that continued for several seconds.  He knew he was standing on the brink of the chasm.  One quick and earnest prayer he breathed to the invisible Power, whose hand could protect him in that dread moment—­then, retiring a single pace, and screwing every nerve and muscle in his body to the utmost tension, he made a step in advance, and threw himself forward into the dark and fearful void.  Who can tell the whirlwind of thought that rushed through his brain in the brief moment that he hung above that yawning gulf?  Should he have miscalculated his distance, or chosen a place where the cleft was widest—­should his footing fail, or his strength be unequal to carry him over, what a death were his!  Dashed down that horrible abyss—­crashing from rock to rock, until he lay at the bottom a mutilated corpse.  The agony of years was crowded into one moment—­in the next, his feet struck against the firm rock on the opposite side of the chasm, and he was saved.  At least, he felt that he had for the moment escaped the imminent peril in which he was placed, and, as he clambered joyfully up the rugged slope at the end of the cave, he thought little of the dangers he had still to encounter.  All through that long night he sat on the narrow ledge of a rock, while the angry waves thundered beneath, and cast their cold spray every instant over him.  With the ebbing of the tide, the sea receded from the cavern; but Frank hesitated to attempt crossing the chasm again; his limbs had become stiff and benumbed, and his long abstinence had so weakened his powers that he shrank from the dangerous enterprise.  While giving way to the most desponding reflections, a stentorian hilloa rang and echoed through the cavern; and never had the human voice sounded so sweetly in his ear.  He replied to it with a thrilling shout of joy, and, in a few minutes, several persons with torches appeared advancing.  A plank was speedily thrust across the fissure, and Frank Costello once more found himself amid a group of his friends, who were warmly congratulating him upon his miraculous escape.  They told him that, from his not having returned home the preceding night, it was generally concluded that he had been drowned, and a party of his neighbors proceeded in a boat, early in the morning, in search of his body.  On reaching “Puffin Hole,” they discovered his boat fastened to a rock, and full of water, as she had remained on the ebbing of the tide.  This circumstance induced them to examine the cavern narrowly, and the happy result of their search is already known.

ADVENTURE WITH A COBRA DI CAPELLO