“I think we’ll do now,” said Davy. “Please Providence, they may easily be smashed to atoms here.” And he looked gratefully at the sharp rocks. But I turned after a little, and beheld that phantom-like pursuer still following us closely through the windings of the passage. The reefs had now become high cliffs, and seemed to close us in on every side; but as we came round another corner we saw before us a low archway. Through this we shot, and we found ourselves as it were at the bottom of a tea-cup, with precipitous walls on every side; just in front of us a little sandy beach. Davy pushed the boat towards a narrow slit in the rocks. “Jump in there, my girl,” he said. “Don’t be afraid; if you slip, I’ll catch you.” Nancy jumped at once, I followed her, landing half in and half out of the water, but quickly drawing myself up to be out of Davy’s way, who came with a mighty rush—at the same time spinning the boat to the other side of the creek—only just in time, the Frenchmen were in the archway. “Go on as far as you can,” whispered Davy. “If they see this slit, they can only come one at a time, and—” He didn’t finish, but it wasn’t necessary. Nan and I stumbled on in the interior, and found ourselves ere long in quite a large cave, where even in the dusky light we could discern objects extremely like kegs, also bales and packages of all sorts. Outside we heard the cries and screams of the Frenchmen, baulked of their prey; for (probably fortunately for themselves) they did not discover the narrow and hidden entrance to our cave. We were soon joined by Davy, who remarked that if they had a guide with them, there were a few things he didn’t know yet. “There’s plenty of food here—and spirits—if we want to stay,” he continued; “but perhaps we may as well get to the top and see what is going on.” CHAPTER VI. WELSH WIVES. We did prefer (as soon as we had got our breath again) knowing what was going on in our usual world overhead to remaining in ignoble security in Davy’s locker, for so we named his cave. Accordingly we scrambled and crawled and pushed our way up the far-end of the cavern, till at last the aperture resembled a chimney lined with ferns instead of soot more than aught else. We emerged at last into the open air full of morning sunshine, and perceived that we were now quite beyond the enemy’s lines and once more among our own people. The first thing to be done in this situation was naturally—to talk; as good and true Celts we all agreed to that; and when we got into the high-road we found no dearth of people to talk to. They were gathering like ants from every quarter, and the one topic which each man liked to discourse on was simply this: how he was going to fight the French. The bonfires last night had aroused the country, and some of the men we met had come from distant parts of the county.