One afternoon, they were sitting on the seat that looks down into Govett"s Leap-the great, mysterious valley that the highest rocks of the mountains guard. It was all in shadow; the sun had moved across to the west, and was setting there, away on the other side of the railway line. The tremendous trees and ferns at the bottom of the Leap were a mass of dark shadow. There was no light in the sky behind, and none for the leaping waterfall on the right to catch and weave into its curves and waves.
The five girls were all silent. Their eyes, with the dreams of youth in them, were gazing out into the great, silent stretches of mountains rolling back against the sky.
"Oh, to see this place with the sun behind it! " cried Mabel, suddenly. "If we could only see the sun rise there beyond those great, dark boulders, and make all the sky turn red. That"s what it wants-colour behind it. By the time we get down here in the day-time, the sun has gone away from it, and it"s all dull and heavy- looking. "After tea that night they got their mother into her own bedroom, shut the door mysteriously, and told her what they wanted to do-to see the sun rise at the Leap. They kept their voices down, for fear Aubert might be hiding somewhere.
"To see the sun rise? " said the mother. "You will have to get up very early for that. ""Oh, but we can wake ourselves, " said Lennie; "and we won"t make a noise. "" You will all be very careful? "
" Oh, mother, of course we will. "
At that the mother said yes; she thought that they might go.
So that same night most secret preparations went on in the kitchen; the billy was packed with tea, sugar, and a little bottle of milk. Mabel cut sandwiches of bread and butter and hard- boiled eggs, and wrapped them in a damp cloth, and made them into a parcel, all ready for the morning. Lennie polished the glass of the lantern, and put a new candle in it.
Then they borrowed the alarm clock from Emma, set it for three, and went quietly to bed, an hour before their usual time.
Mabel and Lennie had been in bed about half an hour, but had not succeeded in going to sleep, when they heard their door-handle turn gently, and saw, through the dark, a white figure at their bedside.
It was Brenda.
"Lennie, " she whispered, "is it three o"clock yet? I went to sleep, and did not know what time it was. I think we ought to get up. "Mabel and Lennie went into a wild burst of laughter-they were both over-excited with the thought of the coming adventure. Then Mabel struck a match and looked at the clock.
The hands were at half-past eight!
Poor little anxious Brenda went shamefacedly back to bed, where she had been asleep for ten minutes.
At the proper time the alarm went off, and Mabel and Lennie woke up immediately. Lennie crept into the room where the three little sisters slept, woke them briskly, but quietly, and in a quarter of an hour every one was dressed ready to go out.
It was just half-past three o"clock, and very dark. As they opened the back door, and stepped out into the yard, the black darkness confronted them, and they all had little thrills of fear running up and down their nerves. They closed the back door silently, went through the yard and out of the back gate into the dark world.
The back gate, when it closed behind them, seemed to shut them out of all reach of the shelter of home. The mother was sleeping soundly in a front bedroom, quite unconscious that her daughters were stealing through the piece of rough bush that led down to the road. When she had said " to see the sun rise, " she had not realized that they would be leaving home in the middle of the night, as it were.
But the lantern burned brightly. They gathered all their courage together, stepped out bravely, and were soon down on the long red road that led to Govett"s Leap. Once out of the bush, their hearts beat more easily, and the thrills of fear were less sharp and less frequent.
Up in the sky there were many stars, and from them came all the light that there was, except the lantern"s beams. Tramp, tramp, tramp! The footsteps of the five rang clearly and evenlyon the air.
On either side of the road the bush was black and still and shadowless. But from it there came stealing, every time the wind moved, sweet, pure tree-scents and leaf- odours-the scent of cherry-wood, of sharp grey gums and mountain musk, and the delicate wild clematis that hid the nakedness of the poor old ring- barked trees under its long white arms of blossom.
Sweeter than everything else was the smell of the earth under foot.
" It smells as if it had just been washed, " Lennie whispered, breathing it in with long, hard gulps.
Perhaps it was the dew that had washed the sweetness of it into the atmosphere.
