THE GREAT WINTER
It must have snowed most wonderfully to have made that depth of covering
in about eight hours. For one of Master Stickles' men, who had been out
all the night, said that no snow began to fall until nearly midnight.
And here it was, blocking up the doors, stopping the ways, and the water
courses, and making it very much worse to walk than in a saw-pit newly
used. However, we trudged along in a line; I first, and the other men
after me; trying to keep my track, but finding legs and strength not
up to it. Most of all, John Fry was groaning; certain that his time was
come, and sending messages to his wife, and blessings to his children.
For all this time it was snowing harder than it ever had snowed before,
so far as a man might guess at it; and the leaden depth of the sky came
down, like a mine turned upside down on us. Not that the flakes were
so very large; for I have seen much larger flakes in a shower of March,
while sowing peas; but that there was no room between them, neither any
relaxing, nor any change of direction.
Watch, like a good and faithful dog, followed us very cheerfully,
leaping out of the depth, which took him over his back and ears already,
even in the level places; while in the drifts he might have sunk to any
distance out of sight, and never found his way up again. However, we
helped him now and then, especially through the gaps and gateways; and
so after a deal of floundering, some laughter, and a little swearing, we
came all safe to the lower meadow, where most of our flock was hurdled.
But behold, there was no flock at all! None, I mean, to be seen
anywhere; only at one corner of the field, by the eastern end, where the
snow drove in, a great white billow, as high as a barn, and as broad as
a house. This great drift was rolling and curling beneath the violent
blast, tufting and combing with rustling swirls, and carved (as in
patterns of cornice) where the grooving chisel of the wind swept round.
Ever and again the tempest snatched little whiffs from the channelled
edges, twirled them round and made them dance over the chime of the
monster pile, then let them lie like herring-bones, or the seams of sand
where the tide has been. And all the while from the smothering sky, more
and more fiercely at every blast, came the pelting, pitiless arrows,
winged with murky white, and pointed with the barbs of frost.
But although for people who had no sheep, the sight was a very fine one
(so far at least as the weather permitted any sight at all); yet for us,
with our flock beneath it, this great mount had but little charm. Watch
began to scratch at once, and to howl along the sides of it; he knew
that his charge was buried there, and his business taken from him. But
we four men set to in earnest, digging with all our might and main,
shovelling away at the great white pile, and fetching it into the
meadow. Each man made for himself a cave, scooping at the soft, cold
flux, which slid upon him at every stroke, and throwing it out behind
him, in piles of castled fancy. At last we drove our tunnels in (for
we worked indeed for the lives of us), and all converging towards the
middle, held our tools and listened.
The other men heard nothing at all; or declared that they heard nothing,
being anxious now to abandon the matter, because of the chill in their
feet and knees. But I said, 'Go, if you choose all of you. I will work
it out by myself, you pie-crusts,' and upon that they gripped their
shovels, being more or less of Englishmen; and the least drop of English
blood is worth the best of any other when it comes to lasting out.
But before we began again, I laid my head well into the chamber; and
there I hears a faint 'ma-a-ah,' coming through some ells of snow, like
a plaintive, buried hope, or a last appeal. I shouted aloud to cheer him
up, for I knew what sheep it was, to wit, the most valiant of all the
wethers, who had met me when I came home from London, and been so glad
to see me. And then we all fell to again; and very soon we hauled
him out. Watch took charge of him at once, with an air of the noblest
patronage, lying on his frozen fleece, and licking all his face and
feet, to restore his warmth to him. Then fighting Tom jumped up at once,
and made a little butt at Watch, as if nothing had ever ailed him, and
then set off to a shallow place, and looked for something to nibble at.
Further in, and close under the bank, where they had huddled themselves
for warmth, we found all the rest of the poor sheep packed, as closely
as if they were in a great pie. It was strange to observe how their
vapour and breath, and the moisture exuding from their wool had scooped,
as it were, a coved room for them, lined with a ribbing of deep yellow
snow. Also the churned snow beneath their feet was as yellow as gamboge.
Two or three of the weaklier hoggets were dead, from want of air, and
from pressure; but more than three-score were as lively as ever; though
cramped and stiff for a little while.
'However shall us get 'em home?' John Fry asked in great dismay, when
we had cleared about a dozen of them; which we were forced to do very
carefully, so as not to fetch the roof down. 'No manner of maning to
draive 'un, drough all they girt driftnesses.'
'You see to this place, John,' I replied, as we leaned on our shovels
a moment, and the sheep came rubbing round us; 'let no more of them out
for the present; they are better where they be. Watch, here boy, keep
them!'
