many were inclined toward one
another like huts and roofs, many lay upon one another like mighty
clods. Not far from where the children stood, several boulders were
inclined together, and over them lay broad slabs like a roof. The little
house they thus formed was open in front, but protected in the rear and
on both sides. The interior was dry, as not a single snow-flake had
drifted in. The children were very glad that they were no longer in the
ice, but stood on the ground again.

But meanwhile it had been growing dark.

"Sanna," said the boy, "we shall not be able to go down today, because
it has become night, and because we might fall or even drop into some
pit. We will go in under those stones where it is so dry and warm, and
there we will wait. The sun will soon rise again, and then we shall run
down from the mountain. Don't cry, please, don't cry, and I shall give
you all the things to eat which grandmother has given us to take
along."

The little girl did not weep. After they had entered under the stone
roof where they could not only sit comfortably, but also stand and walk
about she seated herself close to him and kept very quiet.

"Mother will not be angry," said Conrad, "we shall tell her of the heavy
snow that has kept us, and she will say nothing; father will not,
either. And if we grow cold, why then we must slap our hands to our
bodies as the woodcutters did, and then we shall grow warm again."

"Yes, Conrad," said the girl.

Sanna was not at all so inconsolable because they could not run down the
mountain and get home as he might have thought; for the immense
exertion, of whose severity the children hardly had any conception, made
the very sitting down seem sweet to them, unspeakably sweet, and they
did not resist.

But now hunger asserted itself imperiously. Almost at the same time,
both took their pieces of bread from their pockets and began to eat.
They ate also the other things, such as little pieces of cake, almonds,
raisins, and other trifles, which grandmother had put into their
pockets.

"Sanna, now we must clean the snow from our clothes," said the boy, "so
that we shall not become wet."

"Yes, Conrad," replied Sanna.

The children went before their little house. Conrad first brushed off
his little sister. He grasped the corners of her coat and shook them,
took off the hat he had put on her head, emptied it of snow and wiped
off the snow that remained in it. Then he rid himself as b