nes--dancing, leaping, striding, racing around, and mingling
altogether in unparalleled confusion. With these were intertwined
undulating snakes of green, and behind these was a broad mass of
lesser light. Simultaneously came from every part of the tumbling
sky what may be called a shout; since, though no shout ever came
near it, it was more of the nature of a shout than of anything else
earthly. In the meantime one of the grisly forms had alighted upon
the point of Gabriel's rod, to run invisibly down it, down the chain,
and into the earth. Gabriel was almost blinded, and he could feel
Bathsheba's warm arm tremble in his hand--a sensation novel and
thrilling enough; but love, life, everything human, seemed small and
trifling in such close juxtaposition with an infuriated universe.

Oak had hardly time to gather up these impressions into a thought,
and to see how strangely the red feather of her hat shone in this
light, when the tall tree on the hill before mentioned seemed on fire
to a white heat, and a new one among these terrible voices mingled
with the last crash of those preceding. It was a stupefying blast,
harsh and pitiless, and it fell upon their ears in a dead, flat blow,
without that reverberation which lends the tones of a drum to more
distant thunder. By the lustre reflected from every part of the
earth and from the wide domical scoop above it, he saw that the
tree was sliced down the whole length of its tall, straight stem, a
huge riband of bark being apparently flung off. The other portion
remained erect, and revealed the bared surface as a strip of white
down the front. The lightning had struck the tree. A sulphurous
smell filled the air; then all was silent, and black as a cave in
Hinnom.

"We had a narrow escape!" said Gabriel, hurriedly. "You had better
go down."

Bathsheba said nothing; but he could distinctly hear her rhythmical
pants, and the recurrent rustle of the sheaf beside her in response
to her frightened pulsations. She descended the ladder, and, on
second thoughts, he followed her. The darkness was now impenetrable
by the sharpest vision. They both stood still at the bottom, side by
side. Bathsheba appeared to think only of the weather--Oak thought
only of her just then. At last he said--

"The storm seems to have passed now, at any rate."

"I think so too," said Bathsheba. "Though there are multitudes of
gleams, look!"

The sky was now filled with an incessant ligh