uffocating sensation he felt himself sinking lower and lower. The snow
was at his waist; then, as he was borne swiftly down, at his breast; and
the next instant at his lips; and all the while he was gliding downward
at railway speed.

"Melk! Help!" he cried hoarsely, as he was twisted violently round and
borne down backward; and then the snow seemed to leap right over him,
and all was dark.

What followed was blind confusion, in which Saxe struggled to fight back
the snow, so that he could breathe, for the sense of suffocation was
terrible. Then all at once the rapid gliding motion ceased, and in the
darkness he felt as if he were being held tightly in some terrible
embrace, which closed round him slowly and surely, till only his arms
were at liberty, and with these he fought.

And now he found that he still held the ice-axe that had been his
companion all day. It was stretched right out above him as far as he
could reach, and, as he moved it, to his intense joy he could see a pale
ray of light, one which increased as he moved the axe again, telling him
that, though he was buried, the head of the axe was above the level of
the snow.

His first efforts were to enlarge the hole that ran right up, very
little larger than the handle of the axe, though the beating with his
hand had formed quite a little hollow about his head.

"The snow has stopped, and I am only buried so deep," he thought to
himself, as the horrible feeling of panic began to subside. "If I can
make that hole bigger, so as to be able to breathe, I ought soon to be
able to creep out."

He worked away, enlarging the hole a little; but he had to observe the
greatest caution, for fear of filling the little perpendicular tunnel
with the loose snow. It was but little, still it enabled him to breathe
more freely; and as soon as he reached this pitch he began to strive to
raise himself, first one leg and then the other, to force himself out to
the surface.

And now the feeling of horror, which had passed away for the moment,
returned, as he grasped the fact that the loose snow, in which he had
been swept down, had been pressed together by the weight above it, till
to his waist he felt as if he were enclosed in solid ice.

In spite of his position the perspiration broke out upon his forehead,
and the wild horror which seized him nearly robbed him of his senses
till the reaction came.

"Melchior and Mr Dale will seek for me and dig me out," he though