"September 9th.

"A cloudy morning and, towards the close of the day, very cold and windy. Late in the afternoon it began to snow, and already the ground is covered with its white mantle.

"How sudden and violent are the changes of temperature in this climate. A few days ago a hot nor'-wester was sweeping over the ranges, melting the glaciers and bringing down freshets in the river; the plains began to assume their parched and yellow page 200summer look, while clouds of dust darkened the air, and in the forests there was a muggy heat. Now we are in mid-winter again.

"I hate cold. It disagrees with me. I am naturally a chilly mortal, with a sluggish circulation and a lack of that robust vitality which shows itself in some temperaments as buoyant animal spirits, love of athletic sports, or unflagging energy.

"I require warmth to develop what small amount of animation there is in me, to call forth any ardour of mind or flow of sentiment. Heat I can bear without much grumbling, but cold is my dread, my aversion.

"However disagreeable it may be to feel the perspiration trickling down your forehead and blinding your eyes, can it be compared to the misery of a tramp against a heavy drift, with a handful of snow jammed inside your collar and melting at leisure, one half of your face so frozen that the blood has sought refuge in the other side, which is burning hot, your hands clenched up in wet pockets, and your feet seeming to partake of the nature of the ice that clogs your boots?

"Don't talk to me about the pleasures of winter. It is said that man can protect himself against the greatest severity of cold, while he seeks in vain for relief against extreme heat.

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"This is not altogether correct. Then consider: these artificial appliances are not universally available. Shivering humanity of the lower orders knows them not. Winter, to the great mass of the labouring population at home, is a period of privation and suffering. Cold is severe on the ragged, it is hard on the needy; and it is the ragged and the needy that make up 'the greatest number.'

"Although I am not partial to winter, yet I love to watch a snowstorm, especially if the outlook is from some warm and cosy indoor corner. Just as I love to muse on the roaring ocean, and watch the raging conflict of its heaving billows, from some snug nook on terra firma.

"To enjoy the war of the elements thoroughly you require 'to be out of it' But a snowstorm has an alluring charm for me. It reminds me of other days; of scenes of happy childhood.

"I remember so vividly how I used, as a little boy, to stand for hours together with my face flattened against the window-panes, in our dear old home on the moors, watching the big snow-flakes in their slow wavering fall, and thinking, God knows, of fairies and giants, of fights and marvels, or indulging in bright dreams of glory and adventure.

"How often would I wonder, in all the intensity page 202of childish fancy, what I should be, what I should look like, when a great big boy, grown up, turned twenty. Imagination could no further go. I stood lost in silent admiration at the idea of the manly figure I should then possess; the frock coat, the bell-topper, the walking stick, and the cigar. I drew outlines of my very juvenile phiz, copied from a daguerreotype of the old style, for I very early got a knack of sketching, and added to the portrait a pair of comely black whiskers. What a wonderful improvement they made to my appearance; what an astonishing air of importance I would suddenly assume. And then to think that in that glorious future that was opening before me I should be able to strut into a pastrycook's, without hesitation or fear of consequences, and actually have as many tarts as I wanted! That seemed to be so far removed beyond the range of my young experiences that I could hardly realise such a state of things. How I longed to grow up quickly, to make haste to be a man, to know that I could sit up to a late dinner, instead of being marched off to bed at the stroke of eight; and of a morning be able to turn on the water for my own shower-bath, instead of having to endure the infliction of a sponging, with an occasional dab of soap in the eye when nurse was out of temper.

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"I would sit in some quiet corner musing intently, and trying hard to get ever such a little peep through the dark veil of the future.

"Oh, how happily for me that I could not! Had I seen myself as I now am, had the shadow of the years that have since elapsed only passed before me, it would have been with a sad face that I should have retired from my musings.

"The melancholy past! Melancholy to me not only in its sorrows and disappointments, but also in the recollection of happiness and love.

"Our trials may be over, we may have weathered the storm, and we may derive even some satisfaction from the sufferings we have undergone, but who can restore to us what is lost—departed love, or friendship that is dead, a beloved one who has passed away, and the joy and brightness of days gone by?

"There is one dark spot in the past that time can never obliterate. There is one kind look that used to smile upon me, but that has long since vanished; one kind voice that was the voice of heaven to me, but which I shall never hear more. Long, long after she had departed hence; long after as a sorrowing child I followed the solemn procession and stood by to hear the clods and stones rebound with a hollow page 204noise from her coffin, she lived to me. She lived in my dreams; in bright visions of future happiness she was present, in imaginary conversations I heard her voice.

"Even now, now that so many years have passed, now that I live many thousand miles from her grave, the thought that she is gone has often startled me from the sport of fancy, awakened me to cold, dark, bitter reality.

"I do not repine. My life has been what it was ordained to be by that Divine dispensation which passes the understanding of man, but which regulates all things. I have had my days of sunshine, I have trodden the flowery path in times gone by. At present the path is dark and thorny. I have wandered into solitary and desolate places, shrouded in gloom and beset with evil presentiments, like the 'valley of the shadow of death.' But shall I not live through it? Are there not endless vistas of sunshine beyond, pleasant arbours on the lengthy journey of life, where one can bide a while and rest, for the road is not all solitary and desolate? How can we foretell what Providence may have in store for us? So let us hope—hope and pray."