"Under the forepart of the house,there are cellars built of stone,but not arched.To these,however,there was no access except on the outside;and I knew from my own experience that Susan could not have gone a step beyond the door,without being carried away by the storm,and probably killed on the spot.The only chance seemed to be that of breaking through the floor.But when the old Cook and myself resolved on this,we found that we had no instrument with which it would be possible to do it.It was now clear that we had only God to trust in.
The front windows were giving way with successive crashes,and the floor shook as you may have seen a carpet on a gusty day in London.Iwent into our bedroom;where I found Susan,Tyrrell,and a little Colored girl of seven or eight years old;and told them that we should probably not be alive in half an hour.I could have escaped,if I had chosen to go alone,by crawling on the ground either into the kitchen,a separate stone building at no great distance,or into the open fields away from trees or houses;but Susan could not have gone a yard.She became quite calm when she knew the worst;and she sat on my knee in what seemed the safest corner of the room,while every blast was bringing nearer and nearer the moment of our seemingly certain destruction.--"The house was under two parallel roofs;and the one next the sea,which sheltered the other,and us who were under the other,went off,I suppose about ten o'clock.After my old plan,I will give you a sketch,from which you may perceive how we were situated:--[In print,a figure representing a floor-plan appears here]
The _a_,_a_are the windows that were first destroyed:_b_went next;my books were between the windows _b_,and on the wall opposite to them.The lines _c_and _d_mark the directions of the two roofs;_e_is the room in which we were,and 2is a plan of it on a larger scale.Look now at 2:_a_is the bed;_c_,_c_the two wardrobes;_b_the corner in which we were.I was sitting in an arm-chair,holding my Wife;and Tyrrell and the little Black child were close to us.We had given up all notion of surviving;and only waited for the fall of the roof to perish together.
"Before long the roof went.Most of the materials,however,were carried clear away:one of the large couples was caught on the bedpost marked _d_,and held fast by the iron spike;while the end of it hung over our heads:had the beam fallen an inch on either side of the bedpost,it must necessarily have crushed us.The walls did not go with the roof;and we remained for half an hour,alternately praying to God,and watching them as they bent,creaked,and shivered before the storm.
"Tyrrell and the child,when the roof was off,made their way through the remains of the partition,to the outer door;and with the help of the people who were looking for us,got into the kitchen.A good while after they were gone,and before we knew anything of their fate,a Negro suddenly came upon us;and the sight of him gave us a hope of safety.When the people learned that we were in danger,and while their own huts were flying about their ears,they crowded to help us;and the old Cook urged them on to our rescue.He made five attempts,after saving Tyrrell,to get to us;and four times he was blown down.
The fifth time he,and the Negro we first saw,reached the house.The space they had to traverse was not above twenty yards of level ground,if so much.In another minute or two,the Overseers and a crowd of Negroes,most of whom had come on their hands and knees,were surrounding us;and with their help Susan was carried round to the end of the house;where they broke open the cellar window,and placed her in comparative safety.The force of the hurricane was,by this time,a good deal diminished,or it would have been impossible to stand before it.
"But the wind was still terrific;and the rain poured into the cellars through the floor above.Susan,Tyrrell,and a crowd of Negroes remained under it,for more than two hours:and I was long afraid that the wet and cold would kill her,if she did not perish more violently.Happily we had wine and spirits at hand,and she was much nerved by a tumbler of claret.As soon as I saw her in comparative security,I went off with one of the Overseers down to the Works,where the greater number of the Negroes were collected,that we might see what could be done for them.They were wretched enough,but no one was hurt;and I ordered them a dram apiece,which seemed to give them a good deal of consolation.
"Before I could make my way back,the hurricane became as bad as at first;and I was obliged to take shelter for half an hour in a ruined Negro house.This,however,was the last of its extreme violence.By one o'clock,even the rain had in a great degree ceased;and as only one room of the house,the one marked _f_;was standing,and that rickety,--I had Susan carried in a chair down the hill,to the Hospital;where,in a small paved unlighted room,she spent the next twenty-four hours.She was far less injured than might have been expected from such a catastrophe.
"Next day,I had the passage at the entrance of the house repaired and roofed;and we returned to the ruins of our habitation,still encumbered as they were with the wreck of almost all we were possessed of.The walls of the part of the house next the sea were carried away,in less I think than half an hour after we reached the cellar:when I had leisure to examine the remains of the house.