As they walked along, they talked a little in whispers; wondered if they would be there in time; wondered ifFrom The Picturesque Atlus of Australasia
Govett"s Leap, Blue Mountains
Aubert and Bert had missed them; wondered if the sunrise would be a red one; wondered if ever five girls had gone down to the Leap to see it before.
Then a pale, weak light crept out into the darkness, the trees in the bush around were not quite so black, and the road in front began to show faintly white.
From all around there came a stir, then a twitter, and a movement of little wings stretching themselves. The twitter swelled, and grew fuller and louder as the little birds everywhere began to awake. At last it burst into such song as our wild birds know. Above all the others rang the musical notes of the magpies. The glittering parrots chattered and twittered. The bell-birds and the coachwhips, the lumpy brown kookaburras, the merry jacky-winters, and the little red- breasted robins, all were singing in the new day with their own delicate, tremulous song. The noise of them all was deafening. There seemed to be an orchestra of birds in every tree; behind every leaf a tiny, delicate, treble voice.
Turn after turn of the long red road went by. All the time the light was strengthening, and the lantern"s beam was paling.
One more turn, and the white fence at the head of the Leap came into view. They hurried on, their cheeks blooming with the roses of health and early morning, and dropped their basket and the billy on the steps of the look-out shed.
Then they seated themselves on the steps and watched. They were just in time.
First, the sky beyond the Leap turned pale, pale pink. Then adazzling zig-zag line of gold wrote itself right across the pink. It was like a flash of golden lightning come to stay.
A great red ship came sailing into the pink and gold. After it floated a crimson castle. Seas and rivers and mountains rose from some mysterious place, and rolled across the sky; the golden islands, and purple, clear lagoons, and the pink tinge deepening in the background roamed dreamily overhead.
Then some long, thin spikes of light, just where the mountains touched the sky.
Then a small, bright, yellow thing, rising from behind a far- off peak. Slowly, and yet quickly, it went up into the sky. All in a moment a flood of light burst out over the eastern mountains, the yellow thing was round and dazzling, the sky was one sea of crimson. The eyes that watched were blinded, and looked down a minute; and the sun had risen.
The Leap was no longer the dull, grave Leap of the noon and afternoon. The light was pouring down through it, and its mists were tinted with old gold and rose and tender saffron and regal purple.
On the mountain sides the leaves of the trees were like diamonds. Over the rocks rolled the water in a fall of jewels. The rocks themselves stood out against a crimson background. A change, more wonderful even than the sunset"s, had overswept the world.
The five little girls sat on the steps, and watched with eager eyes. They sighed, and breathed hard, and sighed again, and never took their eyes from the sky for a moment. For thewonder was all new to them-the fair wonder of a mountain dawn.
The sun rose higher and higher over the top of the Leap, and the colour in the sky changed to what Brenda called " only sunlight. "Then their voices all broke out at once. " Oh, how lovely ! ""How glorious! " "Wasn"t it red ! " "Wasn"t the sun gold! ""Wasn"t the sky beautiful! "
"I wouldn"t have missed it for anything in the world, " declared Lennie.
"Neither would I, " said Mabel, just as solemnly, and of course the little sisters echoed her words.
The fire was made, the billy boiled, and tea and egg sandwiches were eaten on the wooden steps, with the mountains rolling out before them. It was the sweetest breakfast they had ever known. They were all ravenously hungry. The billy-tea was as nice as billy-tea always is, the sandwiches were delicious, and, above all, it was five o"clock in the morning, and they were miles away from home, in the heart of the Blue Mountains.
Louise Mack, in Teens
Author.-Louise Mack is one of a clever Sydney family, sister of Amy Mack. Both of them have written charming stories of Australian life forchildren. Louise Mack"s published books include Teens and Girls Together.
General.-Govett"s Leap is a steep cliff in the Blue Mountains (look up on the map), fabled as the scene of a bushranger"s leap, but really called after the surveyor who discovered it. Who are the characters in this story? Recount the incidents. What do you like in the deion of the sunrise? Tell of a sunrise you have seen. Pick out the metaphors- "a great red ship, " " spikes of light, " " a fall of jewels, " etc. What birds are mentioned? Would you like to read the whole book? Why?