A hasty movement, and he would have fallen.
But he possessed a marvellous power of will, which prevented him from
attempting any violent effort. Prudently, but with determined energy,
he screwed his feet and his knees into the crevices of the rock, feeling
with his hands for some point of support, and gradually sinking to one
side, he finally succeeded in dragging himself from the verge of the
precipice.
It was time, for a cramp seized him with such violence that he was
obliged to sit down and rest for a moment.
That the baron had been killed by his fall, Bavois did not doubt for an
instant. But this catastrophe did not produce much effect upon the old
soldier, who had seen so many comrades fall by his side on the field of
battle.
What did _amaze_ him was the breaking of the rope--a rope so large that
one would have supposed it capable of sustaining the weight of ten men
like the baron.
As he could not, by reason of the darkness, see the ruptured place,
Bavois felt it with his finger; and, to his inexpressible astonishment,
he found it smooth.
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