In this mood was she proceeding on her journey.
Suddenly—indeed so suddenly as to cause her alarm—her steed came to a stop, showing signs of being scared.
His eyeballs were distended, his fore-feet planted stiffly in advance, his mane standing almost straight, while he trembled in every limb.
Another step, and horse and rider would have suddenly disappeared beneath the surface of the earth, and for ever.
They were on the brink of one of those subterranean wells, or “rinks,” common in that part of the country, whose dangerous concavity is concealed by a light crust of earth; and only by the sudden sinking of the support beneath him is the unwary traveller apprised of the peril.
Over the covering of the abyss the grass grew as greenly, the flowers bloomed as brightly as elsewhere.
And yet under that fair seeming was a trap that conducted to death.
In an instant the fair rider comprehended her peril.
To advance would be certain death; to attempt to back her steed upon its own tracks almost as certain destruction.