The dew is all brushed off, and you can see the footmarks." "I can't, my lad.

Perhaps you can with your young eyes." "Oh, it's all right," growled the boatswain.
"Keep a sharp look-out, then, and mind no one gets by." The little force advanced, with the men spread out to right and left, the officers in the centre, following the trail which led right to the gully-like depression, once doubtless a well-worn track, but now completely smoothed over and grass-grown; and there, sure enough, as discovered only a short time before by Celia, was the scooped-out hollow filled with fern, bramble, and wild clematis, and the rough steps down, and the archway dimly seen beyond the loose stones.
"Halt!" cried the master; and, after a careful inspection had shown that the footprints in the dewy grass had gone no farther than the entrance, the men were called up, and stood round the pit.
There it all was, exactly as Archy had pictured it in his own mind: the loose stones at the bottom of the hole covering, he was sure, the trap-door he had so often heard opened and shut; but, as he went down a few steps in his eagerness, and scanned the place, he was puzzled and disappointed; for the trap-door, if that was the spot where it lay, was covered, and therefore the men could not be in the cave.
"Bad job we've got no lanthorns," said Gurr, who was looking over Archy's shoulder at the low-browed arch of the passage leading right in; "and it looks bad travelling, but in we've got to go if they won't surrender.

Let me go first, my lad." For answer the midshipman went down to the bottom of the rough steps, and stood over the trap-door on the loose stones.
"No, no, my lad," said Gurr kindly, as he joined him.

"Too rough a job for you.

I'll lead, and, hang it! I shall have to crawl.