A scream from Dora was echoed by an exclamation of horror from M'Dermot and myself. Ashley had cleared the chasm and alighted on the opposite edge, but it was shelving and slippery, and his feet slid from under him. For one moment it appeared as if he would instantly be dashed to pieces, but in falling he managed to catch the edge of the rock, which at that place formed an angle. There he hung by his hands, his whole body in the air, without a possibility of raising himself; for below the edge the rock was smooth and receding, and even could he have reached it, he would have found no foot-hold. One desperate effort he made to grasp a stunted and leafless sapling that grew in a crevice at not more than a foot from the edge, but it failed, and nearly caused his instant destruction. Desisting from further effort, he hung motionless, his hands convulsively cramped to the ledge of rock, which afforded so slippery and difficult a hold, that his sustaining himself by it at all seemed a miracle, and could only be the result of uncommon muscular power. It was evident that no human strength could possibly maintain him for more than a minute or two in that position; below was an abyss, a hundred or more feet deep--to all appearance his last hour was come.
M'Dermot and I stood aghast and helpless, gazing with open mouths and strained eyeballs at our unhappy friend. What could we do? Were we to dare the leap, which one far more active and vigorous than ourselves had unsuccessfully attempted? It would have been courting destruction, without a chance of saving Ashley. But Dora put us to shame. One scream, and only one, she uttered, and then, gathering up her habit, she sprang unaided from her mule. Her cheek was pale as the whitest marble, but her presence of mind was unimpaired, and she seemed to gain courage and decision in the moment of peril.
"Your cravats, your handkerchiefs!" cried she, unfastening, as she spoke, her long cashmere scarf. Mechanically M'Dermot and myself obeyed. With the speed of light and a woman's dexterity, she knotted together her scarf, a long silk cravat which I gave her, M'Dermot's handkerchief and mine, and securing--how, I know not--a stone at either extremity of the rope thus formed, she threw one end of it, with sure aim and steady hand, across the ravine and round the sapling already referred to. Then leaning forward till I feared she would fall into the chasm, and sprang forward to hold her back, she let go of the other end. Ashley's hold was already growing feeble, his fingers were torn by the rock, the blood started from under his nails, and he turned his face towards us with a mute prayer for succour. At that moment the two ends of the shawl fell against him, and he instinctively grasped them. It was a moment of fearful suspense. Would the knots so hastily made resist the tension of his weight? They did so; he raised himself by strength of wrist. The sapling bent and bowed, but his hand was now close to it. He grasped it; another powerful effort, the last effort of despair, and he lay exhausted and almost senseless upon the rocky brink. At the same moment, with a cry of joy, Dora fell fainting into her brother's arms.