a
life with so much of open-air adventure, sunshine, gaiety, and charm in
it? The sweat streamed upon his face as he strove vainly to hang by one
of his arms and search the cope of the crumbling wall for a surer hold
with the other; he stretched his toes till his muscles cramped, his eyes
in the darkness filled with a red cloud, his breath choked him, a vision
of his body thrashing through space overcame him, and his slipping
fingers would be loose from the mortar in another minute!

To one last struggle for a decent mastery his natural manhood rose, and
cleared his brain and made him loose his grip.

He fell less than a yard!

For a moment he stopped to laugh at his foolish terror, and then set
busily to explore this new place in which he found himself. The air was
fresher; the walls on either hand contracted into the space of a lobby;
he felt his way along for twenty paces before he could be convinced
that he was in a sort of tunnel. But figure a so-convenient tunnel in
connection with a prison cell! It was too good to be true.

With no great surrender to hope even yet, he boldly plunged into the
darkness, reason assuring him that the _cul-de-sac_ would come sooner
or later. But for once reason was wrong; the passage opened ever before
him, more airy than ever, always dank and odorous, but with never a
barrier--a passage the builders of the castle had executed for an age
of sudden sieges and alarms, but now archaic and useless, and finally
forgotten altogether.

He had walked, he knew not how long, when he was brought up by a curious
sound--a prolonged, continuous, hollow roar as of wind in a wood or a
sea that rolled on a distant beach. Vainly he sought to identify it, but
finally shook aside his wonder and pushed on again till he came to the
apparent end of the passage, where a wooden door barred his progress
farther. He stopped as much in amazement as in dubiety about the door,
for the noise that had baffled him farther back in the tunnel was now
close at hand, and he might have been in a ship's hold and the ship
all blown about by tempest, to judge from the inexplicable thunder
that shook the darkness. A score of surmises came quickly, only to be
dismissed as quickly as they came; that extraordinary tumult was beyond
his understanding, and so he applied himself to his release. Still his
lucky fortune remained with him; the door was merely on a latch. He
plucked it open eagerly, keen to solve the puzzle of the