could place itself with security, close to the brink of the
precipice--but they were not long enough; there was still a great
space from the outermost projecting cliff, which protected the nest;
the rocky wall was perfectly smooth. After some consultation, they
decided to lower into the opening two ladders tied together and to
fasten them to the three already beneath them. With great difficulty
they dragged them up and attached them with cords; the ladders shot
over the projecting cliffs and hung over the chasm; Rudy sat already
on the lowest round.

It was an ice-cold morning, and the mist mounted from the black
ravine. Rudy sat there like a fly on a rocking blade of grass, which a
nest-building bird has dropped in its hasty flight, on the edge of a
factory chimney; but the fly had the advantage of escaping by its
wings, poor Rudy had none, he was almost sure to break his neck. The
wind whistled around him and the roaring water from the thawed
glaciers, the palace of the Ice-Maiden, poured itself into the abyss.

He gave the ladders a swinging motion--as the spider swings herself by
her long thread--he seized them with a strong and steady hand, but
they shook as if they had worn-out hasps.

The five long ladders looked like a tremulous reed, as they reached
the nest and hung perpendicularly over the rocky wall. Now came the
most dangerous part; Rudy had to climb as a cat climbs; but Rudy could
do this, for the cat had taught it to him. He did not feel that
Vertigo trod in the air behind him and stretched her polypus-like arms
towards him. Now he stood on the highest round of the ladder and
perceived that he was not sufficiently high to enable him to see into
the nest; he could reach it with his hands. He tried how firm the