KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



119 



their fingers, and detest infinitely the no-fire 

 at school ; and the parish beadle's nose is 

 redder than ever. 



Now, sounds in general are dull, and 

 smoke out of chimneys looks warm and 

 rich ; and birds are pitied, hopping about 

 for crumbs ; and the trees look wiry and 

 cheerless — albeit they are still beautiful to 

 imaginative eyes, especially the evergreens, 

 and the birch with boughs like dishevelled 

 hair. Now mud in the roads is stiff, and 

 the kennel ices over, and boys make illegal 

 slides on the pathways, and ashes are 

 strewed before doors ; or you crunch the 

 snow as you tread, or kick mud-flakes before 

 you, or are horribly muddy in cities. But 

 if it is hard frost, all the world is buttoned 

 up, and great-coated, except ostentatious 

 elderly gentlemen, and pretended beggars 

 with naked feet ; and the delicious sound of 

 1 All hot ! ' is heard from roasted apple and 

 potatoe stalls — the vendor himself being 

 cold, in spite of his ' hot,' and stamping up 

 and down to warm his feet ; and the little 

 boys are astonished to think how he can eat 

 bread and cold meat for his dinner, instead 

 of the smoking apples. 



Now, skaters are on the alert ; the cutlers' 

 shop windows abound with their swift shoes; 

 and as you approach the scene of action — 

 pond or canal — you hear the dull grinding 

 noise of the skates to and fro, and see tum- 

 bles and Banbury cake-men and blackguard 

 boys playing ' hockey ;' and ladies stand 

 shivering on the banks, and admiring any- 

 thing but their brother — especially the gen- 

 tleman who is cutting figures of eight, who 

 for his part, is admiring his own figure. 

 Beginners affect to laugh at their tumbles, 

 but are terribly angry, and long to thump the 

 byestanders. On thawing days, idlers per- 

 sist to the last in skating or sliding amidst 

 the slush and bending ice, making the Hu- 

 mane Society man ferocious. He feels as if 

 he could give them the deaths from which it 

 is his business to save them. When you 

 have done skating, you come away, feeling at 

 once warm and numb in the feet, from the 

 tight effect of the skates ; and you carry them 

 with an ostentatious air of indifference, as if 

 you had done wonders — whereas you have 

 fairly had three slips, and can barely achieve 

 the inside edge. 



Now, riders look sharp, and horses seem 

 brittle in the legs, and old gentlemen feel so ; 

 and coachmen, cabmen, and others, stand 

 swinging their arms across at their sides, to 

 warm themselves ; and blacksmiths' shops 

 look pleasant, and potatoe shops detestable ; 

 the fishmongers' still more so. We wonder 

 how he can live in that plash of wet and cold 

 fish, without even a window. Now, clerks in 

 offices envy the one next the fire-place : and 

 men from behind counters hardly think them- 



selves repaid by being called out to speak to 

 a countess in her chariot ; and the wheezy 

 and effeminate pastry cook, hatless and 

 aproned, and with his hand in his breeches- 

 pockets, stands outside his door, chilling his 

 household warmth by attending to the ice 

 which is brought to him, and seeing it 

 unloaded into his cellar like coals. Com- 

 fortable look the Miss Joneses, coming this 

 way with their muffs and furs ; and the 

 baker pities the maid-servant cleaning the 

 steps, who, for her part, says she is not cold, 

 which he finds it difficult to believe. 



Now dinner rejoiceth the gatherers to- 

 gether, and cold meat is despised, and the 

 gout defieth the morrow, thinking it but 

 reasonable, on such a day, to inflame itself 

 with " t'other bottle ; " and the sofa is 

 wheeled round to the fire after dinner, and 

 people proceed to burn their legs in their 

 boots, and little boys their faces ; and young 

 ladies are tormented between the cold and 

 their complexions, and their fingers freeze at 

 the piano-forte — but they must not say so, 

 because it will vex their poor comfortable 

 grand-aunt, who is sitting with her knees in 

 the fire, and who is so anxious that they 

 should not be spoilt. 



Now the muffin-bell soundeth sweetly in 

 the streets, reminding us, not of the man, 

 but his muffins, and of twilight, and evening, 

 and curtains, and the fire-side. Now play- 

 goers get cold feet, and invalids stop up 

 every crevice in their rooms and make them- 

 selves worse ; and the streets are compara- 

 tively silent ; and the wind rises and falls in 

 moanings ; and fires burn blue and crackle ; 

 and an easy chair, with your feet by it on a 

 stool, the lamp or candles a little behind you, 

 and an interesting book just opened where 

 you left off — is a bit of heaven upon earth. 

 People in cottages crowd close to the chim- 

 ney, and tell stories of ghosts and murders, 

 the blue flame affording something like evi- 

 dence of the facts. 



" The owl, with all her feathers, is a-cold," 



or you think her so. The whole country 

 feels like a petrifaction of slate and stillness, 

 cut across by the wind ; and nobody in the 

 omnibuses are warm but the horses,who steam 

 pitifully when they stop. The " oldest 

 man " makes a point of never having " seen 

 such weather." People have a painful 

 doubt whether they have any chins or not ; 

 ears ache with the wind ; and the wago - 

 ner goes puckering up his teeth, and 

 thinking the time will never arrive when 

 he shall get to the Five Bells. 



At night, people get sleepy with the 

 fire side, and long to go to bed ; yet fear 

 it, on account of the different temperature 

 of the bed-room ; which is furthermore apt 

 to wake them up. Warming-pans and hot- 

 water bottles are in request ; and naughty 



