A SNOW-STORM 



As I passed the creek, I noticed the 

 white woolly masses that filled the water. 

 It was as if somebody upstream had been 

 washing his sheep and the water had carried 

 away all the wool, and I thought of the 

 Psalmist's phrase, "He giveth snow like 

 wool." On the river a heavy fall of snow 

 simulates a thin layer of cotton batting. 

 The tide drifts it along, and, where it meets 

 with an obstruction alongshore, it folds up 

 and becomes wrinkled or convoluted like 

 a fabric, or like cotton sheeting. Attempt 

 to row a boat through it, and it seems in- 

 deed like cotton or wool, every fibre of 

 which resists your progress. 



As the sun went down and darkness fell, 

 the storm impulse reached its full. It be- 

 came a wild conflagration of wind and snow; 

 the world was wrapt in frost flame ; it en- 

 veloped one, and penetrated his lungs and 

 caught away his breath like a blast from a 

 burning city. How it whipped around and 

 under every cover and searched out every 

 crack and crevice, sifting under the shingles 

 in the attic, darting its white tongue under 

 the kitchen door, puffing its breath down 

 the chimney, roaring through the woods, 

 stalking like a sheeted ghost across the 

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