190 FOREST CEEATUEES. 



However, after many an hour's hard work, it was done 

 at last. 



There then stood the three ladders, 110 feet in 

 length, firmly bound together and held by the rope 

 from above, as straight as a plummet line, with the foot 

 resting on the earth. I now had them drawn up till the 

 lowest part hung even with the spot where the young- 

 fir was growing, and by means of a boat hook, pulled 

 them in and planted them there. The foot of the ladder 

 was now, it is true, in the right place ; but the upper 

 part, owing to the overhanging formation of the wall of 

 rock, bulged out Avith its own weight. By means of a 

 hook and a small rope, I managed at last, after vain 

 efforts, repeated for more than an hour, to make the 

 ladder incline inwards*, towards the eyrie. Weber had 

 now to go up, and, on the word of command being given, 

 slacken the rope twenty feet or so, and let the ladder 

 fall against the e3^rie. In this manoeuvre it was much 

 to be feared that either the ladders would break, or that 

 we should have to attempt it a hundred times in vain, 

 till at last, by good chance, it should fall as we wanted. 

 After endless endeavours it fell really against the nest 

 without breaking. But now I saw that the ladder 

 reached only the bottom of the eyrie, and was therefore 



* Forming thus a concave lino, or "bellying," as boys say of the 

 string of their kite, when, instead of being pulled pretty straight, it 

 hangs, or "makes a beUy," downwards. — C. B. 



