“Here a strong breeze was blowing, that made our heated bodies shiver until we were fain to go on.  Casting one look into the gulf below, deepened without limit in the moonlight, we lit fresh torches and again took to the path.  Before we had scrambled, now we climbed.  We had left vegetation behind us, and were face to face with the naked rock that forms the actual Peak.  At the foot of this Peter called a halt, and pointed out the first set of chains.  Without these, in my weak state I could never have attempted the ascent.  Even as it was, my eye was dazed and my head swam and reeled as I hung like a fly upon the dizzy side.  But clutching with desperation the chains riveted in the living rock, I hauled myself up after Peter, and sank down thoroughly worn out upon the brink.

“It now wanted but little before daybreak would be upon us.  As I gathered myself up for a last effort, I remembered that amid the growth into which we were now to plunge, stood the tree of seven trunks which was to be my mark.  But my chance was small of noting it by the light of these flaring torches that distorted every object, and wreathed each tree into a thousand fantastic shapes.  Plainly I must stake my hopes on the descent next day; at any rate, I would scale the summit before I began my search.

“We had plunged into the thicket of rhododendrons, whose crimson flowers showed oddly against the torches’ gleam, and I was busy with these thoughts, when suddenly my ankle gave way, and I fell heavily forward.  My two guides were beside me in an instant, and had me on my feet again.

“‘All’s good,’ said Peter, ’but lucky it not happen otherwhere.  Only take care for last chain.  But what bad with him?’

“He might well ask; for there, full in front of my eyes that strained and doubted, glimmered a huge trunk cleft into seven—­yes, seven—­ branches that met again and disappeared in a mass of black foliage.  It was my father’s tree.

“So far then the parchment had not lied.  Here was the tree, ‘noticeable and not to be missed,’ and barely thirty-two paces from the spot where I was standing lay the key to the treasure which I had travelled this weary distance to seek.  But the time for search had not yet come.  By the clear light of day and alone I must explore the secret.  It would keep for a few hours longer.

“Dismissing my pre-occupied manner which had caused no small astonishment to Peter and Paul, I fixed the position of the tree as firmly as I could in my mind, and gave the word to advance.

“We then continued in the same order as before, whilst, to make matters sure, I counted our steps.  I had reached six hundred and twenty-though when I considered the darkness and the rough path I reflected that this was but little help—­when we arrived at the second set of chains.  My foot was already beginning to give me pain, but under any circumstances this would have been by far the worst of the ascent.