Cape North 
said they could n't ; we said they must. They 
said it was impossible, and we pictured in 
graphic terms the alternative, our being obliged 
to spend the cold night on the mountain- 
side, where they would go out next day and 
find our frozen forms, and be obliged to bury 
us then and there, and be pointed to by all 
posterity as the cruel folk who had turned 
travellers from their door, to perish on the 
mountain. They saw the reasonableness of 
the argument, and we stayed, though it is not 
quite fair to say they allowed it, suffered it 
would be better ; at least until all hands were 
well warmed up over the kitchen stove, and 
a supper of oatmeal porridge had lent a more 
genial glow to all our heart-strings. Then we 
fell into friendly conversation, and the woman 
showed us her rugs, and the man told us 
of the awful night when he rescued Parson 
Gibbons from sure death on the side of 
Smoky. 
Many of these people are endowed with 
" second sight," and all believe in it. The 
story the man told was this : One night, 
bitter cold and snowing, he had a sudden 
knowledge that Parson Gibbons was on the 
299 
