over all the rocks;
torrents above; foam below. Then the roaring was redoubled. No uproar of
men or beasts could yield an idea of that din which mingled with the
incessant breaking of the sea. The clouds cannonaded, the hailstones
poured their volleys, the surf mounted to the assault. As far as eye
could reach, the sea was white; ten leagues of yeasty water filled the
horizon. Doors of fire were opened, clouds seemed burnt by clouds, and
showed like smoke above a nebulous red mass, resembling burning embers.
Floating conflagrations rushed together and amalgamated, each changing
the shape of the other. From the midst of the dark roof a terrible
arsenal appeared to be emptied out, hurling downward from the gulf,
pell-mell, waterspouts, hail torrents, purple fire, phosphoric gleams,
darkness, and lightnings.

Meanwhile Gilliatt seemed to pay no attention to the storm. His head was
bent over his work. The second framework began to approach completion.
To every clap of thunder he replied with a blow of his hammer, making a
cadence which was audible even amidst that tumult. He was bareheaded,
for a gust had carried away his _galerienne_.

He suffered from a burning thirst. Little pools of rain had formed in
the rocks around him. From time to time he took some water in the hollow
of his hand and drank. Then, without even looking upward to observe the
storm, he applied himself anew to his task.

All might depend upon a moment. He knew the fate that awaited him if his
breakwater should not be completed in time. Of what avail could it be to
lose a moment in looking for the approach of death?

The turmoil around him was like that of a vast bubbling cauldron. Crash
and uproar were everywhere. Sometimes the lightning seemed to descend a
sort of ladder. The electric flame returned incessantly to the same
points of the rock, where there were probably metallic veins. Hailstones
fell of enormous size. Gilliatt was compelled to shake the folds of his
overcoat, even the pockets of which became filled with hail.

The storm had now rotated to the west, and was expending its fury upon
the barricades of the two Douvres. But Gilliatt had faith in his
breakwaters, and with good reason. These barricades, made of a great
portion of the fore-part of the Durande, took the shock of the waves
easily. Elasticity is a resistance. The experiments of Stephenson
establish the fact that against the waves, which are themselves elastic,
a raft of timbe