were struggling around the shoulder of Lansing Mountain and the
Bishop was rounding out an elegant period to the bewildered admiration
of Arsene, when the latter broke in with a sharp:

"Jomp, M'sieur l'Eveque, _jomp_!"

The Bishop jumped--or was thrown--ten feet into a snow-bank.

While he gathered himself out of the snow and felt carefully his
bulging breast pockets to make sure that everything was safe, he saw
what had happened.

The star-faced pony on the near side had slipped off the trail and
rolled down a little bank, dragging the other pony and Arsene and the
sled with him. It looked like a bad jumble of ponies, man and sled at
the bottom of a little gully, and as the Bishop floundered through the
snow to help he feared that it was serious.

Arsene, his body pinned deep in the snow under the sled, his head just
clear of the ponies' heels, was talking wisely and craftily to them in
the _patois_ that they understood. He was within inches of having his
brains beaten out by the quivering hoofs; he could not, literally,
move his head to save his life, and he talked and reasoned with them
as quietly as if he stood at their heads.

They kicked and fought each other and the sled, until the influence of
the calm voice behind them began to work upon them. Then their own
craft came back to them and they remembered the many bitter lessons
they had gotten from kicking and fighting in deep snow. They lay still
and waited for the voice to come and get them out of this.

As the Bishop tugged sturdily at the sled to release Arsene, he
remembered that he had seen men under fire. And he said to himself
that he had never seen a cooler or a braver man than this little
French-Canadian storekeeper.

The little man rolled out unhurt, the snow had been soft under him,
and lunged for the ponies' heads.

"Up, Maje! Easee, Lisette, easee! Now! Ah-a! Bien!"

He had them both by their bridles and dragged them skilfully to their
feet and up the bank. With a lurch or two and a scramble they were all
safe back on the hard under-footing of the trail.

Arsene now looked around for the Bishop.

"Ba Golly! M'sieur l'Eveque, dat's one fine jomp. You got hurt, you?"

The Bishop declared that he was not in any way the worse from the
tumble, and Arsene turned to his team. As the Bishop struggled back up
the bank, the little man looked up from his inspection of his harness
and said ruefully:

"Dat's bad, M'sieur l'Eveque. She's gone bu