The Lake County star., 1877-05-24
Storms On the English Coast

Such great storms, my companion
told me, come periodically. Every
five years or 90 the ocean gives yawn,
as It were, kicks over its barriers,
shakes its name at the little village,
and throws stones at the outlying
houses. The latter, therefore. intrench
themselves behind sturdy wall of
compact masonry, built round three
sides ofa square. But nothing entire
ly avails against the burly besieger !;
yonder stands blighted mansion,
whose lower story was entered last
year by several hundred tons of rude
sea-pebbles, which knocked, indeed, at
door and windows, but came In without
staying for an answer, carrying win
dows and door with them. No writ of
ejectment or prosecution has been serv-
ed on the trespassers, and they still re-
main In possession. Probably the as
founding effrontery of the outrage at
once and forever quelled all spirit of
opposition. Certainly It would be
hard to devise q more terrific way Of
awakening peaceful householder In
the dead OF night; and what II he pos
sessed q wine-cellar!
Three centuries ago, according to my
porter, searchange happened here
which really deserves to be called
strange. At that time q small river
(by no means an insignificant one,
however, ~ English rivers go) flowed
peacefully through the l0wland, and
found its exit to the ocean beside this
same small fshing-village, upon which
It conferred some little maritime i'm
portance. Ever since Julius Ceear's
eye for the picturesque brought him
over to Britain, and for how long be-
forethat we know not, this quiet stream
had pursued Its accustomed course,
with no more idea Of altering It than
the Conservative party In England has
Of altering its policy on the Eastern
question. One winter night, however,
during the latter half of the sixteenth
century, q hurricane began to blow,
the like OF which had never been
known before. 9 The sea, 90 to speak,
reared straight up on end, and stalked
over the Land like an army Of giants.
The surf broke miles inland, amid se.
questered farms and over green coun-
try lanes. It was the conviction of
those who retained their senses suffi-
oiently to be conscious Of any convic-
tion at all that the traditional subjects
Of Britannia had organized q success
fll rebellion, and that the fright
little, ught little island" was not
water-tight, but, on the contrary, was
incontinently become part Of the sea-
bottom. The storm ragged for three
days, after which there was an i'm
pr0vement, % far - weather was con-
cerned.
But when. at last, the appalled, fish,
ermen ventured to thrust their heads
inquiringly outside their windows, 10!
they had lost their river. Amazed,
they staggered forth, and sought dis
gone, and there was not 80 much as q
pint Of ditch-water LEFT to show where
It had been. It was nota case Of amir
an elopement; the most heart1ess in
stance Of geographical unfaithfuIness
that I ever heard of. One of the vii
layers, wandering foriorn some miles
TO the northward, all at cnCe stumbled
upon q stream which he had never
seen In that part Of the country before.
Oppressed with dark suspicion. he
followed it up toward its source. and
u the trait0r0us current which he and
his fellows had mourned - dead. It
occupied its unlawful bed with 90 much
demure self.possession, and smiled I'm
its betrayed ones face 80 placidly, that
had it been possible still to doubt he
would have done So It was an Inn
pressive story, and might, I thought,
% worked up Into romantic and pa
thetic novel in three volumes, in
which the heroine, II not the plot,
should be entirely unhsckneyed and
original. It would be difYicult, how
ever, 10 infiict poetical Justice In the