But this was a great wall, starting up no one knew where, swelled by the streams, expanded by the Missouri, sweeping all before it, submerging Gaboret Island, gathering momentum every moment, swirling at every point and curve, as if longing to beat them out of existence, and with an accumulation of uprooted trees so jammed together that many of them stood upright, a great army of devastation. The current was very swift in any freshet. Although it was called the great river, that applied more to its length, for here it was not much over two thousand feet wide. But it was deep, with a dangerous power when it rose in its might, and fed by so many streams and tributaries that the _débris_ was constantly washing down to the gulf at its numerous mouths. They gazed in speechless terror at first, as if they would be helpless in the grasp of such a giant, and the roar was appalling. The spray seemed dashed up in the very face of heaven; the rending, tearing and crushing was terrific. The very trees shrieked as they were torn from their foundation. On it rushed, a great, dark, fierce wall, sweeping everything in its way, tearing out banks, booming like the roar of artillery, shrieking with madness, as if hundreds of people were crying out for help and safety. The crowd looked at each other in dismay. Some fled to the next higher range, many sank helplessly to the ground, others were on their knees praying. And when it struck the little town it seemed like a mighty earthquake, and the ground fairly shuddered as it rushed by furiously. The boats that had been drawn up to a safe line, as was thought, were swept off to join the mad, careering mass and add to the rending, deafening sound. And when the first accumulation had swept by and was whirling around the bend of the river another and still another followed. Was the whole north going to be precipitated upon them? The curve in the river did the town this much good: it swept the fierce current to the eastern side, tore out, submerged, and by the time it turned it was below the town. They were not to be swept quite away, and some of the braver ones began to take courage and ventured to look at the levee below. That was gone, of course. It was a day and a night of terror. The flood had submerged a part of the Rue Royale and some of the residents had moved their belongings to higher ground. Trading houses had been emptied of their goods. Gaspard Denys shrugged his shoulders with intense satisfaction. Up here past the Rue de l’Eglise all was safe and dry. For days there seemed a spell upon the people. They could do little besides watch the receding river and view the wreckage it had left in its wake. Great caves and indentations on the opposite shore, bare spaces where trees had waved their long green arms joyously in the sunshine a few days ago. Yet they found they had not fared so badly. Everybody turned out to help repair damages.