And it was rather a sombre scene, as is here represented in the picture.
“O, is there a picture, Mary Jay?” “Let us see the picture,” said all the girls. They came around Mary Jay, and looked at the picture which was painted in the Morocco Book, at the place where Mary Jay was reading. They stood, some on each side and some behind, looking over her shoulder. They looked at it a few minutes in silence.
There was a lonely-looking place upon a river, the surface of the stream being white with snow. There were dark woods in the background, hanging gloomily over the shore; and upon the foreground, too, upon one side, there were some large rocks and fir-trees, which were upon the bank nearest the spectator. Jenny’s sleigh was going along, the moon shining upon it brightly; and behind it there was the other sleigh, which was seen more dimly, as it was partly shaded by trees. Still you could see the man’s head turned back, looking towards Jenny’s sleigh.
“How cold it looks!” said Marielle.
The rest of the children said nothing; but, after they had looked at it for some minutes, silently, they went back to their places, and Mary Jay went on.
Jenny met with no other adventure on the ice. In a short time, she came to the place where she was to go off the ice, and the horse took her very safely through the water, and up upon the shore.
She then guided him along towards the village, and across the bridge, and thence up to the mill. Just as she got there, she saw her father and the miller going along around the house to find her. His wheat was ground, and he was now ready to go home. He supposed that Jenny was in the house, and his sleigh in the yard. He heard a sleigh coming along behind him; but, not imagining it could be his, he did not pay particular attention to it, but walked on.
As soon, however, as he turned around the corner of the house, and saw that his sleigh was not there, under the shed where he had expected to find it, he stopped, and exclaimed,—
“What!—where’s my sleigh?”
“Here it is, father,” said Jenny, “and here is your bag, too, for the bran.”