fear, nigh baffles the efforts of the rescuers, straining to the utmost a rope held by them, whose entire strength fails to check the terrified animals that have already been swept past [Illustration: _Sheep and Lambs._] the place of safety, and come driving full on to another cottage, nearer the front of the picture; an exhausted ox has reached this spot, and now, breathless, with bloody nostrils and eyes possessed with the madness of fear, strives in vain to save itself. The dumb agony of this beast is fearful; being nigh spent with the violence of the flood which sweeps over its flanks, the forefeet wrestle fruitlessly, and the animal will soon be borne away to destruction. The principal group, in which the chief interest of the picture concentrates, is placed on the roof of the nearest cottage. The people have saved themselves, but little else, so sudden was the coming of the flood. Right in the front sits a woman with a cradle beside her, of which the clothes are tossed aside, and the infant who occupies it lies in her lap; round her neck the child clings, ignorant, but yet alarmed. The woman’s action tells the horror and fear predominating in her soul. Fear for herself and fear for the infant relax even her grasp on its body, letting it rest almost wholly on her knees (the hands, however, instinctively making a guard), which terror has drawn up towards her; while, with forth-thrust neck and head, she glares at the approaching torrent out of large, rounded and dilated eyes, that have no glance for the infant now, but see in the struggling beast a presage of death for both. Her jaw is set back, paralyzed with dread; her mouth is open, the lips are retracted and hard, the eyebrows are up and yet compressed, the cheek pallid and rigid with lines of fear, her hair is dishevelled and her dress is disarranged. In short, this figure is a perfect study of expression, the success of which does honour to the artist. He has done well to show her momentary indifference to the child; for this is a new point of character, beyond question just and natural, which alone would remove the picture from the conventional order of works of Art.