it by this time, and though it was mighty hard work to catch my breath in such a wind as we made by our flight, yet I managed to sit up and look around me.  It was curious to see how the islands on the Lower Saranac danced about, and how the shores ran away behind while I was looking at ’em; and how the forest trees dodged, and whirled, and jumped about one another, as we tore along.  After tearin’ about the lake a spell, we came to something like a halt, and old Mossyback stuck his head out of water, and openin’ his great glassy eyes like the moon in a mist, ‘How do you like that?’ said he, in a jeerin’ sort of way.  ‘All right,’ said I; ’go it while you’re young.’  I didn’t care about appearin’ skeered or uneasy, but I’d have given a couple of month’s wages just then, to have been on dry land.  ‘Well,’ said he, ‘I guess we’ll be gittin’ towards home.’  And away he started for the Upper Saranac, and up the river, across Round Lake, and right up over the rapids we went.  Two or three times I made up my mind that I was a goner, as the water piled up around me along over the falls; but somehow our very speed made our boat glance upward at such times, and skim along the surface like a duck.  We went boundin’ from hillock to hillock, on the mad waters, till we entered the broad lake and went skiving about again among the islands.

“All at once he seemed to take a notion to go down towards the bottom; so shortenin’ the line some fifty foot or more, he hoisted his great tail straight up towards the sky, and down he went, the boat standing up on end, and somehow the waters didn’t seem to close above us, so rapid was our descent.  It was tight work, as you may guess, to hold on under such circumstances, but I managed to keep my place.  How deep we went I wont undertake to say, but this much is quite sartin, we went down so far that I couldn’t see out at the hole we went in at.  There are some mighty big fish away down in them parts, you may bet your life on that; trout that it wouldn’t be pleasant to handle.

“By-and-bye we started for daylight again.  The fish had to stand out of the way as we rushed like an express train towards the surface; them that didn’t we made a smash of.  One bull head, I remember, about twice as long as one of our boats wasn’t quick enough; the bow of the boat struck him about in the middle and cut him in two like a knife.  One old trout seemed to have made up his mind for a fight, and he chased us more than two miles with his jaws open like a great pair of clamps, as if he’d a mind to swallow us boat and all, and from the size of the openin’, I’m bold to say he’d a done it too, if he’d have caught us; but as we rounded an island, he run head foremost, jam against a rock.  That kind o’ stunned him, and he gave in.