THE UNIVERSAL STRIFE 15 



a little more of the land, and enlarges her 

 boundaries. 



All this violence on the shores, all the inland 

 torrent of rain, however, probably produces but a 

 small effect as compared with that of a more 

 subtle agent the frost, which strikes with sword 

 and dagger at once for the water, and levers out of 

 balance ponderous masses of rock that even the 

 lightning could not dislodge. Silent, seemingly 

 without motion, the frost inserts a slender weapon 

 between the rocks, and thrusts them asunder. 

 When hard weather arrives, there is no change in 

 the appearance of a cliff, save that the boulders 

 are stippled with white ; the masses are, indeed, 

 more firmly bound together by the ice, as with a 

 crystal cement, though an expanding one. But 

 the thaw alters the scene. Then countless chips 

 of stone and fragments of mould fall from the face 

 of every rocky steep ; and at intervals a boulder 

 crashes down. The record of this chipping in past 

 ages may be found in the great beds of angular 

 gravels, countless chips from exposed rocks, and 

 not yet waterworn. 



The war of the elements is felt everywhere. 



