CHAPTER TWELVE.
WE MAKE ANOTHER SLIP.
I'm afraid that we thought very little about Bigley's escape from a horrible death, for by nine o'clock the next morning he was over at the Bay, and while we were talking outside, Bob Chowne came trotting up, holding on to the mane of his father's pony, for the doctor had ridden over to see my father.
Half an hour later we were down on the beach to look for our baskets and nets which had been covered by the tide, and which we were too much exhausted to hunt for after our escape.
For a long time we had no success, for, until the tide ran lower, we were not quite sure of the spot; but we hung about hour after hour till the cluster of rocks were uncovered, and as soon as the water was low enough we were down at the place, and, but for the labour necessary to bale out the lower pool, we should, I am sure, have crawled in again to try how it was Bigley was held.
It did not take much examination to show that, however, for it was plain enough now to see how one part of the opening was a good deal narrower than the other; and here it was that Bigley had become fast, never once striving in his horror to get back, but always forward like an animal in a trap.
As I stood there looking, the whole scene appeared to come back again, and I shuddered as I seemed to see my school-fellow's agonised face gazing appealingly in ours, and for the moment the bright sunny day looked overcast.
"Come away," I said nervously; "let's look for the nets." "Ha, ha, ha!" laughed Bob, who had quite recovered his spirits and took up his usual manner; "look at old Sep! He's frightened, and thinks it's his turn to be stuck in the rock." "Never mind; let's look for the nets," said Bigley, who seemed to be more in sympathy with me, and we set to work, finding one before long, buried all but a scrap of the net in the beach sand and shingle.
This encouraged us, and we hunted with more vigour, finding another wedged in between some blocks of rock, and soon after we discovered something that we had certainly expected would have been swept out to sea, namely, one of the baskets.
It was the one which contained the crab, and it had been driven into a rock pool surrounded by masses of stone, which had held it as the tide retired.
To our great satisfaction the crab was still inside alive and uninjured; but we found no more relics of our expedition.

The other baskets were gone with the eel and prawns, and the third net was wanting.

I must except, though, one of Bigley's shoes, which had been cast up four hundred yards from the rock pool, and lay at high-water mark in a heap of sea-weed, battered wreck-wood and shells.
I am not going to enumerate all our adventures during those holidays; but I must refer to one or two more before passing on for a time to the more serious matters in connection with the silver mine in the Gap, where, while we were enjoying ourselves on the shore or up one of the narrow glens baling out holes to catch the trout, business matters were progressing fast.

Our mishap was soon forgotten, and we determined to have another prawning trip, for, as Bob Chowne said, there was no risk over it, if we didn't go and stick ourselves between two stones ready for the tide to come in and drown us.

"But it was an accident," said Bigley gravely.