Watch came, with his little scut of a tail cocked as sharp as duty, and
I set him at the narrow mouth of the great snow antre. All the sheep
sidled away, and got closer, that the other sheep might be bitten first,
as the foolish things imagine; whereas no good sheep-dog even so much as
lips a sheep to turn it.
Then of the outer sheep (all now snowed and frizzled like a lawyer's
wig) I took the two finest and heaviest, and with one beneath my right
arm, and the other beneath my left, I went straight home to the upper
sheppey, and set them inside and fastened them. Sixty and six I took
home in that way, two at a time on each joumey; and the work grew harder
and harder each time, as the drifts of the snow were deepening. No other
man should meddle with them; I was resolved to try my strength against
the strength of the elements; and try it I did, ay, and proved it. A
certain fierce delight burned in me, as the struggle grew harder; but
rather would I die than yield; and at last I finished it. People talk of
it to this day; but none can tell what the labour was, who have not felt
that snow and wind.
Of the sheep upon the mountain, and the sheep upon the western farm, and
the cattle on the upper barrows, scarcely one in ten was saved; do what
we would for them, and this was not through any neglect (now that our
wits were sharpened), but from the pure impossibility of finding them
at all. That great snow never ceased a moment for three days and nights;
and then when all the earth was filled, and the topmost hedges were
unseen, and the trees broke down with weight (wherever the wind had not
lightened them), a brilliant sun broke forth and showed the loss of all
our customs.
All our house was quite snowed up, except where we had purged a way, by
dint of constant shovellings. The kitchen was as dark and darker than
the cider-cellar, and long lines of furrowed scollops ran even up to the
chimney-stacks. Several windows fell right inwards, through the weight
of the snow against them; and the few that stood, bulged in, and bent
like an old bruised lanthorn. We were obliged to cook by candle-light;
we were forced to read by candle-light; as for baking, we could not do
it, because the oven was too chill; and a load of faggots only brought a
little wet down the sides of it.
For when the sun burst forth at last upon that world of white, what he
brought was neither warmth, nor cheer, nor hope of softening; only a
clearer shaft of cold, from the violet depths of sky. Long-drawn alleys
of white haze seemed to lead towards him, yet such as he could not come
down, with any warmth remaining. Broad white curtains of the frost-fog
looped around the lower sky, on the verge of hill and valley, and above
the laden trees. Only round the sun himself, and the spot of heaven he
claimed, clustered a bright purple-blue, clear, and calm, and deep.
That night such a frost ensued as we had never dreamed of, neither read
in ancient books, or histories of Frobisher. The kettle by the fire
froze, and the crock upon the hearth-cheeks; many men were killed, and
cattle rigid in their head-ropes. Then I heard that fearful sound, which
never I had heard before, neither since have heard (except during that
same winter), the sharp yet solemn sound of trees burst open by the
frost-blow. Our great walnut lost three branches, and has been dying
ever since; though growing meanwhile, as the soul does. And the ancient
oak at the cross was rent, and many score of ash trees. But why should
I tell all this? the people who have not seen it (as I have) will only
make faces, and disbelieve; till such another frost comes; which perhaps
may never be.
This terrible weather kept Tom Faggus from coming near our house for
weeks; at which indeed I was not vexed a quarter so much as Annie was;
for I had never half approved of him, as a husband for my sister; in
spite of his purchase from Squire Bassett, and the grant of the Royal
pardon. It may be, however, that Annie took the same view of my love for
Lorna, and could not augur well of it; but if so, she held her peace,
though I was not so sparing. For many things contributed to make me less
good-humoured now than my real nature was; and the very least of all
these things would have been enough to make some people cross, and rude,
and fractious. I mean the red and painful chapping of my face and hands,
from working in the snow all day, and lying in the frost all night. For
being of a fair complexion, and a ruddy nature, and pretty plump withal,
and fed on plenty of hot victuals, and always forced by my mother to sit
nearer the fire than I wished, it was wonderful to see how the cold ran
revel on my cheeks and knuckles. And I feared that Lorna (if it should
ever please God to stop the snowing) might take this for a proof of low
and rustic blood and breeding.
And this I say was the smallest thing; for it was far more serious that
we were losing half our stock, do all we would to shelter them. Even the
horses in the stables (mustered all together for the sake of breath and
steaming) had long icicles from their muzzles, almost every morning.
But of all things the very gravest, to my apprehension, was the
impossibility of hearing, or having any token of or from my loved one.
