The top of the flood now poured into the mouth of the newly dug
trench, biting huge mouthfuls of earth from its sides in its rush;
spreading the reddish water fan-like over the down-stream slope:
first into gullies; then a broad sluiceway that sunk out of sight
in the soft earth; then crumblings, slidings of tons of sand and
gravel, with here and there a bowlder washed clean; the men
working like beavers,--here to free a rock, there to drive home a
plank, the trench all the while deepening, widening--now a gulch
ten feet across and as deep, now a canon through which surged a
solid mass of frenzied water.
With the completion of the first row of planking MacFarlane took
up a position where he could overlook all parts of the work. Every
now and then his eyes would rest on a water-gauge which he had
improvised from the handle of a pick; the rise and fall of the wet
mark showing him both the danger and the safety lines. He seemed
the least interested man in the group. Once in a while he would
consult his watch, counting the seconds, only to return to the
gauge.
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