| Show AT THE MERCy OF A CATARACT Perilous Adventure of nn Acrobat Under the Niagara Full I was pretty near heaven for half an hour said H C Prentice the acrobat Acrobat Prentices remark just quoted was the prelude to the story he quote the Buffalo Express reporter of his adven tures while viewing Niagara falls for fals the first time Mr Prentice Prentce and Thomas Adamson went to the falls and they tried to keep together as they went from point to point vIewing all the famous spots about tho cataract They spent an hour or so in viewing the falls from above and then they put on rubber suits rbber and started below They went down the ale vator and then down the stairway to ele rocks After a time they concluded that they had seen all that conclude seen below and were the upon wee point of re turning when Prentice told Adamson r gO and ask ono of the guides if there wero anything else to be seen down there Mr Adamson turned about and went to hunt for the guide He was gone about five minutes and when he came back his friend Prentice was miss ing Adamson was puzzled at the disap pearance of Prentice Adamson had spent about half an hour looking for Prentice when the news reached him that his companion had been found down between be-tween the rocks up to his neck in the water In a few minutes after this news reached Adamson he was joined by Prentice who told of his experiences after af-ter Adamson had left expence for the guide Mr Prentice said that after Adamson turned back he thought he would walk down Into a gully between the rocks I noticed that it was comparatively dry there He was therefore considerably surprised soon after he got down into I tho gully to have a stream of water two feet deep and moving with great violence strike him in the back of the I legs The stream was so strong that it staggered him and to avoid being swept from his feet and carried on into tho river he crouched down in an angle of one of the rocks with his bat to the torrent and braced himself to resist the power of the stream that had cut off his line of retreat He had hold of the edge of the rock with his hands and he did not dare to let go for fear the current cur-rent would sweep him out from behind the angle He yelled for help but the noise of the water drowned his cries cres At one time he looked over the edge of the rock and saw the Maid of the Mist I 100 feet away In the river He shook his I head hoping that the passengers on the little boat would notice the motion but no one saw him After he crouched down behind the rock the water washed over his body up to his neck He was on the point of giving giv-ing up when a stranger who had also come down to the rocks saw him and notified no-tified the guides Prentice was hauled out with a pole The stream of water that surprised him came from a mill I race that is closed part of the time |
