OCEAN PLAINS 



113 



and glassy, and rest perfectly still as though 

 beaten into quietude. 



The driving rain that waves through the air, 

 like the folds of a huge flag unfurling in the 

 breeze, is something very different. The drops 

 are small and fierce enough in their impact, but 

 striking the sea diagonally they make no pit- 

 ting. Tlrey seem to lash the surface with long 

 lines of trembling spray, or break it into little 

 waves that go shivering and quivering in er- 

 ratic dashes with each new gust; but the effect 

 is only of momentary duration. In heavy seas, 

 when the wind is blowing with hurricane force, 

 the fall of rain is even less marked. The wind 

 seems to drive it into mist and mingle it with 

 scud and rack, until at times they are not dis- 

 tinguishable apart. 



Sometimes before thunder showers and 

 squalls of wind comes an odd feature of the 

 sea — the water spout. It is caused by wind 

 and, so far as I know, is the same phenomenon 

 as the great dust whirls which one sees on the 

 deserts. The dust whirl is a long, thin column, 

 sometimes twenty-five hundred feet in height, 

 which moves in a solemn, stately fashion across 

 the sands, its head in the sky, its foot on the 

 earth, catching up sand and dust in its hollow 

 trough, whirling it high in air, and finally, 



Drinng 

 rain. 



The crater 

 spoul. 



