sidled away, and got closer, that the other sheep might be bitten first,
as the foolish things imagine; whereas no good sheep-dog even so much as
lips a sheep to turn it.

Then of the outer sheep (all now snowed and frizzled like a lawyer's
wig) I took the two finest and heaviest, and with one beneath my right
arm, and the other beneath my left, I went straight home to the upper
sheppey, and set them inside and fastened them. Sixty and six I took
home in that way, two at a time on each journey; and the work grew harder
and harder each time, as the drifts of the snow were deepening. No other
man should meddle with them; I was resolved to try my strength against
the strength of the elements; and try it I did, ay, and proved it. A
certain fierce delight burned in me, as the struggle grew harder; but
rather would I die than yield; and at last I finished it. People talk of
it to this day; but none can tell what the labour was, who have not felt
that snow and wind.

[Illustration: 361.jpg None can tell what the labour was]

Of the sheep upon the mountain, and the sheep upon the western farm, and
the cattle on the upper barrows, scarcely one in ten was saved; do what
we would for them, and this was not through any neglect (now that our
wits were sharpened), but from the pure impossibility of finding them
at all. That great snow never ceased a moment for three days and nights;
and then when all the earth was filled, and the topmost hedges were
unseen, and the trees broke down with weight (wherever the wind had not
lightened them), a brilliant sun broke forth and showed the loss of all
our customs.

All our house was quite snowed up, except where we had purged a way, by
dint of constant shovellings. The kitchen was as dark and darker than
the cider-cellar, and long lines of furrowed scollops ran even up to the
chimney-stacks. Several windows fell right inwards, through the weight
of the snow against them; and the few that stood, bulged in, and bent
like an old bruised lanthorn. We were obliged to cook by candle-light;
we were forced to read by candle-light; as for baking, we could not do
it, because the oven was too chill; and a load of faggots only brought a
little wet down the sides of it.

For when the sun burst forth at last upon that world of white, what he
brought was neither warmth, nor cheer, nor hope of softening; only a
clearer shaft of cold, from the violet depths of sky. Long-drawn alleys
of white haze seemed to