When the two discharges had killed ten men, Aramis, habituated to the windings of the cavern, went to reconnoitre them one by one, and counted them, for the smoke prevented seeing on beyond; and he immediately commanded that the canoe should be rolled as far as the great stone, the closure of the liberating issue. Porthos collected all his strength, and took the canoe in his arms and lifted it, while the Bretons made it run rapidly along the rollers. They had descended into the third compartment; they had arrived at the stone which walled up the outlet. Porthos seized this gigantic stone at its base, applied his robust shoulder to it, and gave a heave which made this wall crack. A cloud of dust fell from the vault with the ashes of ten thousand generations of sea-birds, whose nests stuck l
