ming towards us. At the head
of this procession we were placed, and then we all advanced together
towards the temple where human victims were wont to be sacrificed!

A thrill of horror ran through my heart as I recalled to mind the awful
scenes that I had before witnessed at that dreadful spot. But
deliverance came suddenly from a quarter whence we little expected it.
During the whole of that day there had been an unusual degree of heat in
the atmosphere, and the sky assumed that lurid aspect which portends a
thunderstorm. Just as we were approaching the horrid temple, a growl of
thunder burst overhead, and heavy drops of rain began to fall.

Those who have not witnessed gales and storms in tropical regions can
form but a faint conception of the fearful hurricane that burst upon the
island of Mango at this time. Before we reached the temple the storm
burst upon us with a deafening roar; and the natives, who knew too well
the devastation that was to follow, fled right and left through the
woods in order to save their property, leaving us alone in the midst of
the howling storm. The trees around us bent before the blast like
willows, and we were about to flee in order to seek shelter when the
teacher ran toward us with a knife in his hand.

"Thank the Lord," he said, cutting our bonds, "I am in time! Now, seek
the shelter of the nearest rock."

This we did without a moment's hesitation, for the whistling wind burst,
ever and anon, like thunderclaps among the trees, and tearing them from
their roots, hurled them with violence to the ground. Rain cut across
the land in sheets, and lightning played like forked serpents in the
air, while high above the roar of the hissing tempest the thunder
crashed and burst and rolled in awful majesty.

In the village the scene was absolutely appalling. Roofs were blown
completely off the houses in many cases, and in others the houses
themselves were levelled with the ground. In the midst of this the
natives were darting to and fro--in some instances saving their goods,
but in many others seeking to save themselves from the storm of
destruction that whirled around them. But terrific although the tempest
was on land, it was still more tremendous on the mighty ocean. Billows
sprang, as it were, from the great deep, and while their crests were
absolutely scattered into white mist, they fell upon the beach with a
crash that seemed to shake the solid land. But they did not end th