1 62 " The Raven Wys." [Sess. 



reached the foot of the gully, however, and looked up at the 

 pile of sticks, even C. was prepared to let his latest argument 

 go by the board. The external structure bore no signs of 

 young Eavens ; it seemed to be in the same condition as when 

 my brother and I had seen it last. Nevertheless we scrambled 

 up the gully to the top of the cliff and set about lowering a 

 man down on the rope. Like most Eaven's nests it was 

 practically invulnerable to most hand-and-foot methods of 

 attack. It was built on a short, broad ledge about fifty feet 

 from the base of the cliff and about thirty from the summit. 

 Below the nest the rock bulged slightly outwards and then 

 fell rather vertically ; above, the cliff overhung nearly a couple 

 of feet, and then canted inwardly for twenty feet to the top. 

 On the left side of the nest a projecting snag put a barrier in 

 the way of a traverse, and on the right a long unbridgeable 

 fissure prevented approach from that direction. We thought 

 that this pair had fully maintained the Eaven reputation for 

 awkward sites, and chosen rather skilfully, although it was 

 certainly not one of the " impregnables." In fact, to three 

 men and a rope it fell rather more easily than we cared for ; 

 it refused us the pleasures of insurmountable difficulties. In 

 a quarter of an hour the climber had returned and issued his 

 report, — " Nothing — except these," he spoke with a smile on 

 his face, and flung three stones on the turf. How these 

 stones, which were ordinary fragments of hill-rock, came to 

 occupy the position of the eggs in the nest, is a question I 

 leave you to answer for yourselves. I doubt not you will 

 attribute it to human agency rather than to the nest-owners. 

 Personally I have no theory, but I have one reliable piece of 

 evidence which I willingly present to you. No mere man 

 could have thrown the stones into the nest. C, my brother, 

 and myself, all of us tried for twenty minutes or more, and 

 failed — failed, understand me, without ignominy. 



And so another great quest had ended like so many others. 

 We lay recumbent, despondent, pondering the cryptic ways of 

 Eavens. And each besought the other, what next ? Our 

 eyes ever restlessly pursuing their business of seeking new 

 signs, as if in defiance of the melancholy foreboding spirit that 

 had grown within, roved up and down the glen, up the scarred 

 sides of the giant Ben, to the grey screes and the snowfields, 



