In all this run through Glen Canyon we had a good current, but only one place resembling a rapid.  Here, below the Escalante, it was very quiet, and hard pulling was necessary to make any headway.  We were anxious to reach the San Juan River that evening, but the days were growing short, and we were still many miles away when it began to grow dusk; so we kept a lookout for a suitable camp.  The same conditions that had bothered us on one or two previous occasions were found here; slippery, muddy banks, and quicksand, together with an absence of firewood.  We had learned before this to expect these conditions where the water was not swift.  The slower stream had a chance to deposit its silt, and if the high water had been very quiet, we could expect to find it soft, or boggy.  In the canyons containing swift water and rapids we seldom found mud, but found a firm sand, instead.  Here in Glen Canyon we had plenty of mud, for the river had been falling the last few days.  Time and again we inspected seemingly favourable places, only to be disappointed.  The willows and dense shrubbery came down close to the river; the mud was black, deep, and sticky; all driftwood had gone out on the last flood.  Meanwhile a glorious full moon had risen, spreading a soft, weird light over the canyon walls and the river; so that we now had a light much better than the dusk of half an hour previous, our course being almost due south.  Finally, becoming discouraged, we decided to pull for the San Juan River, feeling sure that we would find a sand-bar there.  It was late when we reached it, and instead of a sand-bar we found a delta of bottomless mud.  We had drifted past the point where the rivers joined, before noticing that the stream turned directly to the west, with canyon walls two or three hundred feet high, and no moonlight entered there.  Instead, it was black as a dungeon.  From down in that darkness there came a muffled roar, reverberating against the walls, and sounding decidedly like a rapid.  There was not a minute to lose.  We pulled, and pulled hard—­for the stream was now quite swift close to the right shore, and a sheer bank of earth about ten feet high made it difficult to land.  Jumping into the mud at the edge of the water, we tied the boats to some bushes, then tore down the bank and climbed out on a dry, sandy point of land.  At the end or sharp turn of the sheer wall we found a fair camp, with driftwood enough for that night.  Emery, weak from his former illness and the long day’s run, went to bed as soon as we had eaten a light supper.  I looked after the cooking that evening, making some baking-powder bread,—­otherwise known as a flapjack,—­along with other arrangements for the next day; but I fear my efforts as a cook always resulted rather poorly.

We had breakfast at an early hour the next morning and were ready for the boats at 7.15, the earliest start to our record.  Our rapid of the night before proved to be a false alarm, being nothing more than the breaking of swift water as it swept the banks of rocks at the turn.  It was quite different from what we had pictured in our minds.