ntervals the party in the boat
beheld, through the driving clouds and rain, one or other of those
towering waterspouts; which, however, did not come nearer to them.

It is interesting to read the record left by a Christian missionary of
his conflicting feelings on that terrible occasion. Mr Ellis believed
that all hope of escape was over, and his mind went through that ordeal
which must be the experience of every one who sees the steady approach
of speedy death. He says that during those hours when he sat awaiting
his doom, the thought of death itself did not make a deep impression.
"The struggle, the gasp, as the wearied arm should attempt to resist the
impetuous waves; the straining vision, that should linger on the last
ray of retiring light, as the deepening veil of water would gradually
conceal it for ever; and the rolling billows heaving over the sinking
and dying body, which, perhaps ere life should be extinct, might become
the prey of voracious inhabitants of the deep;"--these things caused
scarcely a thought, compared with the immediate prospect of the
disembodied spirit being ushered into the presence of its Maker; the
account to be rendered, and the awful and unalterable destiny that would
await it there. "These momentous objects," he says, "absorbed all the
powers of the mind, and produced an intensity of feeling, which, for a
long time, rendered me almost insensible to the storm, or the liquid
columns which threatened our destruction."

It was now that the missionary could look back with deepest gratitude
upon that mercy which had first brought him to a knowledge of the
Saviour. "Him and Him alone," he adds, "I found to be a refuge, a rock
in the storm of contending feelings, on which my soul could cast the
anchor of its hope for pardon and acceptance before God... I could not
but think how awful would have been my state, had I in that hour been
ignorant of Christ, or had I neglected or despised the offers of his
mercy. Our prayers were offered to Him who is a present help in every
time of danger, for ourselves and those who sailed with us; and under
these and similar exercises several hours passed away."

Those prayers were answered, for the waterspouts gradually disappeared,
and the boat got safe to land.

In speaking of another waterspout, seen on a subsequent voyage, Mr
Ellis tells us that it was well defined,--an unbroken column from the
sea to the clouds, which on this occasion were neither d