ad lay across
the country. To add to the inconveniences of the journey, the snow began
to fall pretty quickly. The postilion, however, proceeded on his journey
for a good many miles without expressing doubt or hesitation. It was not
until the night was completely set in that he intimated his apprehensions
whether he was in the right road. The increasing snow rendered this
intimation rather alarming, for, as it drove full in the lad's face and
lay whitening all around him, it served in two different ways to confuse
his knowledge of the country, and to diminish the chance of his
recovering the right track. Brown then himself got out and looked round,
not, it may be well imagined, from any better hope than that of seeing
some house at which he might make inquiry. But none appeared; he could
therefore only tell the lad to drive steadily on. The road on which they
were ran through plantations of considerable extent and depth, and the
traveller therefore conjectured that there must be a gentleman's house at
no great distance. At length, after struggling wearily on for about a
mile, the post-boy stopped, and protested his horses would not budge a
foot farther; 'but he saw,' he said, 'a light among the trees, which must
proceed from a house; the only way was to inquire the road there.'
Accordingly, he dismounted, heavily encumbered with a long great-coat and
a pair of boots which might have rivalled in thickness the seven-fold
shield of Ajax. As in this guise he was plodding forth upon his voyage of
discovery, Brown's impatience prevailed, and, jumping out of the
carriage, he desired the lad to stop where he was by the horses, and he
would himself go to the house; a command which the driver most joyfully
obeyed.

Our traveller groped along the side of the inclosure from which the light
glimmered, in order to find some mode of approaching in that direction,
and, after proceeding for some space, at length found a stile in the
hedge, and a pathway leading into the plantation, which in that place was
of great extent. This promised to lead to the light which was the object
of his search, and accordingly Brown proceeded in that direction, but
soon totally lost sight of it among the trees. The path, which at first
seemed broad and well marked by the opening of the wood through which it
winded, was now less easily distinguishable, although the whiteness of
the snow afforded some reflected light to assist his search. Directing
himself a