d never ventured to penetrate.

"Well, I must see her," exclaimed Bunce. "I a'n't afraid, 'cause you
see, Mr. Williams--Chub, I mean, it's only justice, and to save the poor
young gentleman's life. I'm sure I oughtn't to be afraid, and no more I
a'n't. Won't you go there with me, Chub?"

"Can't think of it, strannger. Guy is a dark man, and mother said I must
keep away when he rode in the woods. Guy don't talk--he shoots."

The pedler made sundry efforts to procure a companion for his adventure;
but finding it vain, and determined to do right, he grew more resolute
with the necessity, and, contenting himself with claiming the guidance
of Chub, he went boldly on the path. Having reached a certain point in
the woods, after a very circuitous departure from the main track, the
guide pointed out to the pedler a long and rude ledge of rocks, so rude,
so wild, that none could have ever conjectured to find them the abode of
anything but the serpent and the wolf. But there, according to the
idiot, was Lucy Munro concealed. Chub gave the pedler his directions,
then alighting from his nag, which he concealed in a clump of
neighboring brush, hastily and with the agility of a monkey ran up a
neighboring tree which overhung the prospect.

Bunce, left alone, grew somewhat staggered with his fears. He now
half-repented of the self-imposed adventure; wondered at his own rash
humanity, and might perhaps have utterly forborne the trial, but for a
single consideration. His pride was concerned, that the deformed Chub
should not have occasion to laugh at his weakness. Descending,
therefore, from his horse, he fastened him to the hanging branch of a
neighboring tree, and with something of desperate defiance in his
manner, resolutely advanced to the silent and forbidding mass of rocks,
which rose up so sullenly around him. In another moment, and he was lost
to sight in the gloomy shadow of the entrance-passage pointed out to him
by the half-witted, but not altogether ignorant dwarf.

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE ROCK CASTLE OF THE ROBBERS.

But the preparations of Bunce had been foreseen and provided for by
those most deeply interested in his progress; and scarcely had the
worthy tradesman effected his entrance fairly into the forbidden
territory, when he felt himself grappled from behind. He struggled with
an energy, due as much to the sudden terror as to any exercise of the
free will; but he struggled in vain. The arms that were fastene