MARTIN RATTLER. 219

Perplexed and wearied with unavailing thought
and anxiety, Martin pressed his hands to his forehead
and gazed down the perpendicular cliff, which was
_ elevated fully a hundred feet above the plain below.
Suddenly he started, and clasped his hands upon his
eyes, as if to shut out some terrible object from his
sight. Then, creeping cautiously towards the edge of
the cliff, he gazed down, while an expression of stern
resolution settled upon his pale face.

And well might Martin’s cheek blanch, for he had
hit upon a plan of escape which, to be successful,
required that he should twice turn a bold, unflinching
face on death. The precipice, as before mentioned,
was fully a hundred feet high, and quite perpendicular.
At the foot of it there flowed a deep and pretty wide
stream, which, just under the spot where Martin stood,
collected in a deep black pool, where it rested for a
moment ere it rushed on its rapid course down the
valley. Over the cliff and into that pool Martin
made up his mind to plunge, and so give the impression
that he had fallen over and been drowned. The risk
he ran in taking such a tremendous leap was very
great indeed, but that was only half the danger he
must encounter.

The river was one of a remarkable kind, of which

there are one or two instances in South America.