But the rapid
dying down of the hubbub among the savages gave him cause to think. He
asked Suarez to cease pulling. The canoes behind came crowding in on
the more solid boat, and an oar held out until it encountered some
invisible branch was rudely swept aside. In a word, they were being
impelled towards an unknown destination with the silence and gathering
speed of a mill-race.
An expert engineer, though his work may have little to do with sea or
river, cannot fail to accumulate a store of theoretical knowledge as to
the properties and limitations of water in motion. Gray knew that the
quickened impulse of the stream arose from the tidal force exerted in a
channel which gradually lessened its width. The boat was traveling at
sea level. Therefore, there could be neither rapids nor cataract in
front; but the steady rush of the current, now plainly audible, could
not be accounted for simply by the effort of the tide to gain a passage
through a mere by-way, as the boat was now nearly half a mile from the
estuary, and the velocity of the current was increasing each moment.
"We must endeavor to reach the bank and hold on to the branches of a
tree," he shouted in Spanish.
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