In fact, it is _not_ made, farther than that the trees and undergrowth have been cut away sufficiently to admit of the passage of a vehicle—if passage it can be called when the wheels graze the trunks of trees that line the way, when the turns are so abrupt that only the most careful driving could save any wheeled conveyance from an overturn, and only the best of springs stand the constant jolting over stumps, and roots, and stones. Presently we reach a point where the wagon must be left, and where the equestrians are told to dismount. “The mountain behind Paint Rock was child’s-play to that!” says Mrs. Cardigan, addressing Sylvia, and pointing to the height over which we have to climb before we can obtain a glimpse of the falls. “Not exactly child’s-play—only good training,” answers Sylvia, taking off the water-proof which served her as a riding-skirt and throwing it over her saddle. Certainly Charley was right. Nothing which we have been called upon to undertake before can equal this which we attempt now. Of the nearly perpendicular ascent over rocks and through dense undergrowth, language fails me to speak. Now and then—breathless with climbing, disordered in attire—we pause and ask each other if anything that may be in store for us can possibly repay us for such an exertion. It is the highest possible tribute to the falls that we answer this question unhesitatingly in the affirmative when we finally reach the point from which their beauty fully bursts upon us. A stream of flashing silver, of white foam and misty spray, leaps in successive cascades through a world of green foliage, over massive walls of rock, down a mountain gorge hundreds of feet in depth, and, not content with this journey from the clouds, tumbles, whirls, and surges over the rocks as it pours through the ravine. The magnificence of the scene almost takes away our breath, and hushes all terms of admiration on our lips. There are no words which would not sound trivial and impertinent with the thunder of the cataract in our ears and its tumultuous splendor before our eyes. We looked for nothing half so beautiful, half so majestic in its beauty, as this, and we feel as if we had wandered carelessly into a sanctuary. All around tower the mountains, clothed to their crests with virgin forest. Far up—where the green line of trees meets the blue of the overarching sky—we catch the first silvery gleam of the water as it plunges downward, and we mark it leap from point to point, over crags, and precipices, and masses of rock, until it reaches the place where we stand. “The height of the entire fall is seven hundred feet,” says Eric, when he thinks that we are all as much impressed as can be desired. “And the Veil yonder—that lovely cascade about midway—is one hundred and fifty.” “Can one go behind that Veil?” asks Mrs. Cardigan, with a mischievous glance at Sylvia.