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CHAPTER XVII. 



THE CYCLONE. 



Next day, about three in the afternoon, we had a 

 terrible tropical storm. It was what sailors dread 

 so much and call a white squall. Our huts were in 

 a moment levelled to the ground, and in one place 

 even the fence of the "laager" was prostrated. It 

 was accompanied almost uninterruptedly by heavy 

 thunder and lightning ; the flash and report for 

 some time so rapidly succeeded each other that the 

 vortex of the gale could not have been far distant. It 

 commenced with a sudden burst of wind. For some 

 time before the clouds were in rapid motion, cross- 

 ing and meeting each other, while along the face of 

 the nimbus a heavy vapour fell. This is much 

 lower than the rain cloud, and the closer it comes 

 to the earth the more violent will be the gale in- 

 dicated. The gathering darkness rapidly increased, 

 the trees swayed to and fro, and when they came in 

 contact produced shrieking, grating sounds, not un- 

 like the groaning of the bulkheads in a sea-lashed 

 vessel. The lack of light, the erratic and vivid 

 lightning, the hoarse reverberating claps of thunder, 

 with the screeching wind, everything combined to 

 overpower the observer with awe. You gaze around 



