I came hurriedly down, and my announcement was enough to set my companions off, Jecks limping painfully through the loose sand, climbing rocks, and finding it no easy task to get over that so-called quarter of a mile, which, like all such spaces on the sea-shore, proved to be about double the length it looked, while the nearer we got the higher and more formidable the ridge seemed to grow, completely shutting out all beyond, where it ran down from the cliff at right angles into the sea.