The night, as we have already said, had been calm, but gloomy and oppressive. Now, however, the wind had sprung up, and, by the time Kennedy commenced his journey home, it was not only tempestuous but increasing in strength and fury every moment. This, however, was not all;--the rain came down in torrents, and was battered against his person with such force that in a few moments he was drenched to the skin. So far, it was wind and rain--dreadful and tempestuous as they were. The storm, however, was only half opened. Distant flashes of lightning and sullen growls of thunder proceeded from the cloud masses to the right, but it was obvious that the thunderings above them were only commencing their deep and terrible pealings. In a short time they increased in violence and fury, and resembled, in fact, a West Indian hurricane more than those storms which are peculiar to our milder climates. The tempest-voice of the wind was now in dreadful accordance! with its power. Poor Kennedy, who fortunately knew every step of the rugged road along which he struggled and staggered, was frequently obliged to crouch himself and hold by the projecting crags about him, lest the strength of the blast might hurl him over the rocky precipices by the edges of which the road went. With great difficulty, however, and not less danger, he succeeded in getting into the open highway below, and into a thickly inhabited country. Here a new scene of terror and confusion awaited him. The whole neighborhood around him were up and in alarm. The shoutings of men, the screams of women and children, all in a state of the utmost dread and consternation, pierced his ears, even through the united rage and roaring of the wind and thunder. The people had left their houses, as they usually do in such cases, from an apprehension that if they remained in them they might be buried in their ruins. Some had got ladders, and attempted, at the risk of their lives, to secure the thatch upon the roofs by placing flat stones, sods, and such other materials, as by their weight, might keep it from being borne off like dust upon the wings of the tempest. Their voices, and! screams, and lamentations, in accordance, as they were, with the uproar of the elements, added a new feature of terror to this dreadful tumult. The lightnings now became more vivid and frequent, and the pealing of the thunder so loud and near, that he felt his very ears stunned by it. Every cloud, as the lightnings flashed from it, seemed to open, and to disclose, as it were, a furnace of blazing fire within its black and awful shroud. The whole country around, with all its terrified population running about in confusion and dismay, were for the moment made as clear and distinct to the eye as if it were noonday, with this difference, that the scene borrowed from the red and sheeted flashes a wild and spectral character which the light of day never gives. In fact, the human figures, as they ran hurriedly to and fro, resembled those