They stood at the verge of a precipice. Below them stretched a wide and comparatively level plain, vaulted over by a crystalline canopy supported by innumerable clusters of slender columns, and sheltering low-storied houses, or huts, collected together in the close companionship of a thriving little village. The familiar accompaniments of such a scene, supposing that it formed a part of some straggling, hospitable highway in the outer world, were there. At the doorways of the houses men and women stopped to talk; children played in the vacant spaces that served for yards and streets; even diminutive animals, that appeared in the distance to be near of kin to the patient, ubiquitous burro, jogged along under their burdens of merchandise. The villagers were evidently of the same race as Anitoo and his companions, dressed like them in white flowing togas, but lacking their indefinable charm and lordliness of bearing. Anywhere else they would have been taken for peasants, attired somewhat fantastically, engaged in the most primitive occupations. Here, remote from everything that lives under the sun, their very simplicity was cause for wonder, if not for fear. So far the explorers had not attracted the attention of the villagers. Where the former stood they could watch the scene below without being observed themselves. But they knew that this security could not last. Either they had to go on and make themselves known, or return to Anitoo, who by this time, possibly, was at the mercy of Raoul and his party. They hesitated. The problem was a knotty one--but it was not left for them to decide. From an unexpected quarter came an interruption, startling in some respects, that solved their difficulties--temporarily at least--and seemed a promising augury that whatever dangers confronted them they might rely on backing, of a sort. A heavily veiled figure, bent with age and toiling down a precipitous path from the rocky height beneath which they were sheltered, silently approached them. At sight of this singular being, Mrs. Quayle, not yet accustomed to this land of uncomfortable surprises, started to run away. Her frantic efforts at speed restored the confidence of the others and, after she had been unceremoniously brought to order by Leighton, the little party managed to face the newcomer with some show of composure.