"Is it not strange that they should rise like this--like a wall
from the water?" Wulf said. "Had they been built up by human hands
they could scarcely have been more erect and regular. I have never
seen anything at all like it on land."

"Then it must be something formed by the sea, Wulf. Do you see those
caverns at the foot of the cliff, and in some places you see there
is a mound of rocks as if newly formed? It may be that this white
stone is soft, and that the sea beating against the foot wears it
away in time, and then the rock overhead gives way by its weight
and so leaves an upright wall. Perhaps, long back, these hills were
like other hills, sloping gradually down into the sea; but in time,
perhaps many, many years before the Romans landed here, the sea
began to eat them away, and has continued to do so ever since, until
they are as we see them."

"That may be so, Beorn. My father has told me that he could remember
when our estates stretched a good half-mile farther seaward, but
had since been eaten away by the waves, and he says that his father
had told him the same thing; therefore, as you say, in many hundreds
of years even hills, if the stone were soft, might also be worn
away. There we are rounding the point, and beyond there are no more
cliffs; doubtless it is in this bay that the Shipmaster Edred thinks
to anchor."

At that moment their conversation was cut short by a tremendous
gust of wind rushing down the sloping hill into the bay striking
them with such terrible force that the ship heeled over until the
water rushed above the bulwark. The men were thrown against each
other, and several fell down to leeward. The confusion was heightened