Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor
ancient shepherd had dropped in and taken supper with us, and foretold a
heavy fall and great disaster to live stock. He said that he had known
a frost beginning, just as this had done, with a black east wind, after
days of raw cold fog, and then on the third night of the frost, at this
very time of year (to wit on the 15th of December) such a snow set in
as killed half of the sheep and many even of the red deer and the forest
ponies. It was three-score years agone,* he said; and cause he had to
remember it, inasmuch as two of his toes had been lost by frost-nip,
while he dug out his sheep on the other side of the Dunkery. Hereupon
mother nodded at him, having heard from her father about it, and how
three men had been frozen to death, and how badly their stockings came
off from them.
* The frost of 1625.
Remembering how the old man looked, and his manner of listening to the
wind and shaking his head very ominously (when Annie gave him a glass
of schnapps), I grew quite uneasy in my bed, as the room got colder and
colder; and I made up my mind, if it only pleased God not to send the
snow till the morning, that every sheep, and horse, and cow, ay, and
even the poultry, should be brought in snug, and with plenty to eat, and
fodder enough to roast them.
Alas what use of man's resolves, when they come a day too late; even if
they may avail a little, when they are most punctual!
In the bitter morning I arose, to follow out my purpose, knowing the
time from the force of habit, although the room was so dark and gray.
An odd white light was on the rafters, such as I never had seen before;
while all the length of the room was grisly, like the heart of a mouldy
oat-rick. I went to the window at once, of course; and at first I could
not understand what was doing outside of it. It faced due east (as I may
have said), with the walnut-tree partly sheltering it; and generally I
could see the yard, and the woodrick, and even the church beyond.
But now, half the lattice was quite blocked up, as if plastered with
gray lime; and little fringes, like ferns, came through, where the
joining of the lead was; and in the only undarkened part, countless dots
came swarming, clustering, beating with a soft, low sound, then gliding
down in a slippery manner, not as drops of rain do, but each distinct
from his neighbour. Inside the iron frame (which fitted, not to say too
comfortably, and went along the stonework), at least a peck of snow had
entered, following its own bend and fancy; light as any cobweb.
With some trouble, and great care, lest the ancient frame should yield,
I spread the lattice open; and saw at once that not a moment must be
lost, to save our stock. All the earth was flat with snow, all the air
was thick with snow; more than this no man could see, for all the world
was snowing.
I shut the window and dressed in haste; and when I entered the kitchen,
not even Betty, the earliest of all early birds, was there. I raked the
ashes together a little, just to see a spark of warmth; and then set
forth to find John Fry, Jem Slocombe, and Bill Dadds. But this was
easier thought than done; for when I opened the courtyard door, I
was taken up to my knees at once, and the power of the drifting cloud
prevented sight of anything. However, I found my way to the woodrick,
and there got hold of a fine ash-stake, cut by myself not long ago. With
this I ploughed along pretty well, and thundered so hard at John
Fry's door, that he thought it was the Doones at least, and cocked his
blunderbuss out of the window.
John was very loth to come down, when he saw the meaning of it; for he
valued his life more than anything else; though he tried to make out
that his wife was to blame. But I settled his doubts by telling him,
that I would have him on my shoulder naked, unless he came in five
minutes; not that he could do much good, but because the other men would
be sure to skulk, if he set them the example. With spades, and shovels,
and pitch-forks, and a round of roping, we four set forth to dig out the
sheep; and the poor things knew that it was high time.
CHAPTER XLII
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 journey; 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