about, for they were quite capable of encountering his vague
philosophy. Then they had their Euclid and Virgil--and even tried
their mental teeth upon Dante, but found the Commedia without notes
too hard a nut for them. Every fresh spring, Ian brought with him
fresh books, and these they read in their cave. But I must not
forget the cave itself, which also shared in the progress of its
troglodytes.

The same week in which they first ate and read in it, they conceived
and began to embody the idea of developing the hollow into a house.
Foraging long ago in their father's library for mental pabulum, they
had come upon Belzoni's quarto, and had read, with the avidity of
imaginative boys, the tale of his discoveries, taking especial
delight in his explorations of the tombs of the kings in the rocks
of Beban el Malook: these it was that now suggested excavation.

They found serviceable tools about the place at home, and the rock
was not quite of the hardest. Not a summer, for the last seventeen
years, had passed without a good deal being done, Alister working
alone when Ian was away, and the cave had now assumed notable
dimensions. It was called by the people uamh an ceann, the cave of
the chief, and regarded as his country house. All around it was
covered with snow throughout the winter and spring, and supplied
little to the need of man beyond the blessed air, and a glorious
vision of sea and land, mountain and valley, falling water, gleaming
lake, and shadowy cliff.

Crossing the wide space where so lately they had burned the heather
that the sheep might have its young shoots in the spring, the
brothers stood, and gazed around with delight.