174 THE RING OF NATURE 



AUGUST 



IN THE SEA 



ON the first day of the townsman's holiday at 

 the sea, or at any rate for the first hour, he 

 is content to lie on his back and watch the waves 

 dashing up the shingle, or lapping with the sob of 

 a disappointed ambition. As a passive accepter 

 he allows their message to beat into his tired but 

 happy brain. Possibly he interprets them by 

 means of a little mathematical ' shop,' and no harm 

 done. 



The waves that are beating merely inches high 

 on our summer strand ran in the deep sea, not as 

 men say ' mountains high,' but when the wind 

 had fetched them four hundred miles, thirty feet 

 high. These monstrous deep-sea waves race along 

 at the rate of a mile a minute, and the distance 

 between their crests is some two thousand feet. 

 Running into shallow water (say merely a hundred 

 fathoms), they begin to slacken speed, and at 

 length wave after wave can only crawl in and 

 throw itself dead on the beach. 



