s usual spirits,
the Rat said, 'Now then! I'll just take a look outside and see if
everything's quiet, and then we really must be off.'

He went to the entrance of their retreat and put his head out. Then
the Mole heard him saying quietly to himself, 'Hullo! hullo!
here--is--a--go!'

'What's up, Ratty?' asked the Mole.

'SNOW is up,' replied the Rat briefly; 'or rather, DOWN. It's snowing
hard.'

The Mole came and crouched beside him, and, looking out, saw the wood
that had been so dreadful to him in quite a changed aspect. Holes,
hollows, pools, pitfalls, and other black menaces to the wayfarer
were vanishing fast, and a gleaming carpet of faery was springing up
everywhere, that looked too delicate to be trodden upon by rough feet.
A fine powder filled the air and caressed the cheek with a tingle in its
touch, and the black boles of the trees showed up in a light that seemed
to come from below.

'Well, well, it can't be helped,' said the Rat, after pondering. 'We
must make a start, and take our chance, I suppose. The worst of it is, I
don't exactly know where we are. And now this snow makes everything look
so very different.'

It did indeed. The Mole would not have known that it was the same
wood. However, they set out bravely, and took the line that seemed
most promising, holding on to each other and pretending with invincible
cheerfulness that they recognized an old friend in every fresh tree that
grimly and silently greeted them, or saw openings, gaps, or paths with
a familiar turn in them, in the monotony of white space and black
tree-trunks that refused to vary.

An hour or two later--they had lost all count of time--they pulled
up, dispirited, weary, and hopelessly at sea, and sat down on a fallen
tree-trunk to recover their breath and consider what was to be done.
They were aching with fatigue and bruised with tumbles; they had fallen
into several holes and got wet through; the snow was getting so deep
that they could hardly drag their little legs through it, and the trees
were thicker and more like each other than ever. There seemed to be no
end to this wood, and no beginning, and no difference in it, and, worst
of all, no way out.

'We can't sit here very long,' said the Rat. 'We shall have to make
another push for it, and do something or other. The cold is too
awful for anything, and the snow will soon be too deep for us to wade
through.' He peered about him and considered. 'Look here,' he went on,