Perched on a hill-top overlooking
the village of Littleton, stood the humble log-house
in which the Morelys had taken refuge. It was
on the other side of the river from the village, and
was by the road full two miles distant. It had
been a poor place when they took possession of it;
and it was a poor place still though Morely’s
skilful hands had greatly improved it.
In summer it was a very pleasant place.
Behind it lay a wide stretch of sloping pasture-land,
and the forest crowned the hill. It was not a
very fertile spot, to be sure. It was full of
hillocks and hollows, and there were great rocks scattered
here and there through it, and places where the underwood
had sprung up again after the first clearing.
Later, when the November rains fell, and the wind blew
through the hollows, it was dreary enough. It
needed the sunshine to make it bright. But the
hill screened it from the bitter north; and it was
with a thankful heart that poor Alice Morely looked
forward to a safe and sheltered winter for her children.
At the time when the merry boys and
girls of Littleton were enjoying the last of the skating
on the mill-pond, the little Morelys were watching
the departure of their father for the distant city
of Montreal. Their clothes looked scant and
threadbare, and quite too thin for the season; but
there was an air of cleanliness, and order about them
which is rarely seen in connection with the poverty
which comes of evil-doing. Only five gravely
watched the retreating form of their father; the youngest a
babe of three months lay in the cradle,
and little Ben was in heaven.
There was something more than gravity
in the mother’s face as she stood watching also, something
more even than the sadness that would naturally follow
the separation from her husband. It was an unchanging
look not of pain exactly, but as if the
face could not easily be made to express any pleasing
emotion, such as hope or joy. She was a brave
little woman. She had dared much, and borne much,
for her husband’s sake; she had accepted the
sorrowful necessities of her lot with a patient courage
which could not have been predicted of one whose girlhood
had been so carefully sheltered from evil. Through
all her troubles she had been strong to endure, and
never, even in the worst times, had she quite lost
faith in her husband.
But as she saw him disappear round
the turn of the hill, and then came out of the sunshine
into the dimness of the deserted room, where her baby
lay in his cradle, a sense of being utterly forsaken
came over her, and for the moment she sank beneath
it. The want to which her children might be
soon exposed, the danger of temptation which she had
so dreaded for her husband, and the bitter feeling
of utter friendlessness and loneliness, overcame her.
She did not hear her baby cry, nor did she see her
little daughter’s look of wonder and terror,
as, with bitter weeping, she cast herself down, calling
aloud upon her father and her mother.
It was only for a moment. The
child’s terrified face recalled her to herself,
and by a great effort she grew quiet again. Well
might poor little Sophy look on with wonder and terror.
She had seen many sorrowful sights, but never, even
when they left their old home, or when little Ben
died, had her mother given way like this. “What
is the matter, mother? Are you ill? Speak
to me, mother.”
But her mother had no power to speak;
she could only lay herself down by her wailing baby,
quite exhausted. Sophy took up the child, and
cared for it and soothed it. She shut the door,
to keep her brothers out of the room, and in a little
while she said again
“What is it, mother? Can I do anything?”
“Yes, love; you must do all
for me and your brothers. I am quite unfitted
for anything to-night. If I can keep quiet, I
shall be better to-morrow. Give me baby, and
keep the boys out a little while. Oh! I
must get strong again!”
The house was quiet enough; the boys
needed no bidding to stay out among the falling snow;
and Sophy, having covered the window, that her mother
might sleep, crept in behind the curtain to watch the
snow-flakes.
Before it grew dark the earth was
white as far as the eye could see; the snow fell all
night too, and when Sophy opened the door in the morning,
it lay on the threshold as high as her waist.
In the single glimpse of sunshine that flashed forth,
how dazzling the earth looked! The fields around,
the valleys beneath, the river, the pond, and the hills
beyond, all were white.
“How beautiful!” she repeated
many times. It was a little troublesome, too,
she was willing to acknowledge by the time she had
gone backward and forward through it to the spring
for water, and to the wood-pile for wood, to last
through the day. It was neither pleasant nor
easy to do all that she had to do in the snow that
morning; but little Sophy had a cheerful heart and
a willing mind, and came in rosy and laughing, though
a little breathless when all was done. She needed
all her courage and cheerfulness, for her mother was
quite unable to rise; and whatever was to be done
either in the house or out of it, must be done by her
to-day.
