When Maud and General Beau arrived at the waterfall, there, of course, was Desvoeux, trying to encourage the Miss Fotheringhams to cross the stream and so ascend to the finest point of view. This was a little more than the Miss Fotheringhams' nerves were equal to: the stream was full and foamed and tossed itself into an angry crest; the water looked black and swift and treacherous. You had to jump on to one boulder, then balance yourself on three stepping-stones through the shallows, then make one good spring to the rock opposite, and the feat was done! This, however, was just too much for the Miss Fotheringhams, who had not been trained in athletics and were not naturally what the Irishmen call 'leppers.' As they were hesitating and refusing, Maud and the General came up, looking very much bored. Maud had been finding her companion almost intolerable, and would have jumped _anywhere_ to be free of him. There was nothing in it: Desvoeux had been skipping across half-a-dozen times. 'Look,' he said, 'a skip, two hops and a jump, and there you are! Do try. Don't you see?' 'I see, exactly,' said Maud, gathering up her petticoats and giving her parasol to General Beau. 'Stop! it is not safe,' he cried; 'stop, I implore; the rocks are slippery, the water is deep. I implore, I beseech, I command!' But the General might as well have commanded the stream to stop, for Maud was gone, and in about two seconds was standing, flushed, beautiful and triumphant, on the opposite side. 'If you will not come with us,' said Desvoeux, calling to the people on the other side, 'we must go up to the Point without you. General Beau will, I am sure, take care of the Miss Fotheringhams.' 'A most wilful girl,' thought the General, 'and dull, but a fine jumper, and feet and ankles quite perfection.' Maud, when she got across the stream, had passed a moral Rubicon; she left propriety, prudence, and prudishness on the other side with the General and the Miss Fotheringhams. Desvoeux was in the greatest glee at the result which had come about. 'I wish the General had tried and tumbled in,' he said, 'and got a ducking.' 'Oh,' cried Maud, 'what a dreadful man he is, with his shrugs and his "Ahs!" How lucky that you came to save me!' 'And you to save me,' said her companion; 'I was having a sad time of it with the Fotheringham girls. What a thing it is to have a deliverer!' 'But,' said Maud, 'I think the younger one is looking very pretty. You know you used to love her. What lovely hair!' 'Yes,' said the other. 'Hair So young and yellow, crowning sanctity, And claiming solitude: can hair be false?' 'It can,' exclaimed Maud; 'Mrs. Blunt showed me two large coils, which had arrived from Douglas' in her last box from Europe. When one has a diamond tiara I suppose one must have hair to put it in, _coûte qui coûte_.'