ndeed! At sight of them her heart was in a sort of
tumult very different from any it had experienced for long. She eagerly
entered the first, and drew deep breath as the thunder of the waters and
the echoes together almost confounded her senses. At the lowest tides
there was some depth of water below, in a winding central channel. In
the evening how black that channel must be! how solemn the whole place!
Now the low sun was shining in, lighting up every point, and disclosing
all the hollows, and just catching a ripple now and then, which, in its
turn, made a ripple of light on the roof; and, far in, there was an
opening--a gaping chink in the side of the cave--which gave admission to
a second rocky chamber.

Lady Carse was bent on reaching this opening; and did so, at last. She
could not cross the clear deep water in the channel below her. It was
just too wide for a safe leap. But she found a footing over the rocks
which confined it; and on she went--now ascending, now descending almost
to the water--amidst dancing lights and rising and falling echoes; on
she went, her heart throbbing, her spirits cheered--her whole soul full
of a joy which she had not experienced for long. She stepped over the
little chasm to which the waters narrowed at last, and, reaching the
opening thrust herself through it.

She seemed to have left light and sound behind her. Dim, cool, and
almost silent was the cavern she now stood in. Its floor was thickly
strewn with fine sand, conveying the sensation that her own footsteps
were not to be heard. Black pillars of rock rose from a still pool
which lay in her way, and which she perceived only just in time to
prevent her stepping into it. These pillars and other dark masses of
rock sprang up and up till her eye lost them in the darkness; and if
there was a roof, she could not see it. A drip from above made a plash
about once in a minute in the pool; and the murmur from without was so
subdued--appeared to be so swallowed up in vastness and gloom--that the
minute drop was loud in comparison. Lady Carse lay down on the soft
sand, to rest, and listen, and think--to ponder plans of hiding and
escape. All her meditations brought her round to the same point: that
three things were necessary to any plan of escape--a supply of food, a
boat, and an accomplice. She arose, chilled and hungry, determined to
try whether she could not meet with one or all of these this very day.

As she slowly p