“I am afraid the storm may prevent
the coming of the things your father was to get for
us,” said her mother; “and, Sophy dear,
you must make the best of the little we have till
I am strong again.”
“Oh, mother, never fear; there’s
plenty,” said the cheerful little Sophy.
“There’s some meal and flour, and some
tea and bread, and that’s all,”
she added, coming to a sudden stop. She had not
been accustomed of late to a very well-stored pantry,
yet even with her limited idea of abundance she was
a little startled at the scantiness of the supply.
“There’s no use in vexing
mother, though,” said she to herself; “if
the things don’t come to-day, they will be sure
to come to-morrow. There’s enough till
then if we take care.”
It snowed all the morning, but it
cleared up a little in the afternoon; that is, there
was every now and then a glimpse of sunshine as the
hurrying clouds failed to overtake each other in the
changing sky. Now and then, before it grew dark,
down the shallow ravine where the road lay there came
driving clouds of snow tokens of the mountainous
drifts that were to pile themselves up there before
the storm should be over.
How the wind raved round the little
house all night, threatening, as it seemed to Alice
Morely, to tear it down and scatter its fragments far
and wide! The first sight the weary little Sophy
saw in the morning was her mother’s pale, anxious
face looking down upon her.
“How you sleep, child!
I have been awake all night, expecting every moment
that we should be blown away. It does not seem
possible that the house can stand against this dreadful
wind much longer.”
“It is much stronger now than
when we came, mother dear,” said Sophy; “it
must have fallen long ago if the wind could blow it
down. Go to bed again, mother, and I will bring
your tea and take baby, and you shall rest.”
Mrs Morely had no choice but to lay
down again. She was trembling with cold and
nervous excitement, quite unable to sit up; and again
Sophy was left to the guidance of their affairs, both
within and without the house. This was a less
easy matter to-day, for the boys were growing weary
of being confined to the house, and the little ones
were fretful, and it needed all their sister’s
skill and patience to keep them amused and happy.
She did her very best. The daily
reading of the Testament was lengthened out by questions
and little stories, and then they sang the sweet Sabbath-school
hymns, which tell the praises of Him who came to save
sinners; and who in the greatness of His love died
on the cross, that all who believe in Him might have
everlasting life. So she kept them quiet while
the weary mother sought a little rest: and thus
the day wore on.
But all through the reading and the
singing and the talk, a vague fear kept crossing the
little girl’s mind. What if the things
so confidently expected from the village should not
come? Their little store of food was diminishing
rapidly. What if their father had forgotten them?
What if there was nothing awaiting them in the village?
Oh, that was too dreadful to be thought of!
But if there was food in the village for them, how
was it to be brought to them through the drifted snow?
She eagerly watched the window for
some sign that the storm was abating. The snow
that had seemed so beautiful at first filled her with
a vague fear now; it no longer fell softly and silently;
the wind bore it by in whirling masses, that hid the
river and the pond and the changing sky, and then
laid it down in the valleys and on the hill-sides,
to lie there, Sophy knew, till April showers and sunshine
should come to melt it away. It was vain to
look for any one coming with the expected food.
Except now and then in a momentary lull of the storm
it was quite impossible to see a rod beyond the window,
and these glimpses only served to show that they were,
on one side at least, quite shut in by a mountainous
drift.
Yes, Sophy began to be quite afraid
of the snow; tales that she had heard during her summer
visits to the mountains came to her mind how
in a single night the valleys would be filled, and
how whole flocks of sheep, and sometimes an unwary
shepherd, had perished beneath it. She remembered
how her grandfather had showed her a cottage where
a mother and her children had been quite shut in for
two nights and a day, till the neighbours had come
to dig them out; and how a lad who had gone out for
help before the storm was over had never come home
again, but perished on the moor, and how they only
found him in the spring time, when the snow melted
and showed his dead face turned towards the sky.
These things quite appalled her when she thought of
venturing out in the storm.
The little store of meal held out
wonderfully; the bread was put aside for her mother hidden,
indeed, that no little brother, hungry and adventurous,
might find it. That night the storm abated, but
towards morning it grew bitterly cold, so cold that
the little lads in their thin garments could not venture
out to play at making roads in the snow, and they
had to submit to another day’s confinement.
They went out a little towards afternoon, and came
in again merry and hungry, and by no means satisfied
with the scanty supper which their sister had prepared
for them.