The boat, the boatmen, their curious oars, the strange noises they made, and the attendant catamarans to pick up the passengers if the boat upsets, being all new to my eyes, and particularly odd in themselves, so strongly engaged my attention, that I had no leisure to think of the danger till the boat was cast violently on the beach.

The very first time I landed, the whole party were pitched out heels over head on the shore.

I thought it a mighty odd way of landing; but supposing it to be all regular and proper, I scrambled up the wet sand, and merely muttered,--"What the devil will the fellows do next ?" The surf at Madras consists of two distinct lines of breakers on the beach, running parallel to each other and to the shore.

These foaming ridges are caused by a succession of waves curling over and breaking upon bars or banks, formed probably by the reflux action of the sea carrying the sand outwards.

The surf itself, unquestionably, owes its origin to the long sand of the ocean-swell coming across the Bay of Bengal, a sweep of nearly five hundred miles, from the coasts of Arracan, the Malay peninsula, and the island of Sumatra.