Not that those three days alone of snow (tremendous as it was) could
have blocked the country so; but that the sky had never ceased, for more
than two days at a time, for full three weeks thereafter, to pour fresh
piles of fleecy mantle; neither had the wind relaxed a single day from
shaking them. As a rule, it snowed all day, cleared up at night, and
froze intensely, with the stars as bright as jewels, earth spread out in
lustrous twilight, and the sounds in the air as sharp and crackling as
artillery; then in the morning, snow again; before the sun could come to
help.
It mattered not what way the wind was. Often and often the vanes went
round, and we hoped for change of weather; the only change was that it
seemed (if possible) to grow colder. Indeed, after a week or so, the
wind would regularly box the compass (as the sailors call it) in the
course of every day, following where the sun should be, as if to make
a mock of him. And this of course immensely added to the peril of the
drifts; because they shifted every day; and no skill or care might learn
them.
I believe it was on Epiphany morning, or somewhere about that period,
when Lizzie ran into the kitchen to me, where I was thawing my
goose-grease, with the dogs among the ashes--the live dogs, I mean, not
the iron ones, for them we had given up long ago,--and having caught
me, by way of wonder (for generally I was out shoveling long before my
'young lady' had her nightcap off), she positively kissed me, for the
sake of warming her lips perhaps, or because she had something proud to
say.
'You great fool, John,' said my lady, as Annie and I used to call her,
on account of her airs and graces; 'what a pity you never read, John!'
'Much use, I should think, in reading!' I answered, though pleased with
her condescension; 'read, I suppose, with roof coming in, and only this
chimney left sticking out of the snow!'
'The very time to read, John,' said Lizzie, looking grander; 'our worst
troubles are the need, whence knowledge can deliver us.'
'Amen,' I cried out; 'are you parson or clerk? Whichever you are,
good-morning.'
Thereupon I was bent on my usual round (a very small one nowadays), but
Eliza took me with both hands, and I stopped of course; for I could not
bear to shake the child, even in play, for a moment, because her back
was tender. Then she looked up at me with her beautiful eyes, so large,
unhealthy and delicate, and strangely shadowing outward, as if to spread
their meaning; and she said,--
'Now, John, this is no time to joke. I was almost frozen in bed last
night; and Annie like an icicle. Feel how cold my hands are. Now, will
you listen to what I have read about climates ten times worse than this;
and where none but clever men can live?'
'Impossible for me to listen now, I have hundreds of things to see to;
but I will listen after breakfast to your foreign climates, child. Now
attend to mother's hot coffee.'
She looked a little disappointed, but she knew what I had to do; and
after all she was not so utterly unreasonable; although she did
read books. And when I had done my morning's work, I listened to her
patiently; and it was out of my power to think that all she said was
foolish.
For I knew common sense pretty well, by this time, whether it happened
to be my own, or any other person's, if clearly laid before me. And
Lizzie had a particular way of setting forth very clearly whatever she
wished to express and enforce. But the queerest part of it all was this,
that if she could but have dreamed for a moment what would be the first
application made me by of her lesson, she would rather have bitten her
tongue off than help me to my purpose.
She told me that in the Arctic Regions, as they call some places, a long
way north, where the Great Bear lies all across the heavens, and no
sun is up, for whole months at a time, and yet where people will go
exploring, out of pure contradiction, and for the sake of novelty, and
love of being frozen--that here they always had such winters as we were
having now. It never ceased to freeze, she said; and it never ceased to
snow; except when it was too cold; and then all the air was choked with
glittering spikes; and a man's skin might come off of him, before he
could ask the reason. Nevertheless the people there (although the snow
was fifty feet deep, and all their breath fell behind them frozen, like
a log of wood dropped from their shoulders), yet they managed to
get along, and make the time of the year to each other, by a little
cleverness. For seeing how the snow was spread, lightly over everything,
covering up the hills and valleys, and the foreskin of the sea, they
contrived a way to crown it, and to glide like a flake along. Through
the sparkle of the whiteness, and the wreaths of windy tossings, and
the ups and downs of cold, any man might get along with a boat on either
foot, to prevent his sinking.
She told me how these boats were made; very strong and very light,
of ribs with skin across them; five feet long, and one foot wide; and
turned up at each end, even as a canoe is. But she did not tell me, nor
did I give it a moment's thought myself, how hard it was to walk upon
them without early practice. Then she told me another thing equally
useful to me; although I would not let her see how much I thought about
it. And this concerned the use of sledges, and their power of gliding,
and the lightness of their following; all of which I could see at once,
through knowledge of our own farm-sleds; which we employ in lieu of
wheels, used in flatter districts. When I had heard all this from her, a
mere chit of a girl as she was, unfit to make a snowball even, or to fry
snow pancakes, I looked down on her with amazement, and began to wish a
little that I had given more time to books.
