At the same instant a shadow passed over the rock. A cloud of chaffinches and small birds swept over the cave, and hundreds of buzzards and hawks dashed on above them, with loud screams. So dense and broad was the feathered mass, that it seemed almost immovable while the fluttering of so many thousand wings sounded like dead leaves driving before the wind. "It is the birds leaving Ardennes," said Hullin. "Yes, the last of them. Their corn and seeds are buried in the snow. But there are more men in the enemy's armies than birds yonder. No matter, Jean-Claude; France will live though the world assail her. Hexe-Baizel, light the lantern; I wish to show Jean-Claude our stock of ammunition." Hexe-Baizel could not willingly obey this command. "No one," said she, "has been in the cave for twenty years. He can as well take your word for it. We take his for payment. I will not light the lantern--not I!" Marc, without saying a word, stretched forth his hand and grasped a stout stick. The old woman, trembling in every limb, disappeared like a ferret through a small aperture, and in a moment returned with a large horn lantern, which Dives tranquilly lighted at the hearth. "Baizel," said he, replacing the stick, "you know that Jean-Claude is my friend, and has been since we were boys, and that I would trust him much sooner than I would you, old snarler; for you know well that if you did not fear being hung the same day, I would long since have danced at the end of a rope. Come, Hullin, follow me." {169} They went out together, and the smuggler, turning to the left, kept on toward the notch, which projected over the Valtin two hundred feet in the air. He pushed aside the foliage of a stunted oak, and then disappeared as if hurled into the abyss. Jean-Claude trembled, but he saw at the same moment Dives's head advancing along the wall of rock. The smuggler called out: "Hullin, place your hand on the left side; there is a hole there; stretch out your foot boldly; you will feel a step, and then turn upon your heel." Master Jean-Claude obeyed, not without fear and trembling; he felt the hole in the rock, found the step, and, turning half-way around, presently stood face to face with his friend in a niche which must formerly have belonged to some postern. At the end of the niche a low vault opened. "How in the world was this discovered?" cried the wondering Hullin. "I came on it while hunting for nests, thirty-five years ago. I had often seen a magnificent eagle with his mate upon this rock; they were splendid birds, full six feet across the wings. I heard the cries of their young beyond the notch, and, after many a trial, found myself here. What a battle we had! They tried to tear my eyes out, and when I killed them I cleared their nest of the bones that lay there after I had twisted the necks of the young; then I kept on, and you shall see what I found. Come."