However I kept on and mounted the
bank and descended a little way towards the sea, and there was the
surf in all its glory. I cannot give you an idea of its majestic
appearance. It was evidently very high, but that was not the most
striking part of it, for there was no such thing as going within a
considerable distance of it (the occasional outbreaks of the water
advancing so far) so that its magnitude could not be well seen. My
impression is that the height of the surf was from 10 to 20 feet. But
the striking part was the clouds of solid spray which formed
immediately and which completely concealed all the other operations of
the water. They rose a good deal higher than the top of the surf, so
the state of things was this. A great swell is seen coming, growing
steeper and steeper; then it all turns over and you see a face just
like the pictures of falls of Niagara; but in a little more than one
second this is totally lost and there is nothing before you but an
enormous impenetrable cloud of white spray. In about another second
there comes from the bottom of this cloud the foaming current of water
up the bank, and it returns grating the pebbles together till their
jar penetrates the very brain.
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