RACE OF THE TIDE 7? 



to a great height. There is a rock in the Marianne 

 Isles known as '* Lot's Wife," which stands '^50 feet 

 above its base, yet the foam is thrown to its summit. 



Mr. Scott Kussell has testified from experience, 

 that an abrupt rise in the bottom of tlie sea (under 

 the circumstances alluded to above) causes an elevii- 

 tion of the water over that particular spot. The rise 

 of the water is as abrupt as that of the sea-bottom, 

 and a ship passing over it experiences a shock so 

 violent as to induce the belief that it has struck on 

 a rock. This fact is familiar to observers accustomed 

 to cross the sea, and there can be no mistake as to 

 the occasional violence of the shock, when we recall 

 that a whaler was dismasted by this cause on the 

 coast of Chili, in 1837. 



Sometimes, particularly in the neighbourhood of 

 the Antilles, a tumultuous movement of the sea is pro- 

 ducked near the coast, whilst everywhere else within 

 the field of immediate observation there is a perfect 

 calm. This phenomenon is always connected either 

 with a volcanic eruption, or an earthquake, or the pas- 

 sage of a cyclone at some distance. An experience 

 related by Dr. Rooke as having occurred to him at 

 the Sandwich Islands is a striking example of the 

 Raz de Maree (Race of the Tide) caused by an earth- 

 quake and a volcanic eruption. His account of the 

 phenomenon is substantially as follows : — 



