“You draw back, then,” says Moisio to Olof.  “He’ll not care to make the trip alone.  No man’s gone down the rapids here and lived—­’tis madness to try.”

Olof scans the water with a critical eye, the crowd waiting expectantly the while.

“I’ll not deny it,” says he at last.  “Don’t think I’m paying no heed to what you say.  But I’ve a reason of my own for doing something more than most would venture—­and I’ll not draw back.”  He spoke loudly and clearly; all on the bridge could hear his words.

Moisio said no more, but drew back a little.

“Well, who’s to go first?” said Falk.

“Let me,” says Redjacket.

“As you please,” said Olof.

Moisio turned to the headmen again.  “You’ll have some men on the farther bank,” he said, “in case of accidents.”

“Not on my account,” puts in Redjacket scornfully.  “But if the other man here wants fishing up....”

“Have them there if you like,” says Olof. “’Twill do no harm.”

The men take up their poles; those on the bridge look expectantly down the river.

Kohiseva Rapids are a lordly sight in spring, when the river is full.  The strong arch of the bridge spans its powerful neck, and just below, the rapids begin, rushing down the first straight reach with a slight fall here and there.  Then curving to the right, and breaking in foam against the rocky wall of Akeanlinna—­a mighty fortress of stone rising straight up in midstream, with a clump of bushes like a helmet plume on its top.  The river then divides, the left arm racing in spate down to the mill, the right turning off through a channel blasted out of the rock for the passage of timber going down.  A wild piece of water this; the foam dances furiously in the narrow cut, but it ends as swiftly as the joy of life; over a ledge of rock the waves are flung a couple of fathoms down into the whirlpool called Eva’s Pool.  Here they check and subside, the channel widens out below, and the water passes on at a slower pace through the easier rapids below.

That is Kohiseva.  The rock of Akeanlinna would be left untroubled were it not for the lumbermen and their work.  In the floating season, the channel between it and the left bank is filled with timber, gathering like a great bridge, against which new arrivals fling themselves in fury, till they are drawn down through the cut.

The task which the rival champions have set themselves to-day is to make their way down the upper rapids as far as Akeanlinna, and there spring off—­if they can—­at the block—­for there is no getting down through the cut on a timber baulk, and none could go over the ledge to Eva’s Pool and live.

The men have taken up their places on the bank, and the two competitors are preparing to start.

“Wouldn’t it be as well to send a couple of baulks down first, for whirlpools and hidden rocks?” suggests Olof.

“Ho, yes!” cries his rival.  “And get a surveyor to mark it all out neatly on a chart—­a fine idea!”