Part 11 (1/2)
”Wish I could fly like that,” said Scarlett. ”Look at them; they're going right over the Rill Head.”
The two boys stopped and watched until the birds glided out of sight, beyond the lion-like headland, an object, however, which grew less lion-like the nearer they drew.
”What would be the good?” replied Fred. ”It would soon be very stupid to go gliding here and there.”
”But see how easy it would be to float like that.”
”How do you know?” said practical Fred. ”I dare say a bird's wings ache sometimes as much as our legs do with running. I say, Scar.”
”Yes.”
”Let's go and have a look at the caves.”
”What caves?”
”Down below the Rill. Now, only think of it; we were born here, and never went and had a look at them. Samson says that one of them is quite big and runs in ever so far, with a place like a chimney at one end, so that you can get down from the land side.”
”And Nat said one day that it was all nonsense; that they were just like so many rabbit-holes--and that's what he thought they were.”
”But our Samson said he had been in them; and if they were no bigger than rabbit-holes, he couldn't have done that. Let's go and see.”
”Bother! I had enough of poking about in that damp old pa.s.sage, and all for nothing. I thought we were going to find the way in there.”
”Well, so we did.”
”But I mean the other end.”
”Bother, bother! what's the good!”
”How do I know? It's very curious. There's something seems to draw you on when you are underground,” said Scarlett, dreamily.
”Hark at the old worm! Why, Scar, I believe you'd like to live underground.”
Scarlett shook his head.
”I mean to find that way in to our place some day, whether you help me or whether you do not. Never mind what your Samson said about the Rill caves. He don't know. Let's go and see.”
”What's the good?”
”I don't know that it will be any good, but let's see. There may be all kinds of strange things in a cave. I've read about wonderful places that went into the earth for a long way.”
”Yes; but our Rill cave would not. My father told me one day about two caves he went into in Derbys.h.i.+re. One had a little river running out of it, and he went in and walked by the side of the water for a long way till he came to a black arch, and there the gentlemen who were with him lit candles and they waded into the water and crept under the dark arch, and then went on and on for a long way through cave after cave, all wet and dripping from the top. Sometimes they were obliged to wade in the stream, and sometimes they walked along the edge.”
”And what did they find?”
”Mud,” said Fred, laconically.
”Nothing else?”
”No; only mud, sticky mud, no matter how far they went; and at last they got tired of it, and turned back to find that the water had risen, and was close up to the top of the arch under which they had crept, so that they had to wait half a day before it went down.”