CYCLONIC FLOODS 315 



where it rushed into the harbour and poured into the 

 market-place. 



That a great sea-wave so produced might have thus 

 arisen in the Persian gulf is quite within the bounds of 

 possibility, particularly as a zone of the earth's crust, 

 very liable to earthquakes, stretches across the mouth of 

 the Gulf near the Ormus mountains. 



But if we are to follow the legend, we must follow it 

 faithfully, and as a result of the most recent investiga- 

 tions, it turns out that all the passages which were 

 supposed to refer to an earthquake have been mistrans- 

 lated. The earthquake is thus put out of court, and we 

 are left with what help we can get from the hurricane, a 

 kind of disturbance which often vies with the earthquake 

 in the destructive nature of the sea-waves to which it 

 gives rise. 



The Andaman islands of the East Indies are a centre 

 which give birth to some of the most terrific hurricanes 

 in the world. Travelling more or less westwards and 

 northwards, these whirlwinds sweep over the waters of 

 the bay of Bengal, and raise the sea into waves mountains 

 high, which every now and again rush over the low-lying 

 lands of the Ganges delta, overwhelming the unfortunate 

 inhabitants by myriads. Thus on the night of October 

 14, 1737, one of these waves, estimated at 40 feet in 

 height, suddenly overtook the dwellers by the Ganges 

 and destroyed them to the number of 100,000, or, as 

 some say, 300,000 souls. 



These storms do not, as a rule, travel towards the 

 Persian gulf, and the North Arabian sea is singularly 

 free from them ; but Suess, tracing the course of the 

 storm of October 24, 1842, suggests that for once, in the 

 case of the deluge, an East Indian storm may have lost 

 its way and blundered, as it were, into the Persian gulf. 

 The track of this storm of 1842 was as follows : At five 



