All this time the snow was falling thick. If it went on like this, I should be buried before morning, and the fact that the wind was rising added to the danger of it. We were at the wrong end of the night too.
“I’m in a kind of ditch, I think, father,” I cried—the place we fell off on one side and a stone wall on the other.”
“That can hardly be, or I shouldn’t have got out,” he returned. “But now I’ve got Missy quiet, I’ll come to you. I must get you out, I see, or you will be snowed up. Woa, Missy! Good mare! Stand still.”
The next moment he gave a joyous exclamation.
“What is it, father?” I cried.
“It’s not a stone wall; it’s a peat-stack. That is good.”
“I don’t see what good it is. We can’t light a fire.”
“No, my boy; but where there’s a peat-stack, there’s probably a house.”
He began uttering a series of shouts at the top of his voice, listening between for a response. This lasted a good while. I began to get very cold.
“I’m nearly frozen, father,” I said, “and what’s to become of the poor mare—she’s got no clothes on?”