rgot that it was raining heavily, and ran down to the great bed
of boulders at the end of the village, where, as the huge waves came in,
they drove up the massive stones, which varied in size from that of a
man's head to that of a Cheshire cheese, sending them some
distance up towards the cliff, and then, as the wave retired,
_boomble_--_roomble_--_doomble, doomble_--_doom_, they rolled back again
one over the other, as if mockingly defying the retiring wave to come
and do that again.

Here was the secret of how pebbles and shingle and boulders were made,
grinding one another smooth as were driven one over the other for
hundreds and hundreds of years till they were as smooth as the rock upon
which they beat.

This was exciting enough for a time, but, regardless of rain and wind,
Dick ran along the cliff to a place he knew, a very shelf in the rock
which went down perpendicularly to a deep little cove, in which he felt
sure that the sea would be beating hard.

"It's just a hundred feet," he said, "because Josh told me, and I shall
be able to see how high a wave can come."

He said this, but only to himself, for as he hurried along the cliff
there were moments when he could hardly get his breath for the force of
the wind which beat full in his face.

Once or twice he hesitated, wondering whether it was safe to proceed in
such a storm.

He laughed at his fears, though, as he stood in shelter for a few
moments, and then went on again, to, reach the spot he sought, and find
to his great delight that the rock bulged out, so that without danger he
could look right down upon the sea; while another discovery he made was,
that though he seemed to be standing right facing the wind he was in
comparative calm.

It paid for the journey, for as he advanced to the edge he could see low
down that the waves were churning up foam which the wind caught as it
was finished and sent right up in a cloud of flakes and balls light as
air in a regular whirl, to come straight up past him, higher and higher
above his head, till the very summit of the cliff was reached, when away
it went in a drift landward.

Why was it quite calm where he stood, and yet the full force of the
Atlantic gale coming full in his face?

It was a puzzle to Dick Temple. The wind was blowing so hard that it
was cutting the foamy tops from the waves, and sweeping all along like a
storm of tremendous rain. It seemed to him that he should be blown flat
against th