Page:Edgar Huntly, or The Sleep Walker.djvu/127

 strength would not allow me to return to the mountain. At the customary hour I retired to my chamber. I incessantly ruminated on the adventures of the last day, and enquired into the conduct which I was next to pursue.

The bridge being destroyed, my customary access was cut off: there was no possibility of restoring this bridge; my strength would not suffice to drag a fallen tree from a distance, and there was none whose position would abridge or supersede that labour; some other expedient must therefore be discovered to pass this chasm.

I reviewed the circumstances of my subterranean journey. The cavern was imperfectly explored; its branches might be numerous: that which I had hitherto pursued, terminated in an opening at a considerable distance from the bottom: other branches might exist, some of which might lead to the foot of the precipice, and thence a communication might be found with the summit of the interior hill.

The danger of wandering into dark and untried paths, and the commodiousness of that road which had at first been taken, were sufficient reasons for having hitherto suspended my examination of the different branches of this labyrinth. Now my customary road was no longer practicable, and another was to be carefully explored: for this end, on my next journey to the mountain, I determined to take with me a lamp, and unravel this darksome maze; this project I resolved to execute the next day.

I now recollected what, if it had more seasonably occurred, would have taught me caution. Some months before this, a farmer living in the skirts of Norwalk discovered two marauders in his field, whom he imagined to be a male and female panther. They had destroyed some sheep, and had been hunted by the farmer with long and fruitless diligence: sheep had likewise been destroyed in different quarters; but the owners had fixed the imputation of the crime upon dogs, many of whom had atoned for their supposed offences by their death. He who had mentioned his discovery of panthers received little credit from his neighbours; because a long time had elapsed since these animals were supposed to have been exiled from this district, and