CHAPTER VIII
Perilous passage of the ravine--Descent into the valley
The fearless confidence of Toby was contagious, and I began to adopt theHappar side of the question. I could not, however, overcome a certainfeeling of trepidation, as we made our way along these gloomy solitudes.Our progress, at first comparatively easy, became more and more difficult.The bed of the watercourse was covered with fragments of broken rocks,which had fallen from above, offering so many obstructions to the courseof the rapid stream, which vexed and fretted about them,--forming atintervals small waterfalls, pouring over into deep basins, or splashingwildly upon heaps of stones.
From the narrowness of the gorge, and the steepness of its sides, therewas no mode of advancing but by wading through the water; stumbling everymoment over the impediments which lay hidden under its surface, ortripping against the huge roots of trees. But the most annoying hindrancewe encountered was from a multitude of crooked boughs, which, shooting outalmost horizontally from the sides of the chasm, twisted themselvestogether in fantastic masses almost to the surface of the stream,affording us no passage except under the low arches which they formed.Under these we were obliged to crawl on our hands and feet, sliding alongthe oozy surface of the rocks, or slipping into the deep pools, and withscarce light enough to guide us. Occasionally we would strike our headsagainst some projecting limb of a tree; and while imprudently engaged inrubbing the injured part, would fall sprawling amongst flinty fragments,cutting and bruising ourselves, whilst the unpitying waters flowed overour prostrate bodies. Belzoni, worming himself through the subterraneanpassages of the Egyptian catacombs, could not have met with greaterimpediments than those we here encountered. But we struggled against themmanfully, well knowing our only hope lay in advancing.
Towards sunset we halted at a spot where we made preparations for passingthe night. Here we constructed a hut, in much the same way as before, andcrawling into it, endeavoured to forget our sufferings. My companion, Ibelieve, slept pretty soundly; but at daybreak, when we rolled out of ourdwelling, I felt nearly disqualified for any further efforts. Tobyprescribed as a remedy for my illness the contents of one of our littlesilk packages, to be taken at once in a single dose. To this species ofmedical treatment, however, I would by no means accede, much as heinsisted upon it; and so we partook of our usual morsel, and silentlyresumed our journey. It was the fourth day since we left Nukuheva, and thegnawings of hunger became painfully acute. We were fain to pacify them bychewing the tender bark of roots and twigs, which, if they did not affordus nourishment, were at least sweet and pleasant to the taste.
Our progress along the steep watercourse was necessarily slow, and by noonwe had not advanced more than a mile. It was somewhere near this part ofthe day that the noise of falling waters, which we had faintly caught inthe early morning, became more distinct; and it was not long before wewere arrested by a rocky precipice of nearly a hundred feet in depth, thatextended all across the channel, and over which the wild stream poured inan unbroken leap. On either hand the walls of the ravine presented theiroverhanging sides both above and below the fall, affording no meanswhatever of avoiding the cataract by taking a circuit round it.
"What's to be done now, Toby?" said I.
"Why," rejoined he, "as we cannot retreat, I suppose we must keep shovingalong."
"Very true, my dear Toby; but how do you purpose accomplishing thatdesirable object?"
"By jumping from the top of the fall, if there be no other way,"unhesitatingly replied my companion; "it will be much the quickest way ofdescent; but as you are not quite as active as I am, we will try someother way."
And so saying, he crept cautiously along and peered over into the abyss,while I remained wondering by what possible means we could overcome thisapparently insuperable obstruction. As soon as my companion had completedhis survey, I eagerly inquired the result.
"The result of my observations you wish to know, do you?" began Toby,deliberately, with one of his odd looks: "well, my lad, the result of myobservation is very quickly imparted. It is at present uncertain which ofour two necks will have the honour to be broken first; but about a hundredto one would be a fair bet in favour of the man who takes the first jump."
"Then it is an impossible thing, is it?" inquired I, gloomily.
"No, shipmate; on the contrary, it is the easiest thing in life: the onlyawkward point is the sort of usage which our unhappy limbs may receivewhen we arrive at the bottom, and what sort of travelling trim we shall bein afterwards. But follow me now, and I will show you the only chance wehave."
With this he conducted me to the verge of the cataract, and pointed alongthe side of the ravine to a number of curious-looking roots, some three orfour inches in thickness, and several feet long, which, after twistingamong the fissures of the rock, shot perpendicularly from it, and rantapering to a point in the air, hanging over the gulf like so many darkicicles. They covered nearly the entire surface of one side of the gorge,the lowest of them reaching even to the water. Many were moss-grown anddecayed, with their extremities snapped short off, and those in theimmediate vicinity of the fall were slippery with moisture.
Toby's scheme, and it was a desperate one, was to entrust ourselves tothese treacherous-looking roots, and by slipping down from one to anotherto gain the bottom.
"Are you ready to venture it?" asked Toby, looking at me earnestly, butwithout saying a word as to the practicability of the plan.
