Page:Recollections of My Boyhood.djvu/54

Rh for a few seconds, the boat was swallowed up in the roaring vortex. The boat came up presently and all the crew except Warren Applegate, succeeded in getting into it, but very soon after it was caught by another whirlpool and swallowed up again, to be seen no more. The last time the boat went down, end foremost, the boy Elisha, as it descended, climbed to the upper end and leaped as far as he could, to avoid being taken down with the boat. Towards the south shore, some distance below where the boat went down, there was what some spoke of as a rock island, a lava rock, which stood table-like from five to ten feet above the water, very rough and broken in appearance, and in area probably a quarter of an acre. This island rock was connected with the south shore by a very narrow causeway of rock, and the north side of the island seems to have been hollow so that a part of the river flowed into it.

When Elisha rose to the surface, he discovered that he had one foot thrust into a pocket of his coat and while extricating it, sank and rolled in the water until he was almost exhausted; hut as soon as his feet were free he struck out boldly for the upper point or head of the rock island, avoiding the force of the waves which came meeting him by diving under them.

William Parker, soon after escaping from the whirlpool, took hold of a feather bedtick floating near him, and being a strong swimmer, guided it towards the head of the island. It chanced that Elisha overtook Parker when near the shore, and taking hold of the tick they both together succeeded in reaching the island, from which they with great difficulty, being very weak, followed the narrow causeway of rock to the main land.

The boy Warren was never seen nor heard of after the boat went down the first time. The old man McClellan was seen the last time trying to reach the head of the island where Parker and young Applegate were. He had placed the boy Edward on a couple of oars, and carrying him this way, was trying to reach the shore, but being hampered with a heavy coat and boots, falling a little short of the point he attempted to reach, the old man and boy disappeared under projecting cliffs and were seen no more. The brave old soldier could have