is lost
to sight in the driving snow.

Ho--well and good! But after that, well, it would just serve things
generally right if Axel were to manage by himself after all, and get
at the ax without help from any one. He strains all the muscles of his
chest to lift the huge weight that bears him down; the tree moves, he
can feel it shake, but all he gains by that is a shower of snow. And
after a few more tries, he gives up.

Growing dark now. Brede is gone--but how far can he have got? Axel
shouts again, and lets off a few straightforward words into the
bargain. "Leave me here to die, would you, like a murderer?" he cries.
"Have ye no soul nor thought of what's to come? And the worth of a
cow, no less, to lend a helping hand. But 'tis a dog you are and ever
were, Brede, and leaving a man to die. Ho, but there's more shall know
of this, never fear, and true as I'm lying here. And won't even come
and reach me that ax...."

Silence. Axel strains away at the tree once more, lifts it a little,
and brings down a new shower of snow. Gives it up again and sighs;
he is worn out now, and getting sleepy. There's the cattle at home,
they'll be standing in the hut and bellowing for food, not a bite nor
a drop since the morning; no Barbro to look to them now--no. Barbro's
gone, run off and gone, and taken both her rings, gold and silver,
taken them with her. Getting dark now, ay, evening, night; well,
well.... But there's the cold to reckon with too; his beard is
freezing, soon his eyes will freeze too as well; ay, if he had but his
jacket from the tree there ... and now his leg--surely, it can't be
that--but all the same one leg feels dead now up to the hip. "All in
God's hands," he says to himself--seems like he can talk all godly and
pious when he will. Getting dark, ay; but a man can die without the
light of a lamp. He feels all soft and good now, and of sheer humility
he smiles, foolishly and kindly, at the snowstorm round; 'tis God's
own snow, an innocent thing! Ay, he might even forgive Brede, and
never say a word....

He is very quiet now, and growing ever more sleepy, ay, as if some
poison were numbing him all over. And there is too much whiteness to
look at every way; woods and lands, great wings, white veils, white
sails; white, white ... what can it be? Nonsense, man! And he knows
well enough it is but snow; he is lying out in the snow; 'tis no fancy
that he is lying there, pinned down beneath a tree.

He shouts again a