heart: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will
toward men!"

Drawing near the cabin, I was amazed to see the door stretched wide
open, and no light within. Instantly a dark foreboding fell upon me,
and I remembered the fearful visions of the night before. What could it
be that I was to encounter? I ran to the open door, and entered. No
fire! only those few dull ashes. What did it mean? "Boys," I cried,
"boys, where are you?" No reply. "Boys! Langdon! Vidocq! Bar!" and
there came from near me a stifled answer, as if the speaker was but half
awake. Trembling violently, I struck a match, and beheld John Bar,
lying almost at my feet in a bundle of furs, and a pool of blood by him,
and four other figures in everyday garments, without any other covering,
stretched in different attitudes on the floor--sleeping, I thought.
Yes, they were sleeping, but in death. Where they had fallen in drunken
stupor the ice-breath of Death had stiffened them for his own.

"Is that you, Clare? Thank God! I am bleeding and freezing to death."

"Who harmed you, Bar? Tell me first--Vidocq? I thought so. In a
second we'll help you."

Quicker than I can write it, I had run to the other cabin, aroused the
inmates, and we had all reached the fatal cabin.

Some of us carefully removed Bar to the second house, whilst others
chafed the bodies on the floor and poured warm drinks into their mouths
to revive the spark of life, if it yet lingered. But they were frozen
to death. The log-cabin in which my companions and I had lived for
three months was now the lumberman's dead-house. There the four bodies
were to rest until they could be moved to their graves. The next
morning Guyon Vidocq's body was laid beside those of his companions. He
had been found stretched dead on the riverbank.

Such was our Christmas.

It appeared that when John Bar had gone to his cabin he found four of
the inmates lying drunk on the floor, the fires expiring, and Guyon
Vidocq in a delirium of intoxication pulling everything to pieces--
table, benches, etcetera--to pile them in the corner, and, then, as he
said, light a real Christmas bonfire. John Bar immediately saw the
danger that the poor creatures on the floor were in, and whilst he tried
to get fires going in the stove and chimney-place as quickly as
possible, he also exerted his influence to soothe Guyon Vidocq and make
him cease his crazy work. But the presence of Bar seem