"I am," was my reply; for I saw it was our only resource if we wished toadvance, and as for retreating, all thoughts of that sort had been longabandoned.
After I had signified my assent, Toby, without uttering a single word,crawled along the dripping ledge until he gained a point from whence hecould just reach one of the largest of the pendant roots; he shook it--itquivered in his grasp, and when he let it go, it twanged in the air like astrong wire sharply struck. Satisfied by his scrutiny, my light-limbedcompanion swung himself nimbly upon it, and twisting his legs round it insailor fashion, slipped down eight or ten feet, where his weight gave it amotion not unlike that of a pendulum. He could not venture to descend anyfarther; so holding on with one hand, he with the other shook one by oneall the slender roots around him, and at last, finding one which hethought trustworthy, shifted himself to it and continued his downwardprogress.
So far so well; but I could not avoid comparing my heavier frame anddisabled condition with his light figure and remarkable activity: butthere was no help for it, and in less than a minute's time I was swingingdirectly over his head. As soon as his upturned eyes caught a glimpse ofme, he exclaimed in his usual dry tone, for the danger did not seem todaunt him in the least, "Mate, do me the kindness not to fall until I getout of your way"; and then swinging himself more on one side, he continuedhis descent. In the meantime, I cautiously transferred myself from thelimb down which I had been slipping to a couple of others that were nearit, deeming two strings to my bow better than one, and taking care to testtheir strength before I trusted my weight to them.
On arriving towards the end of the second stage in this vertical journey,and shaking the long roots which were round me, to my consternation theysnapped off one after another like so many pipe stems, and fell infragments against the side of the gulf, splashing at last into the watersbeneath.
As one after another the treacherous roots yielded to my grasp, and fellinto the torrent, my heart sunk within me. The branches on which I wassuspended over the yawning chasm swang to and fro in the air, and Iexpected them every moment to snap in twain. Appalled at the dreadful fatethat menaced me, I clutched frantically at the only large root whichremained near me; but in vain; I could not reach it, though my fingerswere within a few inches of it. Again and again I tried to reach it, untilat length, maddened with the thought of my situation, I swayed myselfviolently by striking my foot against the side of the rock, and at theinstant that I approached the large root caught desperately at it, andtransferred myself to i
t. It vibrated violently under the sudden weight,but fortunately did not give way.
My brain grew dizzy with the idea of the frightful risk I had just run,and I involuntarily closed my eyes to shut out the view of the depthbeneath me. For the instant I was safe, and I uttered a devout ejaculationof thanksgiving for my escape.
"Pretty well done," shouted Toby underneath me; "you are nimbler than Ithought you to be--hopping about up there from root to root like any youngsquirrel. As soon as you have diverted yourself sufficiently, I wouldadvise you to proceed."
"Ay, ay, Toby, all in good time: two or three more such famous roots asthis, and I shall be with you."
The residue of my downward progress was comparatively easy; the roots werein greater abundance, and in one or two places jutting out points of rockassisted me greatly. In a few moments I was standing by the side of mycompanion.
Substituting a stout stick for the one I had thrown aside at the top ofthe precipice, we now continued our course along the bed of the ravine.Soon we were saluted by a sound in advance, that grew by degrees louderand louder, as the noise of the cataract we were leaving behind graduallydied on our ears.
"Another precipice for us, Toby."
"Very good; we can descend them, you know--come on."
Nothing indeed appeared to depress or intimidate this intrepid fellow.Typee or Niagaras, he was as ready to engage one as the other, and I couldnot avoid a thousand times congratulating myself upon having such acompanion in an enterprise like the present.
After an hour's painful progress, we reached the verge of another fall,still loftier than the preceding, and flanked both above and below withthe same steep masses of rock, presenting, however, here and there narrowirregular ledges, supporting a shallow soil, on which grew a variety ofbushes and trees, whose bright verdure contrasted beautifully with thefoamy waters that flowed between them.
Toby, who invariably acted as pioneer, now proceeded to reconnoitre. Onhis return, he reported that the shelves of rock on our right would enableus to gain with little risk the bottom of the cataract. Accordingly,leaving the bed of the stream at the very point where it thundered down,we began crawling along one of these sloping ledges until it carried us towithin a few feet of another that inclined downward at a still sharperangle, and upon which, by assisting each other, we managed to alight insafety. We warily crept along this, steadying ourselves by the naked rootsof the shrubs that clung to every fissure. As we proceeded, the narrowpath became still more contracted, rendering it difficult for us tomaintain our footing, until suddenly, as we reached an angle of the wallof rock where we had expected it to widen, we perceived to ourconsternation, that a yard or two farther on it abruptly terminated at aplace we could not possibly hope to pass.
Toby, as usual, led the van, and in silence I waited to learn from him howhe proposed to extricate us from this new difficulty.
"Well, my boy," I exclaimed, after the expiration of several minutes,during which time my companion had not uttered a word: "what's to be donenow?"
He replied in a tranquil tone that probably the best thing we could do inthe present strait was to get out of it as soon as possible.
