value of these clouds lies in their slowness of movement, and consequent
effect in soothing the mind. Outside the hurry and drive of life a rest
comes through the calm of nature. As the swell of the sea carries up the
pebbles, and arranges the largest farthest inland, where they accumulate
and stay unmoved, so the drifting of the clouds, and the touch of the
wind, the sound of the surge, arrange the molecules of the mind in still
layers. It is then that a dream fills it, and a dream is sometimes better
than the best reality. Laugh at the idea of dreaming where there is an
odour of tar if you like, but you see it is outside intolerable
civilisation. It is a hundred miles from the King's Road, though but just
under it.

There is a scheme on foot for planking over the ocean, beginning at the
bottom of West Street. An immense central pier is proposed, which would
occupy the only available site for beaching the smacks. If carried out,
the whole fishing industry must leave Brighton,--to the fishermen the
injury would be beyond compensation, and the aspect of Brighton itself
would be destroyed. Brighton ought to rise in revolt against it.

All Brighton chimney-pots are put on with giant cement, in order to bear
the strain of the tremendous winds rushing up from the sea. Heavy as the
gales are, they seldom do much mischief to the roofs, such as are
recorded inland. On the King's Road a plate-glass window is now and then
blown in, so that on hurricane days the shutters are generally half shut.
It is said that the wind gets between the iron shutters and the plate
glass and shakes the windows loose. The heaviest waves roll in by the
West Pier, and at the bottom of East Street. Both sides of the West Pier
are washed by larger waves than can be seen all along the coast from the
Quarter Deck. Great rollers come in at the concrete groyne at the foot of
East Street. Exposed as the coast is, the waves do not convey so intense