A SEARCH FOR THE PLEIADES = 261 
our stumbling progress brought us nearer to 
it; but no one knew just where to find it, and 
there was a perpetual murmur in the trees, 
drowning all minor sounds. At length a softer 
plash, as of plunging waters, mingled in the 
strain, and almost before we knew it we stood 
in a green dell, where all the shaggy terrors of 
the precipitous ravine suddenly vanished, as if 
they had never been. Westood with level feet 
at last, beside a little stream, on whose flat and 
mossy rocks it seemed as if nothing rougher 
than the moccasined foot of an Indian had ever 
rested. As far up and down as the woods dis- 
closed them extended a series of dainty water- 
falls, — never high or sweeping, like the Artists’ 
Fall in North Conway, or the far bolder Llama 
Falls near Lake Dunmore in Vermont, but 
more like the graceful Chase Cascades in Brat- 
tleborough, as they were while yet unspoiled. 
As for the precise number of these cascades in 
Jobildunk Ravine, it was of no consequence; 
the brook dropped almost continuously from 
ledge to ledge, and there might be seven or 
seventeen, as one chose to count them for pur- 
poses of baptism. At any rate, our lost Plei- 
ades were found. 
When we had once reached them, instanta- 
neous was the change in our condition. No 
longer slipping and staggering down the craggy 