"Yes, my dear Toby, but tell me _how_ we are to get out of it."
"Something in this sort of style," he replied; and at the same moment, tomy horror, he slipped sideways off the rock, and, as I then thought, bygood fortune merely, alighted among the spreading branches of a species ofpalm tree, that shooting its hardy roots along a ledge below, curved itstrunk upwards into the air, and presented a thick mass of foliage abouttwenty feet below the spot where we had thus suddenly been brought to astand-still. I voluntarily held my breath, expecting to see the form of mycompanion, after being sustained for a moment by the branches of the tree,sink through their frail support, and fall headlong to the bottom. To mysurprise and joy, however, he recovered himself, and disentangling hislimbs from the fractured branches, he peered out from his leafy bed, andshouted lustily, "Come on, my hearty, there is no other alternative!" andwith this he ducked beneath the foliage, and slipping down the trunk,stood in a moment at least fifty feet beneath me, upon the broad shelf ofrock from which sprung the tree he had descended.
What would I not have given at that moment to have been by his side? Thefeat he had just accomplished seemed little less than miraculous, and Icould hardly credit the evidence of my senses when I saw the wide distancethat a single daring act had so suddenly placed between us.
Toby's animating "come on!" again sounded in my ears, and dreading to loseall confidence in myself if I remained meditating upon the step, I oncemore gazed down to assure myself of the relative bearing of the tree andmy own position, and then closing my eyes and uttering one comprehensiveejaculation of prayer, I inclined myself over towards the abyss, and afterone breathless instant fell with a crash into the tree, the branchessnapping and crackling with my weight, as I sunk lower and lower amongthem until I was stopped by coming in contact with a sturdy limb.
In a few moments I was standing at the foot of the tree, manipulatingmyself all over with a view of ascertaining the extent of the injuries Ihad received. To my surprise the only effects of my feat were a few slightcontusions too trifling to care about. The rest of our descent was easilyaccomplished, and in half an hour after regaining the ravine, we hadpartaken of our evening morsel, built our hut as usual, and crawled underits shelter.
The next morning, in spite of our debility and the agony of hunger underwhich we were now suffering, though neither of us confessed to the fact,we struggled along our dismal and still difficult and dangerous path,cheered by the hope of soon catching a glimpse of the valley before us,and towards evening the voice of a cataract which had for some timesounded like a low deep bass to the music of the smaller waterfalls, brokeupon our ears in still louder tones, and assured us that we wereapproaching its vicinity.
That evening we stood on the brink of a precipice, over which the darkstream bounded in one final leap of full 300 feet. The sheer descentterminated in the region we so long had sought. On either side of thefall, two lofty and perpendicular bluffs buttressed the sides of theenormous cliff, and projected into the sea of verdure with which thevalley waved, and a range of similar projecting eminences stood disposedin a half circle about the head of the vale. A thick canopy of trees hungover the very verge of the fall, leaving an arched aperture for thepassage of the waters, which imparted a strange picturesqueness to thescene.
The valley was now before us; but instead of being conducted into itssmiling bosom by the gradual descent of the deep watercourse we had thusfar pursued, all our labours now appeared to have been rendered futile byits abrupt termination. But, bitterly disappointed, we did not entirelydespair.
As it was now near sunset we determined to pass the night where we wereand on the morrow, refreshed by sleep, and by eating at one meal all ourstock of food, to accomplish a descent into the valley, or perish in theattempt.
We laid ourselves down that night on a spot, the recollection of whichstill makes me shudder. A small table of rock which projected over theprecipice on one side of the stream, and was drenched by the spray of thefall, sustained a huge trunk of a tree which must have been depositedthere by some heavy freshet. It lay obliquely, with one end resting on therock and the other supported by the side of the ravine. Against it weplaced in a sloping direction a number of the half-decayed boughs thatwere strewn about, and covering the whole with twigs and leaves, awaitedthe morning's light beneath such shelter as it afforded.
During the whole of this night the continual roaring of the cataract--thedismal moaning of the gale through the trees--the pattering of the rain,and the profound darkness, affected my spirits to a degree which nothinghad ever before produced. Wet, half-famished, and chilled to the heartwith the dampness of the place, and nearly wild with the pain I endured, Ifairly cowered down to the earth under this multiplication of hardships,and abandoned myself to frightful anticipations of evil; and my companion,whose spirit at last was a good
deal broken, scarcely uttered a wordduring the whole night.
At length the day dawned upon us, and rising from our miserable pallet, westretched our stiffened joints, and after eating all that remained of ourbread, prepared for the last stage of our journey.
I will not recount every hairbreadth escape, and every fearful difficultythat occurred before we succeeded in reaching the bosom of the valley. AsI have already described similar scenes, it will be sufficient to say thatat length, after great toil and great dangers, we both stood with no limbsbroken at the head of that magnificent vale which five days before had sosuddenly burst upon my sight, and almost beneath the shadow of those verycliffs from whose summits we had gazed upon the prospect.