ared to be
accelerated, and it then became of dazzling whiteness, elongating in
form till, dashing on the ground, it splashed around like molten lead or
quicksilver and disappeared. The next instant the hurricane again burst
forth, rushing amid the trees with the sound of a heartrending and
piercing scream, so loud as entirely to drown the human voice. The
whole building shook and trembled as if an earthquake was taking place
and it was about to be hurled to the ground. Mr Ferris, seizing
Ellen's arm, dragged her into a doorway.

"Should the house not withstand this furious blast, we shall be safer
here than anywhere else," he said.

Young Sandys followed them. Mr Twigg, with his wife and children, was
at the time in another room. Ellen naturally felt anxious for her
friends, and young Sandys offered to go and ascertain how they were
getting on. He quickly returned with the report that they were all
safe, and that the children were clinging round their parents, overcome
with terror, and shrieking piteously. No thunder was at any time heard,
and all agreed that even if the whole battery of a line-of-battle ship
had been going off, the sound would not have been distinguished above
the horrible roar and yelling of the wind and the noise of the ocean, as
its tumultuous waves dashed on the shore, threatening every instant to
sweep over the land and engulf all within their reach. The wind
continually shifted, now blowing from one quarter, now from another.
Suddenly the deafening noise sank into a solemn murmur, and the
lightning, which had hitherto played in flashes and forked darts,
hovered for a few seconds between the clouds and the earth, circling
round and round, causing the whole heavens to appear on fire, when a
similar luminous appearance seemed to burst from the ground, and,
rising, the mass rushed upwards to the sky. After a short interval,
again was felt the breath of the whirlwind with even greater fury than
before, and it seemed as if everything on the face of the earth would be
swept away into the boiling ocean. Again the earth was shaken, and the
house vibrated with a violence which threatened its instant destruction.
Mr Ferris kept a firm hold of his daughter's arm, and she, in a way
which surprised him as well as herself, maintained her composure during
the whole of this fearful strife of the elements. Not till daylight
returned did the fury of the tempest altogether cease; sometimes it
abated, a