"I went down the mountain side at the rush, vaulting as vaults the deer, so strong, so well, so happy was I that my very feet seemed to spurn the turf on which I trode.
"But was it turf? No, surely it was air. So filled with the inspiration of my grand idea was I, that I appeared no longer on earth or even belonging to it.
"Boys, these last words of mine contain a grim kind of a joke which you will at once see. I made just one vault too many, then I was indeed walking on air, and no longer on earth. I was falling, falling, falling! Oh, it did seem such a long, long time ere I reached the foot of that rocky cliff! Then all was a blank.
"I had fallen as it were into sudden darkness, and but for a pine-tree on which I bad luckily alighted, and which lowered me earthward all torn and bleeding, it might have been the darkness of death.
"Eppie, wife, heap more peats upon the fire and stir the blazing drift-wood. Listen, lads, to the moaning wind; surely that is hail that rattles so against the panes. Frank, it is well you haven't to make your way through moor and forest to-night with Bunko."
"I shouldn't have minded being with poor Bunko, sir, I assure you, because I like to be out in storms; but then I could not have heard the conclusion of your story."
"And must I conclude to-night?"
"Oh, sir, yes! You're just coming to the best of it."
"Well, boys, well," said the old bard, "you must be humoured."