The Wildfire Club Author:Emma Hardinge Britten Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: LIFE: A FEAGMENT. TpWAS night on the wild, stormy ocean. A noble ship JL heaved and struggled amidst the tossing billows which broke on the tremendous iron-bo... more »und rocks whose dark forms upheaved on one of the wildest parts of Northumberland. A thick pall of impenetrable blackness shadowed the wild waste of waters, lifted only by fitful gleams of the forked lightning. The demons of the air were shrieking in chorus to the hoarse booming of the mighty waves, while the roar of heaven's artillery broke in strong and awful cadence to the voices which made up the great hallelujah of the tempest. At times, amidst the crash of elemental strife, another and yet more appalling sound broke through the burdened air; — 'twas the heart-stirring cry of human agony — the tones of plaintive voices pleading with the God of the darkness and the storm for life — life ! the precious boon of life ! There were many doomed souls tossing in their ocean grave that night; for at length the dying ship, after many a gallant struggle, shivered and parted, and slowly yielded up her own last breath in the crushing arms of the mighty billows. Her noble crew and despairing passengers were launched into the boiling gulf of the trackless waters. None heard their death-shriek — no human eye saw them die-— beheld the tossing arms madly grappling with the 10 black air, or the writhing forms and staring eyes battling for life amidst the white surf which dashed them on the rude, pointed rocks near which they had been wrecked. And yet, high over all th,e dreadful sounds which made up the requiem of that ship's crew, two persistent wailing voices pleaded still for life. They were passengers on board — an old man and a young and very fair woman. The former was very rich, with a noble name and high descent. He was ...« less