But God shapes all our fitness, and gives each man his meaning, even as
he guides the wavering lines of snow descending. Our Eliza was meant for
books; our dear Annie for loving and cooking; I, John Ridd, for sheep,
and wrestling, and the thought of Lorna; and mother to love all three
of us, and to make the best of her children. And now, if I must tell
the truth, as at every page I try to do (though God knows it is hard
enough), I had felt through all this weather, though my life was
Lorna's, something of a satisfaction in so doing duty to my kindest and
best of mothers, and to none but her. For (if you come to think of it)
a man's young love is very pleasant, very sweet, and tickling; and takes
him through the core of heart; without his knowing how or why. Then he
dwells upon it sideways, without people looking, and builds up all sorts
of fancies, growing hot with working so at his own imaginings. So his
love is a crystal Goddess, set upon an obelisk; and whoever will not bow
the knee (yet without glancing at her), the lover makes it a sacred rite
either to kick or to stick him. I am not speaking of me and Lorna, but
of common people.
Then (if you come to think again) lo!--or I will not say lo! for no one
can behold it--only feel, or but remember, what a real mother is. Ever
loving, ever soft, ever turning sin to goodness, vices into virtues;
blind to all nine-tenths of wrong; through a telescope beholding (though
herself so nigh to them) faintest decimal of promise, even in her vilest
child. Ready to thank God again, as when her babe was born to her;
leaping (as at kingdom-come) at a wandering syllable of Gospel for her
lost one.
All this our mother was to us, and even more than all of this; and hence
I felt a pride and joy in doing my sacred duty towards her, now that the
weather compelled me. And she was as grateful and delighted as if she
had no more claim upon me than a stranger's sheep might have. Yet from
time to time I groaned within myself and by myself, at thinking of
my sad debarment from the sight of Lorna, and of all that might have
happened to her, now she had no protection.
Therefore, I fell to at once, upon that hint from Lizzie, and being used
to thatching-work, and the making of traps, and so on, before very long
I built myself a pair of strong and light snow-shoes, framed with ash
and ribbed of withy, with half-tanned calf-skin stretched across, and
an inner sole to support my feet. At first I could not walk at all, but
floundered about most piteously, catching one shoe in the other, and
both of them in the snow-drifts, to the great amusement of the girls,
who were come to look at me. But after a while I grew more expert,
discovering what my errors were, and altering the inclination of the
shoes themselves, according to a print which Lizzie found in a book of
adventures. And this made such a difference, that I crossed the farmyard
and came back again (though turning was the worst thing of all) without
so much as falling once, or getting my staff entangled.
But oh, the aching of my ankles, when I went to bed that night; I was
forced to help myself upstairs with a couple of mopsticks! and I rubbed
the joints with neatsfoot oil, which comforted them greatly. And likely
enough I would have abandoned any further trial, but for Lizzie's
ridicule, and pretended sympathy; asking if the strong John Ridd would
have old Betty to lean upon. Therefore I set to again, with a fixed
resolve not to notice pain or stiffness, but to warm them out of me.
And sure enough, before dark that day, I could get along pretty freely;
especially improving every time, after leaving off and resting. The
astonishment of poor John Fry, Bill Dadds, and Jem Slocombe, when they
saw me coming down the hill upon them, in the twilight, where they were
clearing the furze rick and trussing it for cattle, was more than I
can tell you; because they did not let me see it, but ran away with one
accord, and floundered into a snowdrift. They believed, and so did every
one else (especially when I grew able to glide along pretty rapidly),
that I had stolen Mother Melldrum's sieves, on which she was said to fly
over the foreland at midnight every Saturday.
Upon the following day, I held some council with my mother; not liking
to go without her permission, yet scarcely daring to ask for it. But
here she disappointed me, on the right side of disappointment; saying
that she had seen my pining (which she never could have done; because
I had been too hard at work), and rather than watch me grieving so,
for somebody or other, who now was all in all to me, I might go upon my
course, and God's protection go with me! At this I was amazed, because
it was not at all like mother; and knowing how well I had behaved, ever
since the time of our snowing up, I was a little moved to tell her that
she could not understand me. However my sense of duty kept me, and my
knowledge of the catechism, from saying such a thing as that, or even
thinking twice of it. And so I took her at her word, which she was
not prepared for; and telling her how proud I was of her trust in
Providence, and how I could run in my new snow-shoes, I took a short
pipe in my mouth, and started forth accordingly.