to pour with
vehemence. "I hope we shall not be flooded in this hollow," said I to
Belle. "There is no fear of that," said Belle: "the wandering people,
amongst other names, call it the dry hollow. I believe there is a
passage somewhere or other by which the wet is carried off. There must
be a cloud right above us, it is so dark. Oh! what a flash!"

"And what a peal," said I; "that is what the Hebrews call _Koul
Adonai_--the voice of the Lord. Are you afraid?"

"No," said Belle, "I rather like to hear it."

"You are right," said I; "I am fond of the sound of thunder myself. There
is nothing like it; _Koul Adonai behadar_; the voice of the Lord is a
glorious voice, as the prayer-book version hath it."

"There is something awful in it," said Belle; "and then the lightning,
the whole dingle is now in a blaze."

"'The voice of the Lord maketh the hinds to calve, and discovereth the
thick bushes.' As you say, there is something awful in thunder."

"There are all kinds of noises above us," said Belle; "surely I heard the
crashing of a tree?"

"'The voice of the Lord breaketh the cedar trees,'" said I, "but what you
hear is caused by a convulsion of the air; during a thunderstorm there
are occasionally all kinds of aerial noises. Ab Gwilym, who, next to
King David, has best described a thunderstorm, speaks of these aerial
noises in the following manner:--

'Astonied now I stand at strains,
As of ten thousand clanking chains;
And once, methought, that overthrown,
The welkin's oaks came whelming down;
Upon my head up starts my hair:
Why hunt abroad the hounds of air?
What cursed hag is screeching high,
Whilst crash goes all her crockery?'

You would hardly believe, Belle, that though I offered at least ten
thousand lines nearly as good as those to the booksellers in London, the
simpletons were so blind to their interest as to refuse purchasing them."

"I don't wonder at it," said Belle, "especially if such dreadful
expressions frequently occur as that towards the end; surely that was the
crash of a tree?"

"Ah!" said I, "there falls the cedar tree--I mean the sallow; one of the
tall trees on the outside of the dingle has been snapped short."

"What a pity," said Belle, "that the fine old oak, which you saw the
peasants cutting up, gave way the other night, when scarcely a breath of
air was stirring; how much better to have fallen in a storm like this,
the fiercest I remember."