Dolph gazed about him in mute delight and wonder, at these scenes of nature’s magnificence.  To the left the Dunderberg reared its woody precipices, height over height, forest over forest, away into the deep summer sky.  To the right strutted forth the bold promontory of Anthony’s Nose, with a solitary eagle wheeling about it; while beyond, mountain succeeded to mountain, until they seemed to lock their arms together, and confine this mighty river in their embraces.  There was a feeling of quiet luxury in gazing at the broad, green bosoms here and there scooped out among the precipices; or at woodlands high in air, nodding over the edge of some beetling bluff, and their foliage all transparent in the yellow sunshine.

In the midst of his admiration, Dolph remarked a pile of bright, snowy clouds peering above the western heights.  It was succeeded by another, and another, each seemingly pushing onwards its predecessor, and towering, with dazzling brilliancy, in the deep-blue atmosphere:  and now muttering peals of thunder were faintly heard rolling behind the mountains.  The river, hitherto still and glassy, reflecting pictures of the sky and land, now showed a dark ripple at a distance, as the breeze came creeping up it.  The fish-hawks wheeled and screamed, and sought their nests on the high dry trees; the crows flew clamorously to the crevices of the rocks, and all nature seemed conscious of the approaching thunder-gust.

The clouds now rolled in volumes over the mountain tops; their summits still bright and snowy, but the lower parts of an inky blackness.  The rain began to patter down in broad and scattered drops; the wind freshened, and curled up the waves; at length it seemed as if the bellying clouds were torn open by the mountain tops, and complete torrents of rain came rattling down.  The lightning leaped from cloud to cloud, and streamed quivering against the rocks, splitting and rending the stoutest forest trees.  The thunder burst in tremendous explosions; the peals were echoed from mountain to mountain; they crashed upon Dunderberg, and rolled up the long defile of the highlands, each headland making a new echo, until old Bull hill seemed to bellow back the storm.

For a time the scudding rack and mist, and the sheeted rain, almost hid the landscape from the sight.  There was a fearful gloom, illumined still more fearfully by the streams of lightning which glittered among the rain-drops.  Never had Dolph beheld such an absolute warring of the elements:  it seemed as if the storm was tearing and rending its way through this mountain defile, and had brought all the artillery of heaven into action.