[Illustration: THE _Maid of the Mist_ IN THE WHIRLPOOL]
Thus was accomplished one of the most remarkable and perilous voyages ever made by men. The boat was seventy-two feet long, with seventeen feet breadth of beam and eight feet depth of hold, and carried an engine of one hundred horse-power. In conversation with Robinson after the voyage, he stated that the greater part of it was like what he had always imagined must be the swift sailing of a large bird in a downward flight; that when the accident occurred the boat seemed to be struck from all directions at once; that she trembled like a fiddle-string, and felt as if she would crumble away and drop into atoms; that both he and McIntyre were holding to the wheel with all their strength, but produced no more effect than they would if they had been two flies; that he had no fear of striking the rocks, for he knew that the strongest suction must be in the deepest channel, and that the boat must remain in that. Finding that McIntyre was somewhat bewildered by excitement or by his fall, as he rolled up by his side but did not rise, he quietly put his foot on his breast, to keep him from rolling around the deck, and thus finished the voyage.
Poor Jones, imprisoned beneath the hatches before the glowing furnace, went down on his knees, as he related afterward, and although a more earnest prayer was never uttered and few that were shorter, still it seemed to him prodigiously long. To that prayer he thought they owed their salvation.
The effect of this trip upon Robinson was decidedly marked. As he lived only a few years afterward, his death was commonly attributed to it. But this was incorrect, since the disease which terminated his life was contracted at New Orleans at a later day. "He was," said Mrs. Robinson to the writer, "twenty years older when he came home that day than when he went out." He sank into his chair like a person overcome with weariness. He decided to abandon the water, and advised his sons to venture no more about the rapids. Both his manner and appearance were changed. Calm and deliberate before, he became thoughtful and serious afterward. He had been borne, as it were, in the arms of a power so mighty that its impress was stamped on his features and on his mind. Through a slightly opened door he had seen a vision which awed and subdued him. He became reverent in a moment. He grew venerable in an hour.