--"Something or other has interposed to prevent his falling lower.
He spoke, and told me so--Oh! for mercy's sake make haste, and you may
yet preserve his life."

"What a horrible situation!" exclaimed the old gentleman; "but no time
must be lost in talking about it, or inquiring into the why or the
wherefore. So here you, Timothy, John Clarke, Harris, Tom Carpenter, run
for your lives, every man Jack of you to the farm, where you'll find
plenty rope;--and here, miners, my dear men--do you bestir
yourselves--succeed or not, I'll pay you well. Could any thing be more
fortunate?" continued the old gentleman, soliloquising to
himself--"could any thing be more fortunate than our show of fire-works
bringing all the miners of the parish about our ears; the very best
hands in the world, from woeful experience in like matters, to render
aid in an accident of this kind."

No one required to be told a second time; and almost ere the words were
out of the worthy squire's mouth, every body had dispersed here and
there to procure ropes, and whatever might be required; all of which
were collected with a celerity almost incredible; and then off started
plenty of able and willing hands, all in eager haste to accomplish the
charitable object they were bent upon.

And now we must return to poor Vernon Wycherley, whom we left pent up in
a narrow dungeon many feet beneath the surface, enveloped in darkness,
and with difficulty sustaining an irksome and even painful position, by
keeping his body jammed across, and, as it were, forming a kind of
bridge over this awful chasm; whilst the loose soil, upon whose unstable
foundation his only chance of safety depended, gradually crumbling away,
kept his attention unceasingly alive to the certain fate that awaited
him when unable longer to retain his hold; the horrors of which were
still further augmented by the deafening din that thundered forth as
each detached mass reached the water far, far below. Few men, indeed,
could have sustained a sufficient degree of self-possession to have held
on a minute under such trying circumstances; but our tall young hero was
possessed of that true kind of courage, which, though disinclined to
seek out danger for mere danger's sake, is never daunted by its
approach, however fearful or unexpected it may be; and thus he was
enabled to await his impending fate with calm resignation. Strange, too,
as it may appear, his thoughts, notwithstanding his appalling situat