soon reached the top. Here I could see nothing whatever. The
tremendous smoke-clouds rolled all about on every side, enveloping me
in their dense folds, and shutting every thing from view. I heard the
cry of the asses of guides, who were howling where I left them below,
and were crying to me to come back--the infernal idiots! The smoke was
impenetrable; so I got down on my hands and knees and groped about. I
was on her track, and knew she could not be far away. I could not
spend more than five minutes there, for my felt hat would not assist
me any longer. About two minutes had already passed. Another minute
was taken up in creeping about on my hands and knees. A half minute
more followed. I was in despair. The child-angel I saw must have run
in much further than I had supposed, and perhaps I could not find her
at all. A sickening fear came to me that she had grown dizzy, or had
slid down over the loose sand into the terrific abyss of the crater
itself. So another half minute passed; and now only one minute was
left."

"I don't see how you managed to be so confoundedly accurate in your
reckoning. How was it? You didn't carry your watch in one hand, and
feel about with the other, I suppose?"

"No; but I looked at my watch at intervals. But never mind that. Four
minutes, as I said, were up, and only one minute remained, and that
was not enough to take me back. I was at the last gasp already, and on
the verge of despair, when suddenly, as I crawled on, there lay the
child-angel full before me, within my reach.

"Yes," continued Dacres, after a pause, "there she lay, just in my
grasp, just at my own last gasp. One second more and it must have been
all up. She was senseless, of course. I caught her up; I rose and ran