s as theirs, and, if we had our rights, it would be ours. I
shall go, in spite of all the Darleys in the county. Who are they?
Piece of rock and moor like that, and they claim it. Let them. I shall
not stop away for them."

The boy flushed, and ignoring the fact that he was about to commit a
trespass, he slipped off shoes and hose, waded straight across the
shallow river, and sat down on the other side to dry his feet, and put
on hose and shoes again.

And all the time he felt a strong desire to glance up and down the
river, to see if he had been observed by any one; but in his pride of
heart he would not, for fear that he would be seen watching, and some
one connected with his family's enemies take it for a sign of fear.

This done, he rose, gave his feet a stamp, glanced up at the face of the
cliff, to see one of the parent ravens fly off, uttering an angry croak;
and then he began to bear off to the right, so as to ascend the low part
of the cliff, reaching the top quite five hundred yards away, and
turning at once to continue his ascent by walking along the edge, which
rose steeply, till it reached the point above the raven's nest, and then
sloped down into a hollow, to rise once more into the wooded eminence
which was crowned by Cliff Castle, the Darleys' home.

"They've a deal better place than we," said Mark to himself, as he
strode on, in full defiance of the possibility of being seen, though it
was hardly likely, a great patch of mighty beech-trees, mingled with
firs, lying between the top of the big cliff and the Darleys' dwelling.
"More trees, and facing toward the west and south, with the river below
them, while our home is treeless and bare, and looks to the north and
east, and is often covered with snow when their side's sunny and bright.
My word! warm work, climbing up here, and the grass is as slippery as
if it had been polished. Mustn't go over. Father wouldn't like it if I
were to be killed; but I shouldn't be, for I should come down in the
tree-tops, and then fall from bough to bough into the river, and it's
deep just under the raven's nest."

Thinking this, he went on, up and up, cautiously, clear of head as one
who had from childhood played about the cliffs, and reaching the summit
breathless, to stand on the extreme verge, watching one of the ravens,
which came sailing up, saw him at a distance, rose above his head, and
then began to circle round, uttering hoarse cries.

"Ah, thief!" cr