266 NATATORES. 



day, the cormorant is nodding on the peak, all the birds have 

 fed themselves full on the fatness of the sea : not a wing is 

 to be seen, not a sound to be heard. You came to see the 

 city of the birds : it is their sepulchre the city of the plague. 

 Those lanes in the little village paved with feathers and 

 down, must have been rendered so soft to the tread by the 

 slaughter of all the winged wanderers of the deep, and 

 nestle rs in the rocks. 



Never despair. That sea which now lies so glassy under 

 you, would, at the call of the west wind, bound in vollied 

 spray up that fearful precipice, and drench and even dash 

 you from your footing ; and the contrast between the repose 

 and the activity of its inhabitants may, for aught you know, 

 be as great. Sound the tocsin. Your cry the shout of a 

 multitude on the height would not avail. Tumble down 

 one of those masses of stone. But, if you are not accustomed 

 to such places (and if you are, you will feel the poverty of 

 words), step back instantly, lest you follow it. Crash! It 

 has hit once ; but the sound is single. Again ! Thunder ! 

 There is rolling, booming, and echoing. The stone has taken 

 effect ; the cliffs are smitten. A shrilly wail rings along the 

 upper ledge, as if it were the war-cry of some savage tribe ; 

 and the storm petrels dart outward simultaneously like a 

 flight of arrows. But the din below is as if you had 

 awakened the elements \ and the bellowing of the sea, the 

 thunder of the sky, and the hurtling sound of the tumbling 

 earth, were confounded together. Anon, forth fare the 

 phalanx, hiding the sea, and agitating the air, till they pro- 

 duce a wind even where you stand. The fulmars in myriads, 

 like a grey smoke ; here and there a shag or a cormorant, 

 like a dark cinder of the disturbing fire. They widen, they 

 close, they wheel, they tumble, they scream, they wail, as if 

 chaos were come ; and as the sound spreads over the sea, up 

 spring the gannets from another islet, like the white steam 



