NIGHT AND STORM.

19

ered with a weight of snow. The wreaths andfancy drapery which, during the first storm, hadengaged the attention of children, and pleasedthe fancy with their forms of beauty and delicatetracery, had now increased until they were heavyblankets and burdensome loads. The featheryflakes, which at first were beds of down, had be-come solid banks. Everything was buried in theincreasing drifts, even trees and houses and fencesstood with muffled forms and burdened with asnowy mantle. The streets were covered withdrifts which were piled high and wide.

No attempt had been made to break the roads.The citizens had, for the third time, confinedthemselves to their houses, and had not evenopened the paths from the doors to the gates. Itwas, in fact, one of those blinding, buryingstorms which occasionally come upon northernhomes. The greatest comfort was in being athome and having the consciousness of the homefeeling. Even the cares of the world were shutout, and many had remained in doors refusing tobe called from the loved circle and comfortablefire. Those who were well housed felt a pleasure