the wind was growing
fiercer and the cold more bitter.

For a moment I quailed inwardly; but I felt Virginia snuggled down by me
in what seemed to be perfect trust; and I brushed the snow from my
eye-opening and pushed on--hoping that I might by pure accident strike
shelter in that wild waste of prairie, and determined to make the fight
of my life for it if I failed.

It was getting dusk. The horses were tiring. We plunged through a deep
drift under the lee of a knoll; and I stopped a few moments to let them
breathe. I knew that stopping was a bad symptom, unless one had a good
reason for it--but I gave myself a good reason. I felt Virginia pulling
at my sleeve; and I turned back the robes and looked at her. She pulled
my ear down to her lips.

"I know you now," she shouted. "It's Teunis!" I nodded; and she squeezed
my arm with her two hands. Give up! Not for all the winds and snows of
the whole of the Iowa prairie! I disarranged the robes while I put my
arm around her for a moment; while she patted my shoulder. Then, putting
tendernesses aside, when they must be indulged in at the expense of snow
in the sleigh, I put my horses into it again. A few minutes ago, I gave
you the thoughts that ran through my mind as I conjured up the image of
one lost in such a storm; but now I thought of nothing--only for a few
minutes after that pressure on my arm--but getting on from moment to
moment, keeping my sleigh from upsetting, encouraging those brave
mares, and peering around for anything that might promise shelter.
Virginia has always told of this to the children, when I was not
present, to prove that I am brave, even if I am mortal slow; and if just
facing danger from minute to minute without looking further, is bravery,
I suppose I am--and there is plenty of good courage in the world which
is nothing more, look at it how you will.

So far, the cutter and team of which I had robbed Buck Gowdy, had been a
benefit to us. They gave us transportation, and the warm sleigh in which
to nest down. I began to wonder, now, as it began to grow dark, as the
tempest greatened, as my horses disappeared in the smother, and as the
frost began to penetrate to our bodies, whether I should not have done
better to have stayed in the schoolhouse, and burned up the partitions
for fuel; but the thought came too late; though it troubled me much. Two
or three times, one of the mares fell in the drifts, and nothing but the
courage bred into them in