tentous. The sense of personal danger, Mr. Ellis confesses, and the certainty of instant destruction if brought within their vortex, prevented a very careful observation of their appearance and accompanying phenomena.
The storm continued all day, and at intervals the party in the boat beheld, through the driving clouds and rain, one or other of those towering waterspouts; which, however, did not come nearer to them.
It is interesting to read the record left by a Christian missionary of his conflicting feelings on that terrible occasion. Mr. Ellis believed that all hope of escape was over, and his mind went through that ordeal which must be the experience of every one who sees the steady approach of speedy death. He says that during those hours when he sat awaiting his doom, the thought of death itself did not make a deep impression. "The struggle, the gasp, as the wearied arm should attempt to resist the impetuous waves; the straining vision, that should linger on the last ray of retiring light, as the deepening veil of water would gradually conceal it for ever; and the rolling billows heaving over the sinking and dying body, which, perhaps ere life should be extinct, might become the prey of voracious inhabitants of the deep;"—these things caused scarcely a thought, compared with the immediate prospect of the disembodied spirit being ushered into the presence of its Maker; the account to be rendered, and the awful and unalterable destiny that would await
