--a son of the Vikings, Tyrrel's contemporary in age, but very unlike
him in form and features; for Eustace Le Neve was fair and big-built,
a florid young giant, with tawny beard, mustache, and whiskers, which
he cut in a becoming Vandyke point of artistic carelessness. There was
more of the artist than of the engineer, indeed, about his frank and
engaging English face--a face which made one like him as soon as one
looked at him. It was impossible to do otherwise. Exuberant vitality
was the keynote of the man's being. And he was candidly open, too. He
impressed one at first sight, by some nameless instinct, with a
certain well-founded friendly confidence. A lovable soul, if ever
there was one, equally liked at once by men and women.

"Our cliffs are fine," Walter Tyrrel answered, grudgingly, in the tone
of one who, against his will, admits an adverse point he sees no
chance of gainsaying. "They're black, and repellant, and iron-bound,
and dangerous, but they're certainly magnificent. I don't deny it.
Come and see them, by all means. They're the only lions we have to
show a stranger in this part of Cornwall, so you'd better make the
most of them."

And he took, as if mechanically, the winding path that led down the
gap toward the frowning cove in the wall of cliff before them.

Eustace Le Neve was a little surprised at this unexpected course, for
he himself would naturally have made rather for the top of the
promontory, whence they were certain to obtain a much finer and more
extensive view; but he had only arrived at Penmorgan the evening
before, so he bowed at once to his companion's more mature experience
of Cornish scenery. They threaded their way through the gully, for it
was little more--a great water-worn rent in the dark serpentine rocks,