Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 1).djvu/135

 laurel, the butcher's broom, and mountain-box, and ever-prevailng marucca, grew more luxuriantly still above these mounds.

She stooped nearer and cleared the grasses away; there was an orifice large enough for all her body to enter, and she saw a step of stone down in the dusk of the opening. Musa did not know fear, and enterprise was strong in her.

With some difficulty she thrust herself downward into the aperture; and, groping with head bent and shoulders bowed, got her feet upon the stone. It was the first step of a staircase; of such a staircase as was hewn roughly and laid together in the old house of Joconda, to lead down into the cellar. The descent was difficult, the passage very narrow; the sunbeams slanting in showed her the outline of the stairs, and she thrust herself down them, bruising herself at every step.

At the foot of this rude stairway was a portico, without doors, and with the figure of a winged genius holding a torch, and of a couchant lion, carved boldly on each side of it in the stratified sandstone of the rock. The rank growth, overhead and all around, of vegetation, made a labyrinth of