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.

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 lead towards him, yet such as he could not come
down, with any warmth remaining. Broad white curtains of the frost-fog
looped around the lower sky, on the verge of hill and valley, and above
the laden trees. Only round the sun himself, and the spot of heaven he
claimed, clustered a bright purple-blue, clear, and calm, and deep.

That night such a frost ensued as we had never dreamed of, neither read
in ancient books, or histories of Frobisher. The kettle by the fire
froze, and the crock upon the hearth-cheeks; many men were killed, and
cattle rigid in their head-ropes. Then I heard that fearful sound, which
never I had heard before, neither since have heard (except during that
same winter), the sharp yet solemn sound of trees burst open by the
frost-blow. Our great walnut lost three branches, and has been dying
ever since; though growing meanwhile, as the soul does. An