aching this terrible promontory.

He was on the northern side of the promontory when the storm came on,
and as the wind was from the north, it blew directly upon the shore. For
the fleet to make its escape from the impending danger, it seemed
necessary, therefore, to turn the course of the ships back against the
wind; but this, on account of the sudden and terrific violence of the
gale, it was impossible to do. The sails, when they attempted to use
them, were blown away by the howling gusts, and the oars were broken to
pieces by the tremendous dashing of the sea. It soon appeared that the
only hope of escape for the squadron was to press on in the desperate
attempt to double the promontory, and thus gain, if possible, the
sheltered water under its lee. The galleys, accordingly, went on, the
pilots and the seamen exerting their utmost to keep them away from the
shore.

All their efforts, however, to do this, were vain. The merciless gales
drove the vessels, one after another, upon the rocks, and dashed them to
pieces, while the raging sea wrenched the wretched mariners from the
wrecks to which they attempted to cling, and tossed them out into the
boiling whirlpools around, to the monsters that were ready there to
devour them, as if she were herself some ferocious monster, feeding her
offspring with their proper prey. A few, it is true, of the hapless
wretches succeeded in extricating themselves from the surf, by crawling
up upon the rocks, through the tangled sea-weed, until they were above
the reach of the surges; but when they had done so, they found
themselves hopelessly imprisoned between the impending precipices which
frowned above them and the frantic billows which were raging and roaring
below. They gained, of course, by their apparent escape, only a brief
prolongation of suffering, for they all soon miserably perished from
exhaustion, exposure, and cold.

Mardonius had no desire to encounter this danger again. Now the
promontory of Mount Athos, though high and rocky itself, was connected
with the main land by an isthmus level and low, and not very broad.
Xerxes determined on cutting a canal through this isthmus, so as to take
his fleet of galleys across the neck, and thus avoid the stormy
navigation of the outward passage. Such a canal would be of service not
merely for the passage of the great fleet, but for the constant
communication which it would be necessary for Xerxes to maintain with
his own dominions d