Where this snake-like ravine widened out slightly we made choice for our first camp. We reached there near the sunset hour, although the sun itself had utterly vanished from our view long before, and we moved forward amid a semi-darkness most depressing. On the spot selected the towering wall of rock on our side of the little river overhung sufficiently to form a comfortable shelter at its base. I had a goodly supply of fresh pine boughs strewn so as to form a soft bed, while the Puritan busied himself gathering together ample materials for a fire, the reflected light of which caused the deep chasm where we rested to appear more gloomy than before, while scurrying night clouds closed us in as if imprisoned within a grave.
That evening was not devoted to much conversation. We were alike wearied from our long tramp, heavy-hearted, and strangely depressed by the desolate gloom of the rock cavern in which we lay. Even De Noyan yielded to this spirit of brooding and, after a faint effort at forced gayety, crept silently to his sleeping-place. The other two were not long in following him. I was thus left alone to keep the first watch of the night. Four lonelier, more miserable hours I do not remember serving at the call of duty. The round moon crept slowly through the black sky, until its soft, silvery beams rested, brighter than daylight had been in that gorge, in glowing radiance along the surface of the smooth, gleaming wall opposite, yet merely succeeded in rendering more weird and uncanny the sombre desolation. The night wind arose, causing the shadows of clinging pines to sway back and forth like spectral figures, while a solemn silence, awesome in its intensity, brooded over all, broken only by the noise of tumbling water, with occasional rasping of boughs against the face of the cliff. The fire died away into a few red embers, occasionally fanned into uncertain flame by breaths of air sucked up the gorge. By the time my guard ended I was so thoroughly unstrung that each flitting glimpse of deeper shadow tempted me to fire.
It was at midnight, or as close to that hour as I was capable of judging, when I aroused De Noyan and crawled into his place on the bed of boughs. I lay there watching him a brief space, as he walked over to the stream and plunged his face into the cool water. The last I recall previous to dropping off into deep slumber was how large his shadow loomed, silhouetted in the bright moonshine against a huge black bowlder directly in my front.