in a larger and less irregular
stone-case, adorned with heads and horns and skins of animals. Crossing
this, the man opened a door covered with red cloth, which looked
strange in the midst of the cold hard stone, and Donal entered an
octagonal space, its doors of dark shining oak, with carved stone
lintels and doorposts, and its walls adorned with arms and armour
almost to the domed ceiling. Into it, as if it descended suddenly out
of some far height, but dropping at last like a gently alighting bird,
came the end of a turnpike-stair, of slow sweep and enormous
diameter--such a stair as in wildest gothic tale he had never imagined.
Like the revolving centre of a huge shell, it went up out of sight,
with plain promise of endless convolutions beyond. It was of ancient
stone, but not worn as would have been a narrow stair. A great rope of
silk, a modern addition, ran up along the wall for a hand-rail; and
with slow-moving withered hand upon it, up the glorious ascent climbed
the serving man, suggesting to Donal's eye the crawling of an insect,
to his heart the redemption of the sons of God.

With the stair yet ascending above them as if it would never stop, the
man paused upon a step no broader than the rest, and opening a door in
the round of the well, said, "Mr. Grant, my lord," and stood aside for
Donal to enter.

He found himself in the presence of a tall, bowed man, with a
large-featured white face, thin and worn, and a deep-sunken eye that
gleamed with an unhealthy life. His hair was thin, but covered his
head, and was only streaked with gray. His hands were long and thin
and white; his feet in large shoes, looking the larger that they came
out from narrow trousers, which were of shepherd-tartan. His coat was
of light-blue, with a high collar of velvet, and much too wide for him.
A black silk neckerchief tied carelessly about his throat, and a
waistcoat of pineapple shawl-stuff, completed his dress. On one long
little finger shone a stone which Donal took for an emerald. He
motioned his visitor to a seat, and went on writing, with a rudeness
more like that of a successful contractor than a nobleman. But it gave
Donal the advantage of becoming a little accustomed to his
surroundings. The room was not large, was wainscoted, and had a good
many things on the walls: Donal noted two or three riding whips, a
fishing rod, several pairs of spurs, a sword with golden hilt, a
strange looking dagger like a flame of