thing had been observed just before great mountain-slides. This long
rain, too, was just the kind of cause which was likely to loosen the
strata of rock piled up in the ledges; if the dreaded event should ever
come to pass, it would be at such a time.

He paced his chamber uneasily until long past midnight. If the morning
came without accident, he meant to have a careful examination made of
all the rents and fissures above, of their direction and extent, and
especially whether, in case of a mountain-slide, the huge masses would
be like to reach so far to the east and so low down the declivity as the
mansion.

At two o'clock in the morning he was dozing in his chair. Old Sophy had
lain down on her bed, and was muttering in troubled dreams.

All at once a loud crash seemed to rend the very heavens above them: a
crack as of the thunder that follows close upon the bolt,--a rending and
crushing as of a forest snapped through all its stems, torn, twisted,
splintered, dragged with all its ragged boughs into one chaotic ruin.
The ground trembled under them as in an earthquake; the old mansion
shuddered so that all its windows chattered in their casements; the
great chimney shook off its heavy cap-stones, which came down on the
roof with resounding concussions; and the echoes of The Mountain roared
and bellowed in long reduplication, as if its whole foundations were
rent, and this were the terrible voice of its dissolution.

Dudley Venner rose from his chair, folded his arms, and awaited his
fate. There was no knowing where to look for safety; and he remembered
too well the story of the family that was lost by rushing out of the
house, and so hurrying into the very jaws of death.