“Now for the grub,” cried Percy, as they landed safely on the other side. “I say, Jeff, I call that something like a mountain, don’t you? I’m quite sorry we’re over the worst of it, aren’t you?”
“We’ve got the view to see yet,” responded Jeffreys.
“We shall be up in half an hour.”
“And it will take us as long to come down as to go up to-day,” said Jeffreys, “so we ought not to lose much time.”
Off they started again after a hurried but highly appreciated meal, in which the dog took only a very moderate share. The remaining portion of the ascent was simple enough. The zigzag onto the top shoulder was if anything less steep than the lower one, and the path, being rougher underfoot, was less treacherous.
The scramble over the loose rocks at the top onto the cairn was not altogether plain sailing. In summer it was easy enough, but now, with the surface of the great boulders as slippery as glass, it was hardly to be traversed except on the hands and knees.
Poor Julius floundered about pitifully, unable to keep his feet, and disappearing bodily now and then among the interstices of the rocky way. Even Percy and Jeffreys stumbled once or twice awkwardly, and reached the summit with bruised limbs. But finis coronat opus, especially on a mountain.
As they sprang up the cairn a view unequalled in grandeur broke upon them. The frosty air was without haze in any quarter. The Scotch hills beyond the border and the broad heaving sea lay apparently equally within reach, and on the farthest western horizon even the fairy-like outline of the distant Irish hills, never visible except in the clearest winter weather, shone out distinctly.
“Isn’t it scrumptious?” exclaimed Percy, as he flung himself breathless onto the cairn. “If we had waited a year we couldn’t have picked out such a day. Why, that must be Snowdon we see over there, and the high ground out at sea, Holyhead?”
Thus they went on, delightedly recognising the landmarks north, south, east, and west, and forgetting both the hour and the rising breeze.