[Illustration: OLD HOUSES, PONT AUDEMER.]
A storm passed over the town one night in August, which shook the great
rafters of the old houses, and made the timbers strain; the water flowed
from them as from the sides of a ship--one minute they were illuminated,
the next, they were in blackest gloom. In two or three hours it has all
passed away, and as we go out into the silent town, and cross the street
where it forms a bridge over the Rille (the spot from which the next
sketch was taken), a faint gleam of light appears upon the water, and
upon the wet beams of one or two projecting gables. The darkness and the
'dead' silence are soon to be disturbed--one or two birds fly out from
the black eaves, a rat crosses the street, some distant chimes come upon
the wind, and a faint clatter of sabots on the wet stones; the town
clock strikes half-past three, and the watchman puts out his lantern,
and goes to sleep. The morning is breaking on Pont Audemer, and it is
the time for surprises--for the sudden appearance of a gable-end, which
just now was shadow, for the more gradual, but not less curious,
formation of a street in what seemed to be space; for the sudden
creation of windows in dead walls, for the turning of fantastic shadows
into palpable carts, baskets, piles of wood, and the like; and for the
discovery of a number of coiled-up dogs (and one or two coiled-up men)
who had weathered the night in sheltered places.
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