[A CURATE'S HOLIDAY.]
IN FOUR CHAPTERS.—CHAPTER II.
Mr John Williams, landlord of the Ship and Anchor, Lleyrudrigg, had not deceived the little minister and myself with regard to the qualifications of his horse. It was a high-stepping thoroughbred; and notwithstanding that the roads were heavy with the rain of the previous day, we bowled along next morning at a famous rate on our way to Twellryst. Clouds of a somewhat suspicious character floated overhead, occasionally depriving us for a space of the sunshine, and the wind was perhaps too high to be altogether agreeable. But on the whole the weather was favourable; and enlivened by Mr Morgan's instructive and cheerful conversation, the day's trip promised to prove a pleasant one. For some time after leaving Lleyrudrigg we followed the regular coach-road, which, though running for a little way on a line with the coast, very soon turns inland. Then quitting it for one upon which was much less traffic, we found ourselves, at the close of three hours' quick driving, again coming within sight of the blue ocean with its foam-flecked billows, and were told by Jonathan Williams, our hunch-backed, sinister-looking little driver, that we were nearing the Spike Rocks. The Spike Rocks! how I shudder at the bare mention of that name, recalling as it does—— But I will not anticipate. Drawing up before a five-barred gate which led into an extensive piece of meadow-land bordering the shore and, as I afterwards found, crowning precipices which for nearly a mile in length descended in sheer walls to the sea, Jonathan rose in his seat, and pointed out with his whip the two rocks which we had come hither to visit. They stood at some distance from the land—small, conical-shaped islands, bleak and sharp-pointed—their interest consisting, as we had been told, in their being a peculiarly favourite resort of a species of sea-bird. At certain seasons of the year, of which the present was one, the birds would collect here in thousands, covering the rocks from base to summit with a compact living mantle of whity-brown feathers. From the point at which our carriage stopped, however, the rocks were too far away for their clothing to be clearly visible; and we accordingly set off for a nearer inspection, warned by a shout from our driver, when we had taken a few steps, to beware of the 'Devil's Holes.' (So Mr Morgan translated the barbarous-sounding Welsh word he used.) 'Devil's Holes! Why, what can they be?' I inquired. But my companion was no wiser with regard to the matter than myself, as he confessed with a shake of the head; so we walked on, trusting to our observation for enlightenment.
The enlightenment came sooner than we anticipated, and was accompanied for me by a great shock. Under the influence of my new friend's inspiriting society, I was feeling a light-heartedness to which I had long been a stranger; and upon observing before me a small round hollow in the field we were crossing, I was seized with a momentary impulse to run forward, as I might have done when a boy, and let the impetus of descending the near side carry me up the sloping grassy bank which I saw upon the farther one. Had I followed out that impulse, however, I should not now have been writing this story; for when close upon it, but not before, I perceived to my horror that the innocently seeming indentation of the ground was in reality an awful natural pit. Where the grassy slope terminated, instead of the green level I had expected to see, yawned a black chasm; and looking downwards, I positively trembled as my eye sank into an abyss some hundred feet in depth, at the bottom of which, as though it had been a gigantic caldron, appeared a seething mass of water, rolling and dashing itself against the rocky sides, and sending up a booming sound like the explosion of cannon.
An exclamation of horror burst from my lips as this unexpected phenomenon met my sight, and drawing Mr Morgan backwards, I nervously entreated him not to stand so near the edge. That 'Devil's Hole' had filled me with the strangest sensation of creeping dread; and when presently we came upon a second hollow in the meadow, I shrank from approaching it. The little minister, however, would not be deterred from doing so; and from the manner in which I saw him walking round and round, curiously peering over its side, I was prepared for the announcement which he made upon rejoining me, that that too was a 'Devil's Hole'—larger but in other respects similar to the one I had seen. An involuntary shiver was almost the only comment I made upon this communication; and as we continued our course, I looked apprehensively in all directions for further suspicious undulations of the ground. But none presented themselves; for like the Spike Rocks, these holes are but two in number; and when we had taken a survey of the Rocks—to my mind the lesser curiosities of the district—we returned to our dog-cart.
Words can scarcely express the relief I experienced as I felt myself being carried swiftly away from the neighbourhood of these horrible pits. The state of my health possibly may have had something to do with it; but my imagination certainly had been powerfully impressed with what was perhaps an exaggerated idea of their danger, and throughout the remainder of our drive I could talk of little else. Interested only in a lesser degree than myself, Mr Morgan joined me in conjectures as to the way in which they had been formed; the probable depth of water contained in them; the manner in which they were connected with the sea, and so forth. But though each of us endeavoured by turns to draw Jonathan into the conversation, in order to extract information from him, our dwarfish driver either could not or would not afford us any. He did not know, he said, whether or not there had ever been an accident at the spot, and replied to all our questions with a shortness which—considering that he had chattered incessantly during the former part of the journey—made me think that for some reason or other the subject must be distasteful to him.
Upon reaching Twellryst the little minister and I separated, with the understanding that we were to meet again at the inn at which we had put up, at four in the afternoon—that hour being as late a one as we thought it wise to appoint, on account of the necessity of getting back to Lleyrudrigg that night.
A careful exploration of the ruins, which turned out to be very interesting; a walk in the country; and a saunter round the town, filled up my time very agreeably; and arriving exactly as the clock struck the appointed hour, I found Mr Morgan already at the rendezvous. Our conveyance was then called for; but to our annoyance, the driver was not forthcoming. He had strolled away from the hotel some time ago, we were told; and when, eventually, the search for him ended in his discovery in a neighbouring public-house, he appeared to be a good deal the worse for liquor. The delay thus occasioned in starting upon our backward journey was the more vexatious because of the threatening aspect which during the last hour the weather had been assuming. Thick dark clouds had gradually spread themselves over the entire sky, and the wind, as it moaned amongst the trees of a neighbouring orchard or whistled round the corners of the inn, had a decidedly stormy sound. Naturally I am rather a passionate man, and at the time of which I write my private troubles made me more than usually prone to irritation. It is scarcely to be wondered at then, that when, upon my friend's calling Jonathan's attention to these signs of the times, I observed an impish look of satisfaction stealing over his face as though he were inwardly rejoicing in the anticipation of our getting a good wetting, in return for the scolding we had given him. Indeed, I had some difficulty in restraining my inclination to seize his horse-whip and lay it across his shoulders. I did restrain it, however; and when ready at length, we set off at full speed. This was so well kept up by Mr Williams's excellent horse, that although we could not hope to escape a drenching, we began to congratulate ourselves that after all we might get to Lleyrudrigg before very late in the evening.