g wish to examine,
geologically, the great band of limestone which alternated with the
slate towards the mountains, the more particularly as he knew that the
Captain and the Major intended to ride out in another direction, to
examine some new netting for sheep-yards which the Captain had imported.

If Major Buckley thought Alice beautiful as he had seen her in the
morning, he did not think her less so when she was seated on a
beautiful little horse, which she rode gracefully and courageously, in
a blue ridinghabit, and a sweet little grey hat with a plume of
companion's feathers hanging down on one side. The cockatoo was on the
door-step to see her start, and talked so incessantly in his
excitement, that even when the magpie assaulted him and pulled a
feather out of his tail, he could not be quiet. Sam's horse Widderin
capered with delight, and Sam's dog Rover coursed far and wide before
them, with joyful bark. So they three went off through the summer's day
as happy as though all life were one great summer's holiday, and there
were no storms below the horizon to rise and overwhelm them; through
the grassy flat, where the quail whirred before them, and dropped again
as if shot; across the low rolling forest land, where a million parrots
fled whistling to and fro, like jewels, in the sun; past the old
stockyard, past the sheep-wash hut, and then through forest which grew
each moment more dense and lofty, along the faint and narrow track
which led into one of the most abrupt and romantic gullies which pierce
the Australian Alps.

All this became classic ground to them afterwards, and the causes which
made it so were now gathering to their fulfilment, even now, while
these three were making happy holiday together, little dreaming of what
was to come. Afterwards, years after, they three came and looked on
this valley again; not as now, with laughter and jokes, but silently,
speaking in whispers, as though they feared to wake the dead.

The road they followed, suddenly rising from the forest, took over the
shoulder of a rocky hill, and then, plunging down again, followed a
little running creek up to where a great ridge of slate, crossing the
valley, hemmed them in on either side, leaving only room for the creek
and the road. Following it further, the glen opened out, sweeping away
right and left in broad curves, while straight before them, a quarter
of a mile distant, there rose out of the low scrub and fern a mighty
wall