THE EARTH. 139 



and under a bed of some hundred feet deep, yet 

 they were luckily taken out alive ; the weight of 

 the snow being supported by a beam that kept 

 up the roof; and nourishment being supplied 

 them by the milk of an ass, if I remember right, 

 that was buried under the same ruin.* 



[* " A remarkable and well authenticated case of a woman surviving 

 nearly eight days, buried in the snow, without food, has occurred, this spring^ 

 near Impington, in Cambridgeshire. An account of it has been published 

 by Mr Okes, surgeon, from which we extract the following particulars. 



" Elizabeth Woodcock, aged 42, of a slender, delicate make, on her re- 

 turn from Cambridge, on the evening of the 2d of February, being fatigued 

 and exhausted with running after her horse which had started from her, and 

 becoming incapable of proceeding, from the numbness of her hands and feet, 

 sat down on the ground. At that time but a small quantity of the snow 

 had drifted near her, but it began to accumulate very rapidly ; and when 

 Chesterton bells rang at eight o'clock, she was completely enclosed and 

 hemmed in by it. To the best of her recollection, she slept very little during 

 the first night, or indeed any of the succeeding nights or days, except Friday 

 the 8th. On the morning of the 3d, the first after her imprisonment, ob- 

 serving before her a circular hole in the snow, about two feet in length and 

 half a foot in diameter, running obliquely upwards through the mass, and 

 closed with a thin covering of ice or snow, she broke off a branch of a busli 

 that was close to her, and with it thrust her handkerchief through the hole, 

 as a signal of distress. 



" In consequence of this, the external air being admitted, she felt herself 

 very cold. On the second morning, the hole was again closed up, and con- 

 tinued so till the third day, after which time it remained open. She heard 

 distinctly the ringing of the village bells, noises on the highway, and even 

 the conversation of some gypsies who passed near her, but could not make 

 herself heard. She easily distinguished day and night, and could even read 

 an almanack she took from her pocket. The sensation of hunger ceased al- 

 most entirely after the first day. -Thirst was throughout her predominant 

 feeling; and this she had the plentiful means of allaying, by sucking the 

 surrounding snow. She felt no gratification from the use of her snuff*. On 

 Friday the 8th, when a thaw took place, she felt uncommonly faint and 

 languid : her clothes were wet quite through by the melted snow ; and the 

 aperture became enlarged, and tempted her in vain to attempt to disengage 

 herself. 



" On Sunday the 10th, a little after mid-day, she was discovered. A 

 piece of biscuit and a small quantity of brandy were given her, from which 



