Without a moment’s hesitation Maggot swung himself over the edge of the precipice, merely cautioning his comrade, as he did so, to hold on to the rope and prevent it from slipping.
He slid down about two yards, and then found that the rock overhung so much that he was at least six feet off from the crevice in which the young daws nestled comfortably together, and no stretch that he could make with his legs, long though they were, was sufficient to enable him to get on the narrow ledge just below the nest. Several times he tried to gain a footing, and at each effort the juvenile daws—as yet ignorant of the desperate nature of man—opened their little eyes to the utmost in undisguised amazement. For full five minutes Maggot wriggled and the daws gazed, and the anxious comrade above watched the vibrations and jerks of the part of the rope that was visible to him while he listened intently. The bubbles on Zawn Buzzangein, like millions of watery eyes, danced and twinkled sixty feet below, as if in wonder at the object which swung wildly to and fro in mid-air.
At last Maggot managed to touch the rock with the extreme point of his toe. A slight push gave him swing sufficient to enable him to give one or two vigorous shoves, by which means he swung close to the side of the cliff. Watching his opportunity, he planted both feet on the narrow ledge before referred to, stretched out his hands, pressed himself flat against the rock, let go the rope, and remained fast, like a fly sticking to a wall.
This state of comparative safety he announced to his anxious friend above by exclaiming,—“All right, John—I’ve got the daws.”
This statement was, however, not literally true, for it cost him several minutes of slow and careful struggling to enable him so to fix his person as to admit of his hands being used for “stroobing” purposes. At length he gained the object of his ambition, and transferred the horrified daws from their native home to his own warm but unnatural bosom, in which he buttoned them up tight. A qualm now shot through Maggot’s heart, for he discovered that in his anxiety to secure the daws he had let go the rope, which hung at a distance of full six feet from him, and, of course, far beyond his reach.
“Hullo! John,” he cried.
“Hullo!” shouted John in reply.
“I’ve got the daws,” said Maggot, “but I’ve lost the rope!”
“Aw! my dear,” gasped John; “have ’ee lost th’ rope?”
It need scarcely be said that poor John Cock was dreadfully alarmed at this, and that he eagerly tendered much useless advice—stretching his neck the while as far as was safe over the cliff.