against the sides of the house had so deadened the sound within, that
the party ensconced there could hear little beyond the whistling of the
wind round the eaves of the house.

Frank returned to those within, after carefully closing the door again
behind him, just like the dove messenger came back to Noah and his
imprisoned family in the ark!

Like the bearer of the olive branch, he too was a herald of glad
tidings.

"There is a change," said he, addressing himself to Mr Meldrum, "and I
think, sir, we'll soon be able to get out again."

"I'm glad to hear that," replied the other, getting up to look; but he
came back even sooner than Frank, and did not seem quite so jubilant.

"I'm afraid the shift of the wind will not do us much good, as far as
getting about is concerned," he said. "It will only tend to drift the
snow where it has not penetrated before; and may very probably shut us
in more firmly than ever. I notice one good thing, however, that the
snowstorm has done. It has covered over the house, and we will be all
the warmer should it start freezing again!"

"But won't it break down the roof?" said Mrs Major Negus, alarmed at
this.

"Oh, no!" replied Mr Meldrum, "the roof is too strongly built for that;
besides which, we're under the lee of the cliff that protects us from
this very wind. Still, I hope we'll have a chance of getting some more
Kerguelen cabbage before the snow commences to fall heavily again, as
I've no doubt it will. I ought to have laid in a stock when we went
rabbit shooting that time. In this sort of treacherous climate one
should take advantage of every fine day and provide for the next."

"You forget," said Mrs Major Negus, "sufficient for the day is the evil
thereof!"

"But it don't say the good, only the evil, ma'rm; mind that," put in Mr
Lathrope. "Some folks seem to take a pleasure in twisting Scripture
contrariwise, jest to suit theer own squintin'-one-eye-skimmin'-the-pot-
and-t'other-lookin'-up-the-chimbley sort of conscience!"

"Some people," retorted the lady, "never apply the parable of the mote
and the beam, because they can't see their own faults."

"We should live and let live," said Mr Meldrum, trying to put a stop to
a sort of argument which was endlessly going on between the pair of
combatants, much to his annoyance generally, when Florry created a
diversion.

"Look!" she exclaimed. "Puss has caught another mouse!"

"Thar, boss," said Mr Lathrope laugh