“You are right,” said I, “I am fond of the sound of thunder myself. There is nothing like it; Koul Adonai behadar; the voice of the Lord is a glorious voice, as the prayer-book version hath it.”
“There is something awful in it,” said Belle; “and then the lightning, the whole dingle is now in a blaze.”
“‘The voice of the Lord maketh the hinds to calve, and discovereth the thick bushes.’ As you say, there is something awful in thunder.”
“There are all kinds of noises above us,” said Belle; “surely I heard the crashing of a tree?”
“‘The voice of the Lord breaketh the cedar trees,’” said I, “but what you hear is caused by a convulsion of the air; during a thunder-storm there are occasionally all kinds of aërial noises. Ab Gwilym, who, next to King David, has best described a thunder-storm, speaks of these aërial noises in the following manner:—
‘Astonied now I stand at strains,
As of ten thousand clanking chains;
And once, methought, that overthrown,
The welkin’s oaks came whelming down;
Upon my head up starts my hair:
Why hunt abroad the hounds of air?
What cursed hag is screeching high,
Whilst crash goes all her crockery?”
You would hardly believe, Belle, that though I offered at least ten thousand lines nearly as good as those to the booksellers in London, the simpletons were so blind to their interest as to refuse purchasing them.”
“I don’t wonder at it,” said Belle, “especially if such dreadful expressions frequently occur as that towards the end; surely that was the crash of a tree?”
“Ah!” said I, “there falls the cedar tree—I mean the sallow; one of the tall trees on the outside of the dingle has been snapped short.”
“What a pity,” said Belle, “that the fine old oak, which you saw the peasants cutting up, gave way the other night, when scarcely a breath of air was stirring; how much better to have fallen in a storm like this, the fiercest I remember.”