Waterbury evening Democrat., 1894-01-17


telligence the manner of getting rid of me-
With quaking limbs and the worst fore
bodings fell into line at the bidding of the
captain, and we struck, single file, into
a craggy path, at its best no broader than a
sheep run in the highlands and in places so
narrow as scarcely to afford foothold for a
weasel. Looking upward from the bottom
one could not imagine how it scaled the
darkening precipices that frowned upon US
in vast swellings and outings with the saw
age, solitary pride of the inaccessible If the
ascent did not prove utterly impossible, it
was because every man of us had the feet
of a goat and the sinews and agility of a
monkey.
Our ribbon of path wound in crazy coil.
ings and twistings, now rising vertically in
steps higher than our heads, now dropping
treacherously at a critical point, ceasing
suddenly and again appearing beyond some
perilous projection that a channels would
hardly have attempted to pass. Often we
had to go ON our hands and knees, scraping
with toes and clutching with finger nails
as we crawled over some slippery mass,
like ants on the polished knob of glacier,
or scrambled up Jagged rock, the point of
which cut and rent like sharpened fiints, or
slid down, face inward, twice our own
length to scarcely perceptible crevice,
was a hunter and knew what it was to
tread dizzy ways. had followed the fox
to his lair when the hounds had turned
tail and robbed the eagles eyrie when the
hardest of my companions stood holding
his breath in awe. But the self possession
and free spirit of audacity which prompted
to such hazards and gave them relish were
utterly gone. To speak the truth shiv-
cred like one suddenly taken with an ague
1t was not the terror of the place alone
that appalled, me. To go leaping and
scrambling on hair line along the brink of
a tumbling, kissing gulf that sent the
spumes of it's wrath high up in clouds, with
no outlook or hope of escape, was indeed
disconcerting enough, yet scarcely of itself
sufficient to take the heart out of n born
mountaineer. The tremors and shakings,
the alternate spasms of heat and cold, were
duel trust it is not cowardly to confess
it-not to the threatenings of cliff and
chasm, but to the hostile weapons that
cleaned in front and rear and might at
any moment be dyed in my blood.
How easy it would be to prod me there
and send me topping mortally wounded
into the abyss, to be ground as between
millstones at the bottom! A sudden stab
in the back, push, a giddy, headlong fall,
and the deed would be done, and no word
of it need ever get to the outside world
More than once, as my mind dwelt on this
l chung to the rocks shuddering like u child
in mortal fright. The grewsomeness of the
situation was enhanced, too, by the eerie
shadow of light. Here and there buttress
and jutting promontory flushed into rose
and shone in gold and amethyst, but these
points of radiance only gave hideous
emphasis to the prevailing gloom of the
gorge. They were like the CHASTITY mock
cries of a world l had once known, but
was never to know again.
/ am no judge of how long or how far
we had struggled when upon turning a
sharp angle we came upon an open space, or
circular ledge of the dimensions of a small
room. Here we stopped, our sides heaving
like the TANKS of a spent hound, and the
best of US glad to breathe himself.
Whether by accident or the unsupported
design of those about me, stood on the
outer rim, the very edge of the wall that
fell so fathoms sheer, the surging, unsound-
ed depths beneath. Under that unaccount-
able species of fascination which lures
man to gaze on the horrible and awful, l
bent forward and looked into the black pit
at my feet. With a swimming head drew
back to feel myself seized roughly from
behind. An icy sensation thrilled through
me, l gave great gasp, ana my knees
knocked violently together. The fearful
moment had been anticipating had come.
They bandaged my eyes and bound my
hands to my sides, and thus made helpless,
left me standing. l shut my lips tight and
my eyes also, although they were covered,
and awaited the fatal thrust and giddy
whirl into space. Not word was spoken.
I heard the rustic of garments and the rat
tie of arms, and away below the sullen,
mutfled voice of the sea, but other sound
there was none. The i'll boding silence was
more terrifying than the menacing tongues
of hundred enemies. 1t was the very ex-
tremity of torture to have my captors make
their arrangements for disposing of me
with such stealthy secrecy.
In the crowd1ng fears and agitations the
idea flashed upon me that they meant not
only to Stay but to torture me. l thought
of all had read about living men being
hayed and cut into bits by savages, and my
flesh crept and shrank as if at the touch of
the knife. 1t was only by keeping teeth
and lips clinched that l managed to hold
from venting my agony in shrieks.
To my great establishment and unutter-
able relief, the procession began to move on
again, being given the muzzle of a mus
ket to direct my steps. Bruised, cut, bleed