166 Sea Sands 



and most beautiful display on a stretch of western 

 sand. The giant waves move unruffled by any 

 superficial wind, and burst at last upon a golden and 

 drowsy shore-line. No gulls creak or scream at their 

 threat of ruin, and the sky is bare of the wisps and 

 masses of cloud that promise storm. Here is the 

 power of tempest without its fear ; the wrath that 

 stirred this commotion of the waters burst, hours 

 or days ago, on some distant zone of ocean, and is 

 now a bygone tale. 



We can bathe among the rollers where they first 

 trip and founder on the sands, shooting through 

 each wall of water as it pauses, and regaining our 

 feet in time to meet the next. As the shallows sap 

 its feet beneath it, the roller nods forward majesti- 

 cally from above ; it bows in a glassy front, and tears 

 the lines of foam upon its summit into a rainbowed 

 mane. Its weight as it falls is half-stunning ; and 

 sooner or later one may follow its predecessor too 

 quickly to give time for the new dive. It is easier 

 and hardly less exhilarating to plunge among the 

 surf after the crash. The broken water bubbles 

 like champagne, and has a stinging freshness under 

 the glow of the sun. 



Belts of sand-dunes are common along the 

 western coasts ; but from the general absence of 

 other high land they assume a characteristic im- 

 portance round the shores of the North Sea. The 

 North Sea has been eaten out of the land of Europe 

 late in geological time, just as its extension or ap- 

 pendix, the Zuyder Zee, has been formed by subsi- 

 dence and inundation yet more recently. South of 



