Page 101 - English Class 08

catastrophe : disaster
What do you think about the stranger?
“The Slide! The Slide!”
The simplest words must intimate, but not portray, the unutterable horror of the

catastrophe. The victims rushed from their cottages and sought refuge in what they deemed
a safer spot – where, in contemplation of such emergency, a sort of barrier had been reared.
Alas! they had quitted their security and fled right into the pathway of destruction. Down

came the whole side of the mountain, in a cataract of ruin. Just before it reached the house,
the stream broke into two branches – shivered not a window there, but overwhelmed the
whole vicinity, blocked up the road and destroyed everything in its dreadful course. Ere long
the thunder of the great slide had ceased to roar among the mountains; the mortal agony
had been endured, and victims were at peace. Their bodies were never found.

The next morning, the light smoke was seen stealing from the cottage chimney up the

mountain side. Within, the fire was yet smouldering in the hearth and the chairs in a circle
around it as if the inhabitants had but gone forth to view the devastation of the slide, and
would shortly return, to thank Heaven for their miraculous escape. All had left separate
tokens, by which those who had known the family were made to shed a tear for each. Who
has not heard their names? The story has been told far and wide and will forever be a

legend of these mountains. Poets have sung their fate.

There were circumstances which led some to suppose that a stranger had been received
into the cottage on this awful night and had shared the catastrophe of all its inmates — Woe
for the high souled youth with his dream of Earthly Immortality! His name and person
utterly unknown; his history, his way of life, his plans, a mystery never to be solved; his
death and his existence equally a doubt! Whose was the agony of that moment?

English-8 101