nursing babe in her arms, and in answer received the information that
her house had just been swept into the lagoon.

This was the highest spot of land in miles, and already, in many
places on either hand, the great seas were making a clean breach of
the slender ring of the atoll and surging into the lagoon. Twenty
miles around stretched the ring of the atoll, and in no place was it
more than fifty fathoms wide. It was the height of the diving season,
and from all the islands around, even as far as Tahiti, the natives
had gathered.

"There are twelve hundred men, women, and children here," said Captain
Lynch. "I wonder how many will be here tomorrow morning."

"But why don't it blow?--that's what I want to know," Raoul demanded.

"Don't worry, young man, don't worry; you'll get your troubles fast
enough."

Even as Captain Lynch spoke, a great watery mass smote the atoll.

The sea water churned about them three inches deep under the chairs. A
low wail of fear went up from the many women. The children, with
clasped hands, stared at the immense rollers and cried piteously.
Chickens and cats, wading perturbedly in the water, as by common
consent, with flight and scramble took refuge on the roof of the
captain's house. A Paumotan, with a litter of new-born puppies in a
basket, climbed into a cocoanut tree and twenty feet above the ground
made the basket fast. The mother floundered about in the water
beneath, whining and yelping.