‘That was a splendid fellow at the Devil’s Glen.’
‘There’s as good a one any day at the lock on the canal at home! only we do not delude people into coming to see it. Up such places, too!’
‘Cilly, for shame. What, tired and giving in?’
‘Not tired in the least; only this place is not worth getting late for the train.’
‘Will the young lady take my hand? I’d be proud to have the honour of helping her up,’ said the guide. But Lucilla disdainfully rejected his aid, and climbed among the stones and brushwood aloof from the others, Ratia talking in high glee to the Irishman, and adventurously scrambling.
‘Cilly, here it is,’ she cried, from beneath a projecting elbow of rock; ‘you look down on it. It’s a delicious fall. I declare one can get into it;’ and, by the aid of a tree, she lowered herself down on a flat stone, whence she could see the cascade better than above. ‘This is stunning. I vow one can get right into the bed of the stream right across. Don’t be slow, Cilly; this is the prime fun of all!’
‘You care for the romp and nothing else,’ grumbled Lucilla. That boisterous merriment was hateful to her, when feeling that the demeanour of gentlewomen must be their protection,
and with all her high spirit, she was terrified lest insult or remark should be occasioned. Her signs of remonstrance were only received with a derisive outburst, as Rashe climbed down into the midst of the bed of the stream. ‘Come, Cilla, or I shall indite a page in the diary, headed Faint heart—Ah!’ as her foot slipped on the stones, and she fell backwards, but with instant efforts at rising, such as assured her cousin that no harm was done, ‘Nay, Nonsensical clambering will be the word,’ she said.
‘Serves you right for getting into such places! What! hurt!’ as Horatia, after resting in a sitting posture, tried to get up, but paused, with a cry.
‘Nothing,’ she said, ‘I’ll—’ but another attempt ended in the same way. Cilla sprang to her, followed by the guide, imprecating bad luck to the slippery stones. Herself standing in the water, Lucilla drew her cousin upright, and with a good deal of help from the guide, and much suffering, brought her up the high bank, and down the rough steep descent through the wood.