"Her father and the guide had disappeared.
"Partly sliding, partly descending as if by a natural ladder, finding footing and grasp where many might have found neither, mechanically, and as one in a dream, I reached her in about ten minutes; and, as I had a naturally boyish dread of facing death, with joy I saw her move, and then took her in my arms tenderly and caressingly; while she opened her eyes and sighed deeply, for the fall had stunned and shaken her severely. Otherwise she was, happily, uninjured; but I had reached her just in time, for, if left to herself, she must have tottered and fallen into the terrible profundity below.
"'Papa! oh, where is my papa? I was thrown suddenly from my pony—a bird scared it—and remember no more;' then a passion of tears and terror came over her, with the consciousness of the peril she had escaped and that which still menaced her, for to ascend was quite impracticable, and to descend seemed nearly equally so. Above us the mountain side seemed to rise like a wall of rock; on the other hand, at the bottom of the ravine, where the shadows of evening were dark and blue, though sunset still tipped Snowdon's peaks with fire, and clouds of crimson and gold were floating above us, I could see a rivulet, a tributary of the Ogwen, glittering like a silver thread far down, perhaps a thousand feet below.
"'Courage,' said I, while for a time my heart died within me; 'I shall soon conduct you to a place of safety.'
"'But papa, he will die of fright. Where is my papa?' she exclaimed, piteously.
"'Gone round some other way,' I suggested. And subsequently this proved to be the case. Placing an arm round her for aid, we now began to descend, but slowly, the face of the hill, which was there so steep and shelved so abruptly, that to lose one step might have precipitated us to the bottom with a speed that would have insured destruction. From rock to rock, from bush to bush, and from cleft to cleft, I guided and often lifted her, sometimes with her eyes closed; and gazed the while with boyish rapture on the beautiful girl, as her head drooped upon my shoulder. She had lost her hat, and the unbound masses of her golden hair, blown by the wind, came in silken ripples across my face; and delight, mingled with alarm, bewildered me.
"Till that hour no sorrow could have affected a spirit so pure as hers; and certainly love could not have agitated it—she was so young. But when we drew nearer the base of the hill, and reached a place of perfect safety, the soft colour came back to her face, and the enchantment of her smile was as indescribable as the clear violet blue of her eye, which filled with wonder and terror as she gazed upward to the giddy verge from which she had partly fallen; and then a little shudder came over her.
"With a boy's ready ardour, I was already beginning to dream of being beloved by her, when excited voices came on the wind; and round an angle of the ravine into which we had descended came Lloyd, the guide, several peasants, and her father, who had partially witnessed our progress, and whose joy in finding her alive and well, when he might have found her dashed perhaps out of the very semblance of humanity, was too great for words. The poor man wept like a very woman, as he embraced her again and again, and muttered in broken accents his gratitude to me, and praise of my courage. Suddenly he exclaimed to the guide,
"'You said his name was—Arkley, I think?'
"'Yes, sir,' replied Lloyd.