They now ran down a short distance in the daytime, tied up, and hid in a field. A man and boy saw their boat, and were about to take it, when the adventurers, unwilling to be done by as they had done, and confident in their story, came out and stopped the proceeding. They asserted that it was a government boat, and that they belonged to a regiment in Chattanooga, which place they learned was only five miles away. The man invited them to his house to wait the lulling of the storm. They accepted, and after nightfall pushed off again, passing Chattanooga, which they had so long dreaded, in safety. They were now almost jubilant, but soon found that everything was not smooth sailing. I presume the storm, which had been so disagreeable, had also been a shelter, and that without it they might not have got by the rebel headquarters so easily. There is a deep gorge a few miles below the city, where the mountains rise abruptly from the water in frowning grandeur. The river is greatly narrowed, and, suddenly bending to the left, dashes its furious current against a wall of rock, and forms a foaming eddy. Our two navigators "perceived even in the darkness that there was danger ahead. The great roar and noise caused by the dashing of the angry waters against the rocks warned us. We hugged the left hand with our little boat as closely as possible. As we passed the angry whirlpool, into which we seemed to be drifting, our boat was struck a tremendous blow by a floating log. We thought we were all dashed to pieces. The blow hoisted us away, however, several yards to the left, and we went flying down the gorge like the wind. We were afterwards told that a number of adventurous persons had, at different times, lost their lives in trying to run down this place by getting swamped in this great torrent or whirlpool, and it was no doubt owing to the blow we received from the floating log, by which our boat was knocked just beyond the reach of danger, that we escaped as fortunately as we did. It was a providential blow for us, though it had well nigh crushed our boat. We pulled at our paddles with might and main to keep the water from swamping our boat, which sank pretty low in the current and was now going at railroad speed. We soon reached smoother water, and again felt ourselves safe." A man on the bank warned them not to try to run through the "suck," a worse place than that which they had just passed. With much urging, and the promise of three dollars reward, they got him to agree to pilot them through. He was a skilful boatman, and took them in safety, though their boat was nearly filled with water.