'274 TERRIFIC STORM. 



anxious and alarmed at the signs of the coming storm. 

 The horses would not eat the grass that was almost 

 tickling their noses, but, with one ear forward and 

 the other back, showed by their restlessness a sense of 

 the approach of the demon of storm. The storm ap- 

 proached too like a demon. From the deep black 

 horizon vivid flashes of lightning dashed with uncounted 

 rapidity, the answering thunder not being in distinct 

 and separate claps, but in one sullen roar; nearer and 

 nearer it came with giant strides, while where I sat, all 

 was still quiet, save the slight complaining sound of an 

 occasional whirlwind among the trees. I could mark the 

 course of the storm, as it came nearer, as easily as that of 

 a troop of horse. First, the dust in dense clouds, with 

 leaves and grass, &c., was driven furiously along; then 

 came the rain (it ought to have had some other name, it 

 was no more like the thing called rain in England than the 

 Atlantic is like a pond), its force laid every thing flat 

 before it the lightning following with blinding brilliancy. 

 This storm was like a whole host of common thunder- 

 storms in a fury. The klooff that I was in offered me no 

 shelter against these torrents, and I was wet to the skin in 

 about one minute, the water running out of my clothes. 

 I was obliged to shut my eyes and cover them with my 

 hand, to stop the pain caused by the dazzling of the pale 

 blue sparks, which flew from one side of the horizon to 

 the other, and from the heavens to the earth, with 

 messages that no man could read. The whole thing was 

 like the encounter of a vast host, one fleeing, the other 

 pursuing it came and was gone in half an hour. The 



