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Rh out after him; they only began to believe the truth of the story when too late.

Thursday, 28th.—Snow again. Reports from Albany say the Hudson is probably closed, and navigation broken up for the winter. The river usually freezes some time before our lake.

Friday, 29th.—Snow. A darker sky than usual.

Saturday, 30th.—Still, half-cloudy day. Snow eighteen inches deep; a fall of several inches during the night. The air is always delightfully pure after a fresh fall of snow, and to-day this sort of wintry perfume is very marked. Long drive, which we enjoyed extremely. We have put on our winter livery in earnest, and shall probably keep it, with a break here and there, perhaps, until the spring equinox. It is, indeed, a vast change from grass to snow; things wear a widely different aspect from what they do in summer. All color seems bleached out of the earth, and what was a few weeks since a glowing landscape, has now become a still bas-relief. The hills stand unveiled; the beautiful leaves are gone, and the eye seeks in vain for a trace of the brilliant drapery of autumn—even its discolored shreds lie buried beneath the snow. The fields are all alike: meadow, and corn-field, and hop-ground, lie shrouded and deserted; neither laborers nor cattle are seen a-field during three months of our year. Gray lines of wooden fences, old stumps, and scattered leafless trees are all that break the broad, white waste, which a while since bore the harvests of summer.

There is, however, something very fine and imposing in a broad expanse of snow: hill and dale, farm and forest, trees and dwellings, the neglected waste, and the crowded streets of the town, are all alike under its influence; over all it throws its beautiful vesture of purer white than man can bleach; for thousands and