54 



OLD PLYMOUTH TRAILS 



at every wind-sheared crest, and blowing, soft 

 as wool, in rolling masses far inland. It was 

 easy to see the greatest crests rear and draw 

 back, showing the roots of the ledges among 

 boulders brown with weed and sea wrack, then 

 swing forward with seemingly irresistible might, 

 to be shattered as if their crystal was that of 

 glass and to fly skyward a hundred feet, scintil- 

 lant white star drift of comminuted sea. The 

 crash of such waves on such rocks, the hollow 

 diapason of their like on sands, and the shrill 

 roar of a pebbly beach torn and tossed by the 

 waves, all sprang from nothingness into vibrant 

 being there in the black woods as the gale 

 shouldered by the pine tops. 



There is a point where the pines group on the 

 pond shore and look expectantly east, wistful of 

 the sea. Here they caught the full force of the 

 gale and sang mightily, a wild, deep-toned, 

 marching symphony of crashing forces. Now 

 and then a lull came, as comes in the fiercest 

 gales, and in the vast silence which ensued I 

 heard the pines across the pond singing antiphon- 

 ally. Black as it was under the trees, there was 

 a moon behind the night. No suggestion of it 

 showed through the clouds, yet from the pond 



