72 AT THE NORTH OF BE ARC AMP WATER. 
that a fiery sentence appeared to have been 
written on the sky. Another bolt was broad 
and straight, and went down into the forest like 
an arrow. It was so near and so brilliant that 
for almost a minute I could see nothing. The 
thunder which followed it began in the zenith, 
and rolled away, booming and crashing, in three 
directions, lasting so long that I wished I had 
timed it, to see for how many seconds its terrific 
echoes refused to subside. As many of its 
rumblings and mutterings resounded from the 
ravines and hillsides below me, the effect of this 
great peal was unlike any I had ever before 
heard. 
While I was listening to the sighing of the 
wind-tossed forest in the hollows eastward of 
the mountain, another sound reached my ears, 
and made me concentrate my senses in an effort 
to determine its nature. At the moment I 
heard it, I was somewhat below the peak, lean¬ 
ing against a wall of rock facing the south. 
The sound seemed to come from above. It 
resembled that made by a thin stick or shingle 
when whirled rapidly in the air. At the same 
time there was a creaking, and sounds almost 
like wailing and groaning. A moment later, a 
slender column of white cloud, a hundred feet 
or more in height, but proportioned like a hu¬ 
man figure, glided past the mountain over the 
