With desperate struggles each strove to gain an advantage; but strength on the one side, and activity on the other, foiled their opposing exertions.  The turf was torn up under their feet, and they were whirled round, now in this direction, and now in that, until, maddened by the contest, neither thought of his personal safety, nor heeded the frightful abyss on the brink of which they fought.  At length, foaming and endeavoring to throttle each other, the foot of one tripped and he stumbled over the precipice, carrying the other down with him in his arms.  The grappled foes turned over in the air, and then fell upon the edge of a projecting shelf of a rock, some half a dozen feet below.  Ohquamehud was undermost, receiving the full force of the fall, and breaking it for Holden, who, as they touched the rock, threw one arm around the trunk of a small tree that grew out of a fissure.  The Indian must have been stunned, for Holden felt his grasp relax, and, still clinging to the tree, he endeavored to withdraw himself from the other’s hold.  He had partially succeeded, when the Indian, recovering consciousness, made a movement that threw his body over the precipice, down which he would have fallen had he not blindly caught at the freed arm of Holden, which he clutched with the tenacity of despair.  The Indian had now recovered from the stunning effect of the fall, and become sensible of his danger.  In rolling over the edge of the rock, his moccasined feet had come into contact with a slight projection where his toes had caught, and by means of which, Holden, as well as himself, was relieved in part of the weight of his person.  Using this as a support, he made repeated and frantic attempts to spring to the level surface, but the steepness of the rock, and the lowness at which he hung, combined with the exhaustion occasioned by the fierce and prolonged conflict, foiled every effort.  At last, he abandoned the attempt to save himself as hopeless, and directed all his exertions to drag his enemy down with him to destruction.  With this view, he strained, with all his remaining strength, upon the arm he grasped, in order to force Holden to let go his hold upon the tree.  It was now a question of endurance between them, and it is probable that both would have perished, had not an unexpected actor appeared upon the scene.

The boy Quadaquina had been watching Ohquamehud.  Like a trained blood-hound, he had kept faithfully on the track and scarcely let the Indian out of sight until he, came near the village.  Here he was met by a playmate, with whom, like a child as he was, he stopped to amuse himself for a moment.  This was the cause of his not arriving sooner, the delay corresponding nearly with the time Holden was detained by his visit.  The boy now came running up, all out of breath, and gazed around, but saw no one nor heard a sound, save the roar of the Fall.  His eyes fell upon the gun of the Indian, and the cap of the Solitary, lying