It was too late to think of getting out of the tangle then; the water behind was heavy with trailing silks and flowers.

We were jammed together almost like one huge float and in that latter fact lay my one chance.
On the left was a low ledge of rocks leading back to the narrow beach already mentioned, and the ledge came out to within a few feet of where the outmost boat on that side would pass it.

It was the only chance and a poor one, but already the first rank of my fleet was trembling on the brink, and without stopping to weigh matters I bounded off my own canoe on to the raft alongside, which rocked with my weight like a tea-tray.

From that I leapt, with such hearty good-will as I had never had before, on to a second and third.

I jumped from the footstool of one Martian to the knee of another, steadying myself by a free use of their nodding heads as I passed.