The Lee County journal. (Leesburg, Ga.) 1904-19??, 1904-11-25
down
hroat, and made him slow dow


again.
But before he had gone a quarter
Of a mile he began to see that ne
could never reach the ravine. Inc
wind and dust were binding, and the
horses were growing almost uncon-
r0llable with fright. In the turbulent
west the sky was all a blush black,
and in the midst Of it he thought ne
could distinguish hugh, sWlrllng
mass Of inky darkness, the yerdeX OF
the whirlwind, coming down at the
speed Of an express train. 1t had grown
almost as dark as evening. The whole
sky was darkened, except for strip
Of livid pallor low in the east, like
sinister dawn.
He could never make the creek, but
he might get far enough from the Vii
lage to minimize the danger from eX-
pIosion. The tornado seemed several
miles away, and there were still few
minutes of grace. Between the dark
ness and the flying dust he could no
longer see the stones and rough spots
in the road, and growing reckless, he
let the panic-stricken team out
little faster, becoming too much eXclt-
ed to think Of the present risk. lie
dipped into a hollow, where a stream
crossed the road through a culyert,
ratified up the succeeding elevation,
and pulled up short as he reached the
top, suddenly appalled,.
The whole sky appeared to be fall
ing in, like an inky-black torrent, and
in the gloom he could make out the
gigantic, balloon-shaped cloud that
swept the earth with a grinding roar,
like the jar of some immense mill.
He jumped down, pulled out his
knife and cut the horses loose. They
fed down the road by which they had
come, and Matthews raced after them,
leaving the loaded wagon standing on
the top Of the hill.
He had no clear idea of where he
was going till he reached the culvert
at the bottom Of the hollow. He diyed
into the low opening Of the plank tun-
mel, crawled a few feet in, and lay
fiat in the mud and water
For a few seconds he covered
there, and quaked with fright. From
the opening at the end he could see
nothing but obscurity, and the air
seemed filled with cloud and dust.
For an instant there seemed g strange
lull, and then with redoubled and
deafening uproar the cyclone struck
and went over. He was actually
dragged toward the end Of the culvert
by the suction.
One of the planks overhead was
ripped away and went whirling into
the air. The mud and water spouted
up round him For one dreadful NOM
ent the earth seemed ground under
some prodigious force, and then the
darkness was split by brilliant flash
and a paralyzing conclusion. The
explosion was less a report than a
tremendous, shock, with rending and
dislocation of the atmosphere greater
than that of the tornado itself. Then
the air seemed suddenly struck calm,
and a rain of every sort of wreckage
showered down shingles, boards,
fragments of trees and pieces of fenc-
ing.
In his scattered wits, Matthews
thought the center of the cyclone had
gone past, and he peeped through the
gap over his head. The swirling
black cloud was no longer in exis-
tence. 1t appeared to have been split
asunder, and to have broken into a
number of smaller eddies that swept
the fields with immense velocity, but
with comparatively little force. The
great vortex was broken, split by the
explosion as a waterspout is broken
by a cannOn-shot. The tornado was
blown up.