red in fragments, and the full voice of the whirlwind roared
through the aisles. The trees crouched, and were stripped leafless; and
the sturdy oak, whose roots had embraced the earth for centuries, torn
from the deep darkness of its foundations, was uplifted on the wings of
the tempest. Darkness was spread over the earth. Lightnings gathered
together their terrors, and, clothed in the fury of their fearful
majesty, flashed through the air. The fierce hail was poured down as
clouds of ice. At the awful voice of the deep thunder, the whirlwind
quailed, and the rage of the tempest seemed spent.

Nothing was now heard save the rage of the troubled sea, which, lashed
into foam by the angry storm, still bellowed forth its white billows to
the clouds, and shouted its defiance loud as the war-cry of embattled
worlds. The congregation still sat mute, horrified, death-like, as if
waiting for the preacher to break the spell of the elements. He rose to
return thanks for their preservation, and he had given out the lines--

"Lord, in thy wrath rebuke me not,
Nor in thy hot rage chasten me,"

when the screams and the howling of women and children rushing wildly
along the streets, rendered his voice inaudible. The congregation
rose, and hurrying one upon another, they rushed from the church. The
exhortations of the preacher to depart calmly were unheard and unheeded.
Every seat was deserted, all rushed to the shore, and Agnes Crawford and
her children ran, also, in terror, with the multitude.

The wrecks of nearly two hundred boats were drifting among the rocks.
The dead were strewed along the beach, and amongst them, wailing widows
sought their husbands, children their fathers, mothers their sons, and
all their kindred; and ever and anon an additional scream of grief
arose, as the lifeless body of one or other such relation was found. A
few of the lifeless bodies of the hardy crews were seen tossing to and
fro; but the cry for help was hushed, and the yell of death was heard no
more.

It was, in truth, a fearful day--a day of lamentation, of warning, and
of judgment. In one hour, and within sight of the beach, a hundred and
ninety boats and their crews were whelmed in the mighty deep; and,
dwelling on the shore between Spittal and North Berwick, two hundred and
eighty widows wept their husbands lost.

The spectators were busied carrying the dead, as they were driven on
shore, beyond the reach of tide-mark. They had co