100 
THE CABINET OF NATURAL HISTORY 
hit by one of those momentary gusts which fall; and where, 
as Burns expressively has it, the wind is every where 
blowing 
“ As 'twould blaw its last,” 
it lashes a portion of the surge to a greater elevation than it 
can bear; or, some bank or hidden rock from below arrests 
it in its course; and down it thunders in brawling and foam, 
interrupting the succession, and embroiling its successors in 
its fate. 
Even when seen from the pebbly beach of a lee-shore, 
the ocean in a storm is a sight both to be enjoyed and re- 
membered. The wave comes rolling onward, dark and 
silent, till it meets with the reflux of its predecessor, which 
produces a motion to seaward on the ground, and throws the 
approaching wave off its equilibrium. Its progress is arrest- 
ed for a moment; the wall of water vibrates, and as it now 
meets the wind, instead of moving before it, its crest be- 
comes hoary with spray; it shakes — it nods — it curls for- 
ward, and for a moment the liquid column hangs suspended 
in the air; but down it dashes in one volume of snow-white 
foam, which dances and ripples upon the beach. There is 
an instant retreat, and the clean and smooth pebbles, as they 
are drawn back by the reflux of the water, emulate in more 
harsh and grating sounds the thunder of the wave. 
Here we may see what a wonderful thing motion is. 
What is so bland and limpid as still water! what substance 
half so soft and fine as the motionless atmosphere! The 
one does not loosen a particle of sand: the other — you 
must question with yourself, and even add a little faith to 
feeling, before you be quite sure of its existence. But arm 
them once with life, or with that which is the best emblem 
and the most universal indication of life, motion, and they 
are terrible both in their grandeur and their power. The 
sand is driven like stubble; the solid earth must give way; 
and the rocks are rent from the promontory, and flung in 
ruins along its base. Need we, therefore, wonder that the 
masts and cordage that man constructs should be rent as if 
they were gossamer, and his navies scattered like chaff? 
The grandest scenes, however, are found at those places 
where former storms have washed away all the softer parts, 
and the caverned and rifted rocks — the 'firm skeleton of the 
globe, as it were — stand out to contend with the turmoiling 
waters. The long roll of the Atlantic upon the Cornish 
coast; a south-easter upon the cliffs of Yorkshire, or among 
the stupendous caves to the eastward of Arbroath; a north- 
easter in the Bullers of Buchan; or, better still, the whole 
mass of the Northern ocean dashed by the bleak north wind 
against the ragged brows of Caithness and Sunderland; 
those — that especially — are situations in which, if it can be 
viewed in these islands, the majesty of the deep may be 
seen. Upon the last, in the acme of its sublimity, one dares 
hardly look. The wind blows ice; and the spray, which 
dashes thick over five hundred feet of perpendicular cliffs, 
falls in torrents of chilling rain; while the vollied stones, 
which the surges batter .against the cliffs, the hissing of the 
imprisoned air in the unperforated leaves, and the spouting 
water through those that are perforated, and the dashing and 
regurgitation of the latter, as it falls in the pauses of the 
commotion, produce a combination of the terrible, which 
the nerves of those who are unaccustomed to such scenes 
can hardly bear. 
And yet there is an enchantment — a fascination almost to 
madness — in those terrible scenes. Mere height often has 
this singular effect, which is alluded to by the Philosopher 
of Poets, in his admirable description of Dover cliff: 
“ I’ll look no more ; 
Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight 
Topple down headlong.” 
But when the elements are in fury — when the earth is 
rocking, and the sea and sky reeling and confounding their 
distinctive characters in one tremendous chaos — when, in 
all that is seen, the common laws of nature seem to be abro- 
gated, and her productions of peace cast aside, in order that 
there may be an end of her works, and that the sway of 
“the Annarch old” may again be universal — the heroism | 
of desperation — that which tempers the soldier to the strife 
of the field, and the sailor to the yet more terrible conflict 
on the flood — comes, and comes in its power — and the dis- 
position to dash into the thickest of the strife, and die in the 
death-struggle of nature, is one of the most powerful feel- 
ings of one who can enter into the spirit of the mighty 
scene. 
We leave those who allocate the feelings of men accord- 
ing to the scale of their artificial systems, to find the place 
of this singular emotion, and call it a good or an evil one, 
as they choose. But we have been in the habit of feeling 
and thinking that it is an impulse of natural theology — one 
of those unbidden aspirations toward his Maker which man 
feels when the ties that bind him to nature and the earth 
appear to be loosening, and there remains no hope, but in 
the consciousness of his God, and of that eternity, the gate 
of which is in the shadow of death. Thus, amid the fury 
of the elements, the unsophisticated hopes of man cling to 
Him, who “rideth in th.e whirlwind and directeth the 
storm.” 
But beautiful or sublime as the ocean is, according to 
situation and circumstances, we should lose its value, were 
we to look upon it only as a spectacle, and were the emo- 
tions that it produced to be only the dreams of feeling, 
however touching, or however allied to religion. To ad- 
