After several ineffectual attempts, Selkirk, as a last resort, decided
to encircle Marimonda with the noose of the lasso, and, by a gesture,
to send her towards those heights where he was so impatient to join
her.

She departs, dragging after her the chain, of which he holds the other
extremity: this chain, the only bridge thrown for him between the
abyss and the port of safety, between life and death!

With what anxiety he observes, studies its oscillations! Several times
he draws it towards him, and each time, as if in reply to his summons,
Marimonda suddenly re-appears at the brow of the precipice, preparing
to re-descend; but he repulses her with his voice and gestures, and
when these methods are insufficient,--when Marimonda, exhausted with
lassitude, seated on the verge of the tunnel, persists in remaining
motionless, he has recourse to projectiles. To compel her to second
him in his work, the possible realization of which he himself scarcely
comprehends, he throws at her some fragments of stone detached from
his rocky wall, and even the remains of that repast for which he is
indebted to her. Even when she is at a distance, informed by the
movements of the lasso of the direction she has taken, he pursues her
still.

Suddenly the cord tightens in his hand. He pulls again, he pulls with
force; the cord resists! Fire mounts to his brain; his sluggish blood
is quickened; his heart and temples beat violently; his fever returns,
but only to restore to him, at this decisive moment, his former vigor.
He hastily digs new steps in the interstices of the rock; with his
hands suspending himself to the lasso, assisted by his feet, by his