ing used
to thatching-work, and the making of traps, and so on, before very long
I built myself a pair of strong and light snow-shoes, framed with ash
and ribbed of withy, with half-tanned calf-skin stretched across, and
an inner sole to support my feet. At first I could not walk at all, but
floundered about most piteously, catching one shoe in the other, and
both of them in the snow-drifts, to the great amusement of the girls,
who were come to look at me. But after a while I grew more expert,
discovering what my errors were, and altering the inclination of the
shoes themselves, according to a print which Lizzie found in a book of
adventures. And this made such a difference, that I crossed the farmyard
and came back again (though turning was the worst thing of all) without
so much as falling once, or getting my staff entangled.

But oh, the aching of my ankles, when I went to bed that night; I was
forced to help myself upstairs with a couple of mopsticks! and I rubbed
the joints with neatsfoot oil, which comforted them greatly. And likely
enough I would have abandoned any further trial, but for Lizzie's
ridicule, and pretended sympathy; asking if the strong John Ridd would
have old Betty to lean upon. Therefore I set to again, with a fixed
resolve not to notice pain or stiffness, but to warm them out of me.
And sure enough, before dark that day, I could get along pretty freely;
especially improving every time, after leaving off and resting. The
astonishment of poor John Fry, Bill Dadds, and Jem Slocombe, when they
saw me coming down the hill upon them, in the twilight, where they were
clearing the furze rick and trussing it for cattle, was more than I
can tell you; because they did not let me see it, but ran away with one
accord, and floundered into a snowdrift. They believed, and so did every
one else (especially when I grew able to glide along pretty rapidly),
that I had stolen Mother Melldrum's sieves, on which she was said to fly
over the foreland at midnight every Saturday.

Upon the following day, I held some council with my mother; not liking
to go without her permission, yet scarcely daring to ask for it. But
here she disappointed me, on the right side of disappointment; saying
that she had seen my pining (which she never could have done; because
I had been too hard at work), and rather than watch me grieving so,
for somebody or other, who now was all in all to me, I might go upon my
course, and God's protectio