plunging downward, to drown in the deep, black water, or be
mutilated by the rocks amidst which the waters foamed.

But "familiarity breeds contempt," says one proverb, "use is second
nature" another, and there was nothing that appeared terrible to the
boy, who walked quickly along close to the edge, glancing perhaps at its
fellow, in some cases only a few yards away, and looking so exactly the
counterpart of that on the near side that it seemed as if only another
convulsion of nature was needed to compress and join the crack again so
that it would be possible to walk where death was now lurking.

But there was nothing horrible there to Aleck who in every case turned
inland to skirt the chasm, gazing down with interest the while at the
nesting-places of the sea-birds which covered nearly every ledge, each
one being alive with screaming, clamouring, hungry young, straining
their necks to meet the swift-winged auks and puffins that darted to and
fro with newly-captured fish in their bills.

Aleck had left the whitewashed cottages behind, along with the last
traces of busy human life in the shape of boat, rope, spar, lobster-pot,
and net, to reach one of the most rugged and inaccessible parts of the
rocky cliffs--a spot all jagged, piled-up rift with the corresponding
hollows--and at last selected a place which looked like the beginning of
one of the chasms where Nature had commenced a huge gaping crack a good
hundred feet in depth, though its darkened wedge-shaped bottom was still
quite a hundred feet above where the waves swayed in and out at the
bottom, of the cliff. The sides here were not perpendicular, but with
just sufficient slope to allow an experienced, cool-headed cliff-climber
to descend from ledge to ledge and rock to rock till a nook could be
reached, where, securely perched, one who loved cliff-scanning and the
beauties of the ever-changing sea and shore, could sit and enjoy the
wild wonders of the place.

The spot was exactly suited to Aleck's taste; and as old practice and
acquaintance with the coast had made giddiness a trouble he never felt,
he was not long in lowering himself down to this coign of vantage. Here
he perched himself with a sigh of satisfaction, and watched for a time
the great white-breasted gulls which floated down to gaze with curious
watchful eyes at the intruder upon their wild domain. The puffins kept
darting down from the ledges, with beaks pointed, web feet stretched out
behi