breaking upon the shore came faintly to their ears. It was
the merest, faintest murmur, it is true, but their experienced ears told
them in a moment what it was; they were within the sound of the sea, and
in a few short hours at most, please God, they would be safe from
pursuit.

A bend in the defile was before them, about a quarter of a mile distant,
and toward this they eagerly pressed believing that when they had passed
it they would find themselves face to face with the sea. In their
eagerness they broke into a run, notwithstanding their terrible state of
fatigue, and soon rounded the bend--to find themselves in a
_cul-de-sac_, with a perpendicular wall of cliff in front of them nearly
two hundred feet high. With a groan of bitter anguish and
disappointment they deposited Walford in his hammock on the ground, and
turned to ask each other what should be done in the face of this new
difficulty. As they did so, the deep bay of a dog smote upon their ears
from the higher end of the ravine. The sound was instantly repeated
again and again, in a slightly different key, proving that the cries
were uttered not by one, but by several animals.

"The dogs! _The dogs_!" exclaimed Tom. "They are after us, by Jove;
and here we are, caught like rats in a trap."

George glanced eagerly about him, up and down the ravine. To go back
was simply to throw themselves into the arms of their pursuers, for that
they _were_ pursued he did not for an instant doubt; to hide, even if a
hiding-place could be found, was impossible, with those keen-scented
brutes upon their tracks; and to remain where they were was to await
inevitable capture. Could they go _forward_? That meant scaling that
terrible wall of rock. As George glanced despairingly up the lofty
perpendicular cliff, he thought that an active man, unencumbered,
_might_ possibly accomplish the feat; at all events, were he so
circumstanced, he would try it. And what he could do, he knew the lad
Tom could do also; but there was Walford, unable to walk, much less to
scale that awful precipice. As he stood thus, the baying of the dogs
again came floating down the ravine; and how much nearer and clearer
were now the sounds! The brutes must be coming down after them at a
run, as of course they easily could upon a red-hot scent. The sounds
decided George to make one more desperate effort for freedom.

"Look here, Tom," said he; "after coming thus far, we must not be taken
for