THE WAR OF THE ELEMENTS.





_NO_ June day ever opened with a fairer promise. Not a single cloud
flecked the sky, and the sun coursed onward through the azure sea
until past meridian, without throwing to the earth a single shadow.
Then, low in the west, appeared something obscure and hazy, blending
the hill-tops with the horizon; an hour later, and three or four
small fleecy islands were seen, clearly outlined in the airy ocean,
and slowly ascending--avant-couriers of a coming storm. Following
these were mountain peaks, snow-capped and craggy, with desolate
valleys between. Then, over all this arctic panorama, fell a sudden
shadow. The white tops of the cloudy hills lost their clear,
gleaming outlines and their slumbrous stillness. The atmosphere was
in motion, and a white scud began to drive across the heavy, dark
masses of clouds that lay far back against the sky in mountain-like
repose.

How grandly now began the onward march of the tempest, which had
already invaded the sun's domain and shrouded his face in the smoke
of approaching battle. Dark and heavy it lay along more than half
the visible horizon, while its crown invaded the zenith.

As yet, all was silence and portentous gloom. Nature seemed to pause
and hold her breath in dread anticipation. Then came a muffled,
jarring sound, as of far distant artillery, which died away into an