motes of tbe 



a lantern under the ice, you frighten everything 

 off. 



Occasionally, if not extremely careful, you are 

 treated to an experience, at night, that may have 

 a ludicrous or a painful termination. The sloping 

 of an area of ice may be considerable, yet the ap- 

 pearance is that of a dead level. You step with 

 confidence and suddenly you find yourself sliding. 

 Any struggle will surely throw you off your feet, 

 and if you steadily slide down, down, you find 

 yourself moving with increasing speed and have 

 no idea of where you will bring up. This fright- 

 ens you, or did me, when I slipped into a crack 

 about two feet wide, but finding my feet touching 

 the meadow, I felt that I was safe. In many a way 

 in this life it is easier to slip in than to creep out, 

 and so I found that wide crack very ready to ac- 

 cept all comers but not willing to assist at their de- 

 parture. I had nothing to clutch at that I might 

 draw myself upward, and my struggling tended 

 rather to deepen my footmarks in the yielding 

 mud. At first I was disposed to laugh; then 

 growing weary, I began to look more seriously at 

 the situation, seeing no way out of my predica- 

 ment. Why for so long a time it never occurred 

 to me to walk along the crack to some other 

 point, I do not know, but the idea came at last, 

 and a friendly stick upon which I managed to get 

 a foothold enabled me to lean far forward on the 

 ice, and gradually I crawled out. 

 76 



