sudden, jist as she
moved one step nearer to him, she saw he was a dead man, and had been so
long there, part of the flesh had dropt off or dried off his face; and
it was that that made him grin that way, like a fox-trap. It was the
bone-house they was in. The place where poor, benighted, snow-squalled
stragglers, that perish on the mountains, are located, for their friends
to come and get them, if they want 'em; and if there ain't any body that
knows 'em or cares for 'em, why they are left there for ever, to dry
into nothin' but parchment and atomy, as it's no joke diggin' a grave in
that frozen region.

"As soon as she see'd this, she never said another blessed word, but
jist walked off with the livin' man's pike, and began to poke her way
down the mountain as careful as she cleverly could, dreadful tired, and
awful frighted.

"Well, she hadn't gone far, afore she heard her name echoed all round
her--Happy! Happy! Happy! It seemed from the echoes agin, as if there
was a hundred people a yelling it put all at once.

"Oh, very happy,' said she, 'very happy, indeed; guess you'd find it
so if you was here. I know I should feel very happy if I was out of it,
that's all; for I believe, on my soul, this is harnted ground, and the
people in it are possessed. Oh, if I was only to home, to dear Umbagog
agin, no soul should ever ketch me in this outlandish place any more,
_I_ know.'

"Well, the sound increased and increased so, like young thunder she was
e'en a'most skeared to death, and in a twitteration all over; and her
knees began to shake so, she expected to go for it every minute; when a
sudden turn of the path show'd her her husband and the poor squatter a
sarchin' for her.

"She was so overcome with fright and joy, she could hardly speak--and it
warn't a trifle that would toggle her tongue, that's a fact. It was
some time after she arrived at the house afore she could up and tell the
story onderstandable; and when she did, she had to tell it twice over,
first in short hand, and then in long metre, afore she could make out
the whole bill o' parcels. Indeed, she hante done tellin' it yet, and
wherever she is, she works round, and works round, till she gets Europe
spoke of, and then she begins, 'That reminds me of a most remarkable
fact. Jist after I was married to Mr. Lot, we was to the Alps.'

"If ever you see her, and she begins that way, up hat and cut stick,
double quick, or you'll find the road over the Alps to