storm. At the horizon,
a wicked, dull glare gave threat of the typhoon's approach. All as yet
was soundless, only the far-flung clouds told of the fury which was
hurling them ahead of the circling hurricane below.

"Then! A low, whirring whistle of the wind. Not like the moan of an
approaching tornado is this wind, but like the high-pitched note of an
engine running smoothly at high speed. Characteristic and peculiar,
boys, is that heralding wind, with a throbbing note in its character.
That day, too, came the white squalls, lasting a minute or two each,
with puffs of furious wind and a bucketful of rain, like bombs fired in
advance of the hurricane by some huge aeolian howitzer. Steadily the whir
of the advancing wind became louder, steady, without gusts, and more and
more frequent became the white squalls.

"Up, up and ever up came the sea, forced by the iron hand of the grim
wind-tyrant behind. The swells came faster and the tide rose. Against
the sea-wall the billows fell back, baffled, but, inch by inch, the
waters of the Gulf rose against the city. Man's hereditary enemy, the
Ocean, prepared itself for attack. Inch by inch the water gained, wound
its sinuous way through the channel in the bay, backed into nook and
cove and, long before the storm came, swirled a foot deep over land
which never before in the city's history had been under water, even in
the great storm of 1900.

"All day long, since midnight of the day before, three of us, up in the
Weather Bureau, kept watch by our instruments, at the telegraph wire and
the telephone. We had the men of Galveston to deal with, men who were
not afraid of danger, men who knew well what the word 'hurricane' meant.
All through that day an army was organized, an army of men that rested
neither for food nor sleep, warning those who were in the path of
danger, leading the women and children to safety, carrying the old and
sick upon their shoulders from regions where death was threatening.

"Our chief, at the Weather Office, summoned volunteers with motor-cycles
and these men went to every corner of the city with the news of the
approaching disaster. Through the streets rode these Paul Reveres,
carrying the cry of the warning, and on that Sunday not one house in the
entire city of Galveston was left unwarned. The city had lost six
thousand lives in the hurricane of 1900. It was not to be caught napping
a second time.

"At Seabrook, Texas, across the bay, Professor Stea