n their successors, the
howling blasts of winter. Winter at Gould's Bluffs, so Galusha Bangs
discovered, was no light jest of the weather bureau. His first January
no'theaster taught him that. Lying in his bed at one o'clock in the
morning, feeling that bed tremble beneath him as the wind gripped the
sturdy gables of the old house, while the snow beat in hissing tumult
against the panes, and the great breakers raved and roared at the foot
of the bluff--this was an experience for Galusha. The gray dawn of the
morning brought another, for, although it was no longer snowing, the
wind was, if anything, stronger than ever and the seaward view from his
bedroom window was a picture of frothing gray and white, of flying spray
and leaping waves, and on the landward side the pines were bending and
threshing as if they were being torn in pieces. He came downstairs,
somewhat nervous and a trifle excited, to find Mr. Bloomer, garbed in
oilskins and sou'wester, standing upon the mat just inside the dining
room door. Zacheus, it developed, had come over to borrow some coffee,
the supply at the light having run short. As Galusha entered, a more
than usually savage blast rushed shrieking over the house, threatening,
so it seemed to Mr. Bangs, to tear every shingle from the roof.

"Goodness gracious!" exclaimed Galusha. "Dear me, what a terrible storm
this is!"

Zacheus regarded him calmly. "Commenced about ten last night," he
observed. "Been breezin' on steady ever since. Be quite consider'ble
gale if it keeps up."

Mr. Bangs looked at him with amazement.

"If it keeps up!" he repeated. "Isn't it a gale now?"

Zach shook his head.

"Not a reg'lar gale, 'tain't," he said. "Alongside of some gales I've
seen this one ain't nothin' but a tops'l breeze. Do you remember the
storm the night the Portland was lost, Martha?"

Miss Phipps, who had come in from the kitchen with a can of coffee in
her hand, shuddered.

"Indeed I do, Zacheus," she said; "don't remind me of it."

"Why, dear me, was it worse than this one?" asked Galusha.

Martha smiled. "It blew the roof off the barn here," she said, "and blew
down both chimneys on the house and both over at Cap'n Jeth's. So far
as that goes we had plenty of company, for there were nineteen chimneys
down along the main road in Wellmouth. And trees--mercy! how the poor
trees suffered! East Wellmouth lost thirty-two big silver-leafs and
the only two elms it had. Set out over a hundred years