The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-07-15

and the sense of Imprisonment, while
along the water, and for hundreds of feet
above, II was already becoming dark.
shall we sleep this night, Freda32 I
finally timidly inquired.
Greatly she answered with a little
gurgle OF laughter, and instantly turned
tne boat Prov squarely beneath the
nearly a mile of solid stone above our
heads.
The place into which Freda had guided
our boat was practically a vertical assure
thousands OF feet high. and perhaps as
deep below the waters surface. One
edge was like rounded pillar for all its
mighty hight. The other, correspond
lngly followed, followed il to the clouds.
But in behind the narrow opening where
sight could not penetrate were whispers,
murmurs and the hoarse callings of fall
ing waters.
Not fifty feet from the entrance. our
boat grated against a shelving rock.
Above 1t, through some strange action of
tne nature forces in previous centuries,
the wall had given way, or been eaten
away, forming covered hollow like half
OF truncated cone. Caverns like this
have been in use as resting places for the
night by the peasantry, in their journey
iugs over their national highways. the
lords, for more than a thousand years.
AT Freda's bidding, l helped her draw
our boat upon the strange hOspice floor.
linen, after rousing fire had been built,
torch IN hand she showed me the curious
place; the paddock of few square yards
where goats and cattle, when being trans
ported by boat 20 new grazing grounds,
stir not the whole night long knowing as
well as humans the danger of misstep or
roaming; the rock chamber where food
was stored and rude iron utensils have
remained through centuries of peasant
travellers use, and the little niche like
toil-box, where those who will, may de-
posit few ore for the nights housing;
and then, after hearty supper prepared
by F'reda's deXterous hands, our couches
were spread, Freda's in the Prov
and my own in the stern of
the beached boat, which we had
wedged into upright position by sticks of
our fuel and loose stones from the pad
dock; when, with the cheeriest good
nights l had ever received or given and
with the weird music of the falling wa
tiers about US, we sank into peaceful slum-
Der.
I had noticed that Freda's manner had
changed the moment we had entered the
cavernous gorge. l humOred her mood at
supper, at breakfast and while some of
our stores were being placed in the cav
ern, for convenience during the day; but
the moment we set out again upon the
ford, back came the sunshine into her
face. the elation into her splendid form
and the music in her thrilling voice.
Then followed again, for half that day,
the enthrallment of the savagely majestic
scenery of the ford; the loiterings as
chasms, gorges and narrow valley open
ings where odd and fantastic hamleUs
toppled at the edge of precipices, or
seemed to be trembling from the furies
of roaring torrents; and above all, meet
ings and partings of and with quaint
was the only highway ever known, and
their shoutings and wavings of "Favels {"
strangely tender for folk who had never
before met and touchingly pathetic as if
with the voice tremor of those who are
never to meet again; until a needless
vagarous inquiry brought close to its end
my idyllic days upon the somber Naero
ford.
''Freda." l asked, "have YOU homer"
In an instant she seemed a changed be-
ing; stern, hard, grim as the cruel crags
above US there.
This boat" she answered slowly in
her own tongue, ''the cavern where we
slept and a-darker, harder home than
that cavern, far above it among the
crags.'
will you take me to thelatter, Freda?"
''Yesp'
l was startled by her manner; startled
with the wild energy with which she
bent to the oars and the swiftness with
which we few over the silent waters and
still startled and alarmed by the strange
pallor in her face as she urged me forward
through the grewsome cavern behind
where we left our boat. and led dragged
even at times bodily carried me up, up,
up path which seemingly trailed to the
clouds; all in an uuaccountable desperate
savagery which had in it almost the i'm
petuosity and restlessness of some crazed
and ferocious brute.
Having for days been accustomed to
the darkness of the ford. l could at first
scarcely see for the dazzling light in the
upper region where we finally stood.
To the left was misty line above the
ford. Beside it low walls of stone To
the right and behind, a scraggy, ragged
vale, deeply plowed by a thunderous
stream. Beyond, field of shapeless
rock Then, an impenetra bic forest of
stunted fir. Further, jagged lines of
stone, their pits and hollows streaked
with dingy snow. And at last, far toward
the frozen north, the glittering ice peaks
of the Dyrdal Field in the unbroken 81
lences beyond.
1t was like suddenly stepping from earth
to the edge of some planet where utter
and eternal desolation reigned supreme.
But there were human beings even here.
''See-See!' - exclaimed F'reda, her face
the very incarnation of hate. ''One, two,
three, four-fven'
My eyes following her excited gestur-
ing finally discerned five low, gray stone
structures which had at first seemed but
as many huge boulders in the repulsiVe
landscape.
The fifth is mine! They would take it
from me- They shall not. | will kill
them first! That is the home of mine.
you would see! Come back quick.
quick or l will go and tear them in
pieces now!
1t is all like dream to me how we de-
scended that wild path to the ford-side:
how she rocked upon the boat edge,
moaning and laughing tiercelv at times
and how at last | gently brought her half
wandering mind back to its brightness
and light.
Still, like a dream, is all the sad trag-
edy that come TO me, little by little.
through my tenderest conjurings-Of a
father, hard as the frozen stone around
him, driving this maiden from his door
for the love she bore a boatman lad of
Feios; Of this father dying with the
curse for the outcast upon his ashen lips
of those that were left behind, soddenly
following on, and endeavoring to wrest
the laws little wise heritage from the
homeless creature, who had haunted the
ford for years, living like beast in caves
and toiling daily like beast for the pit
lance which would enable her at last to
demand and secure her own.
Standing in the presence of such ma