212 VIISTORY OF 



During all the time of its approach, a hollow murmur is heara 

 in the cavities of the mountains ; and beasts and animals, sensible 

 of its approach, are seen running over the fields, to seek for 

 shelter. Nothing can be more terrible than its violence when it 

 begins. The houses in those countries, which are made of tim- 

 ber, the better to resist its fury, bend to the blast like osiers, 

 and again recover their rectitude. The sun, which but a mo- 

 ment before blazed with meridian splendour, is totally shut out ; 

 and a midnight darkness prevails, except that the air is inces- 

 santly illuminated with gleams of lightning, by which one can 

 easily see to read. The rain falls, at the same time, in torrents; 

 and its descent has been resembled to what pours from the spouts 

 of our houses after a violent shower. These hurricanes are not 

 less offensive to the sense of smelling also, and never come 

 without leaving the most noisome stench behind them. If the 

 seamen also lay by their wet clothes, for twenty-four hours, they 

 are all found swarming with little white maggots, that were 

 brought with the hurricane. Our first mariners, when they 

 visited these regions, were ignorant of its effects, and the signs 

 of its approach ; their ships, therefore, were dashed to the bot- 

 tom at the first onset ; and numberless were the wrecks which 

 the hurricane occasioned. But, at present, being forewarned of 

 its approach, they strip their masts of all their sails, and thus 

 patiently abide its fury. These hurricanes are common in all 

 the tropical climates. On the coasts of Guinea they have fre- 

 quently three or four in a day, that thus shut out the heavens 

 for a little space ; and, when past, leave all again in former 

 sjilendour. They chiefly prevail, on that coast, in the intervals 

 of the trade-winds; the approach of which clears the air of its 

 meteors, and gives these mortal showers that little degree of 

 wholesomeness which they possess. They chiefly obtain there 

 during the months of April and May; they are known, ar 

 Loango, from January to April ; on the opposite coast of Africa, 

 the hurricane season begins in May; and, in general, whenever 

 a trade-wind begins to cease, these irregular tempests are found 

 to exert their fury. 



All this is terrible ; — but there is a tempest known in those 

 climates, more formiduble than any we have hitherto been des- 

 cribing, which is called, by the Spaniards, a Tornado. A& the 

 former was seen arriving from one part of the heavens, thus 



