From this spot of vantage could be discerned how that a wide tract of land, many acres in length, had separated from the main body and was sliding seaward in a tilted position. At the same moment from out the sea rose a black ridge, like the back of a whale, but this drew out and stretched itself parallel to the fissure. An awed silence had fallen on the spectators as they held their breath to watch the progress of the convulsion that was changing the outline of the coast and transforming its appearance. But suddenly a cry was heard, and next moment some one was seen running on the sloping and still sliding mass. It was not Jane Marley. It was a man carrying a carpet-bag. For some time none could make out who he was; but the Captain of the Excise, who had a glass, exclaimed that he was Dench, the ferryman. Olver appeared to be panic-stricken to such an extent as to have almost lost his senses. Seeing the crowd he ran towards it, along the path from the cottage till he came upon the gap that was rapidly widening and dividing him at every moment farther from the mainland. He seemed as though on board a vessel that was being swept out to sea, and frantically strove to escape from her to those who stood on the wharf observing him. Down into the separating chasm eyes looked, but could not make out the bottom; the depth contained a tossing mass of crumbled chalk and erupted pebble, with occasional squirts of water, some two or three hundred feet below the surface on the land side. It was like a mighty polypus mouth that had opened and was chewing and digesting its food in its throat and belly. Seeing this, mad with fear, shrieking like a woman, Olver turned and fled, to be again arrested by a mound that lifted before his eyes as though thrown up by a monstrous burrowing mole. Almost immediately this ridge changed its character, it split with a sharp snap, became a rent, and Dench's way was again cut off. Once more he turned, and this time ran in a seaward direction down the inclination, but when he caught sight of the churning water throwing up volumes of mud, and at the uprising slimy reef lifting itself out of the sea, he turned again, never letting go his hold of the bag, shrieking still, for in the unparalleled horror of the situation his brain had lost its balance. Those who looked on at the frantic man knew that it was not within human power to aid him. It was a mighty arena, and the spectators contemplated the solitary flying wretch pursued to his death by the relentless, invisible forces of Nature. Now he sought the cottage. It seemed to him in his dazed condition that he might find shelter there. But the door had been locked by himself and the key cast away. He stood and wiped from his brow the sweat that rained down and blinded him. And then a gleam of thought lighted his troubled mind. He considered that if he ran eastward and could outstrip the rent as it formed, he might yet attain solid and stationary land.