It was indeed a dreadful evening.The howling of the storm mingled with the shrieks of the sea-fowl, and sounded like the dirge of the three devoted beings, who, pent between two of the most magnificent, yet most dreadful objects of nature--a raging tide and an insurmountable precipice--toiled along their painful and dangerous path, often lashed by the spray of some giant billow, which threw itself higher on the beach than those that had preceded it.Each minute did their enemy gain ground perceptibly upon them! Still, however, loth to relinquish the last hopes of life, they bent their eyes on the black rock pointed out by Ochiltree.It was yet distinctly visible among the breakers, and continued to be so, until they came to a turn in their precarious path, where an intervening projection of rock hid it from their sight.Deprived of the view of the beacon on which they had relied, they now experienced the double agony of terror and suspense.They struggled forward, however; but, when they arrived at the point from which they ought to have seen the crag, it was no longer visible: the signal of safety was lost among a thousand white breakers, which, dashing upon the point of the promontory, rose in prodigious sheets of snowy foam, as high as the mast of a first-rate man-of-war, against the dark brow of the precipice.
The countenance of the old man fell.Isabella gave a faint shriek, and, ``God have mercy upon us!'' which her guide solemnly uttered, was piteously echoed by Sir Arthur--``My child! my child!--to die such a death!''
``My father! my dear father!'' his daughter exclaimed, clinging to him--``and you too, who have lost your own life in endeavouring to save ours!''
``That's not worth the counting,'' said the old man.``I hae lived to be weary o' life; and here or yonder--at the back o' a dyke, in a wreath o' snaw, or in the wame o' a wave, what signifies how the auld gaberlunzie dies?''
``Good man,'' said Sir Arthur, ``can you think of nothing?
--of no help?--I'll make you rich--I'll give you a farm--I'll''--``Our riches will be soon equal,'' said the beggar, looking out upon the strife of the waters--``they are sae already; for I hae nae land, and you would give your fair bounds and barony for a square yard of rock that would be dry for twal hours.''
While they exchanged these words, they paused upon the highest ledge of rock to which they could attain; for it seemed that any further attempt to move forward could only serve to anticipate their fate.Here, then, they were to await the sure though slow progress of the raging element, something in the situation of the martyrs of the early church, who, exposed by heathen tyrants to be slain by wild beasts, were compelled for a time to witness the impatience and rage by which the animals were agitated, while awaiting the signal for undoing their grates, and letting them loose upon the victims.
Yet even this fearful pause gave Isabella time to collect the powers of a mind naturally strong and courageous, and which rallied itself at this terrible juncture.``Must we yield life,''
she said, ``without a struggle? Is there no path, however dreadful, by which we could climb the crag, or at least attain some height above the tide, where we could remain till morning, or till help comes? They must be aware of our situation, and will raise the country to relieve us.''
Sir Arthur, who heard, but scarcely comprehended, his daughter's question, turned, nevertheless, instinctively and eagerly to the old man, as if their lives were in his gift.
Ochiltree paused--``I was a bauld craigsman,'' he said, ``ance in my life, and mony a kittywake's and lungie's nest hae I harried up amang thae very black rocks; but it's lang, lang syne, and nae mortal could speel them without a rope--and if I had ane, my ee-sight, and my footstep, and my hand-grip, hae a' failed mony a day sinsyne--And then, how could I save _you?_ But there was a path here ance, though maybe, if we could see it, ye would rather bide where we are--His name be praised!''
he ejaculated suddenly, ``there's ane coming down the crag e'en now!''--Then, exalting his voice, he hilloa'd out to the daring adventurer such instructions as his former practice, and the remembrance of local circumstances, suddenly forced upon his mind:--``Ye're right!--ye're right!--that gate--that gate!--fasten the rope weel round Crummies-horn, that's the muckle black stane--cast twa plies round it--that's it!--now, weize yoursell a wee easel-ward--a wee mair yet to that ither stane--we ca'd it the Cat's-lug--there used to be the root o' an aik tree there--that will do!--canny now, lad--canny now--tak tent and tak time--Lord bless ye, tak time--Vera weel!--Now ye maun get to Bessy's apron, that's the muckle braid flat blue stane--and then, I think, wi' your help and the tow thegither, I'll win at ye, and then we'll be able to get up the young leddy and Sir Arthur.''