ere
be peril to more than me.'

Without another word she led me, though with many timid glances towards
the upper valley, to, and into, her little bower, where the inlet
through the rock was. I am almost sure that I spoke before (though I
cannot now go seek for it, and my memory is but a worn-out tub) of
a certain deep and perilous pit, in which I was like to drown myself
through hurry and fright of boyhood. And even then I wondered greatly,
and was vexed with Lorna for sending me in that heedless manner into
such an entrance. But now it was clear that she had been right and the
fault mine own entirely; for the entrance to the pit was only to be
found by seeking it. Inside the niche of native stone, the plainest
thing of all to see, at any rate by day light, was the stairway hewn
from rock, and leading up the mountain, by means of which I had escaped,
as before related. To the right side of this was the mouth of the pit,
still looking very formidable; though Lorna laughed at my fear of it,
for she drew her water thence. But on the left was a narrow crevice,
very difficult to espy, and having a sweep of grey ivy laid, like a
slouching beaver, over it. A man here coming from the brightness of the
outer air, with eyes dazed by the twilight, would never think of seeing
this and following it to its meaning.

Lorna raised the screen for me, but I had much ado to pass, on account
of bulk and stature. Instead of being proud of my size (as it seemed to
me she ought to be) Lorna laughed so quietly that I was ready to knock
my head or elbows against anything, and say no more about it. However,
I got through at last without a word of compliment, and broke into the
pleasant room, the lone retreat of Lorna.

The chamber was of unhewn rock, round, as near as might be, eighteen
or twenty feet across, and gay with rich variety of fern and moss
and lichen. The fern was in its winter still, or coiling for the
spring-tide; but moss was in abundant life, some feathering, and some
gobleted, and some with fringe of red to it. Overhead there was no
ceiling but the sky itself, flaked with little clouds of April whitely
wandering over it. The floor was made of soft low grass, mixed with moss
and primroses; and in a niche of shelter moved the delicate wood-sorrel.
Here and there, around the sides, were 'chairs of living stone,' as some
Latin writer says, whose name has quite escaped me; and in the midst a
tiny spring arose, with crystal beads