The snow that had fallen had obscured the faint sled tracks, and
Addison, who was ahead, pulled up. "We can't do it," he said. "We shan't
get through."
My first impulse was to run on, to run faster; that is always your first
instinct in such cases. Then I remembered the old Squire's advice to us
what to do if we should ever happen to be caught by a snowstorm in the
great woods:
"Don't go on a moment after you feel bewildered. Don't start to run, and
don't get excited. Stop right where you are and camp. If you run, you
will begin to circle, get crazy and perish before morning."
Addison cast another uneasy glance into the dim forest ahead. "Better
camp, I guess," he said. Turning, we hurried back into the hollow.
A few yards back from the brook were two rocks, about six feet apart and
nearly as high as my head. Hard snow lay between them; but we broke it
into pieces by stamping on it, and succeeded in clearing most of it
away, so that we bared the leaves and twigs that covered the ground.
Then, while I hacked off dry branches from a fallen fir-tree, Addison
gathered a few curled rolls of bark from several birches near by and
kindled a fire between the rocks.
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