rogress to be made in that direction. In fact, so dangerous
did it seem, that, as Kenneth quickly lowered himself over the
precipice, Max, by an involuntary movement, started forward and made a
clutch at his arm.

"Here! what are you doing?" cried Kenneth. "It's all right. Now then,
I'm here. Lower yourself over. Lay hold of that bit of stone. I'll
guide your feet. There's plenty of room here."

Max drew a long, catching breath, and his first thought was to run back
to the house.

"Make haste!" cried Kenneth from somewhere below; and Max went down on
his hands and knees to creep to the edge and look over, and see that the
rock projected over a broad shelf, upon which the young Scot was
standing looking up.

"Oh, I say, you are a rum chap!" cried Kenneth, laughing. "Legs first,
same as I did; not your head."

"But is it safe--for me?"

"Safe? Why, of course, unless you can pull the rock down on top of you.
Come along."

"I will do it! I will do it!" muttered Max through his set teeth, as he
drew back, ghastly pale, and with a wild look in his eyes. Then,
turning, and lowering his legs over the edge, he clung spasmodically to
a projection which offered its help.

"That's the way. I've got you. Let go."

For a few moments Max dared not let go. He felt that if he did he
should fall headlong seventy or eighty feet into the rock-strewn sea;
but, as he hesitated, Kenneth gave him a jerk, his hold gave way, and
the next moment, in an agony of horror, he fell full twenty inches--on
his feet, and found himself upon the broad shelf, with the crag
projecting above his head and the glittering sea below.

"You'll come down here like a grasshopper next time," cried Kenneth.
"Now then, after me. There's nothing to mind so long as you don't slip.
I'll show you."

He began to descend from shelf to shelf, where the rock had been blasted
away so as to form a flight of the roughest of rough steps of monstrous
size, while, trembling in every limb, Max followed.

"My grandfather had this done so that he could reach the cavern. Before
that it was all like a wall here, and nobody could get up and down.
Why, you can climb as well as I can, only you pretend that you can't."

Max said nothing, but kept on cautiously descending till he stood upon a
broad patch of barnacle-crusted rock, beside what looked like a great
rough Gothic archway, forming the entrance to a cave whose floor was the
sea, but alongside which th