iz, who received her with tender
care, helped to place her in the big chair, and remembering Daddy's
tendency to fall into the fire, tied her securely therein.

Meanwhile Winklemann ran back to his house, where he found Mr Ravenshaw
and Louis Lambert assisting several men to secure it on its foundations
by tying it with ropes to the nearest trees.

Joining these, he lent his powerful aid; but a power greater than his
was at work, which could not be resisted. Not only did the water rise
at an alarming rate and rush against the house with tremendous violence,
but great cakes of ice bore down on it and struck it with such force as
to make every timber tremble. Like all the other houses of the
settlement, it was built entirely of wood, and had no other foundation
than the levelled ground on which its framework stood.

When the water rose considerably above his knees, and ice-floes
threatened to sweep him away, Mr Ravenshaw thought it was time for an
elderly gentleman to retire. The others continued for some time longer
securing the ropes and, with poles, turning aside the ice; but ere long
they also were driven to the higher ground, and compelled to stand idly
by and watch the work of destruction.

"You've got everything out, I fancy?" asked Lambert.

"Everyt'ing," replied Winklemann, with a deep sigh; "not'ing is left but
zee hause."

"An' that won't be left long," observed Mr Ravenshaw, as a huge mass of
ice went against its gable-end like a battering-ram.

It seemed to be the leader of a fresh battalion of the destroyer. A
succession of ice-floes ran against the house and trees to which it was
fastened. An additional rush of water came down at the same time like a
wave of the sea. Every one saw that the approaching power was
irresistible. The wave, with its ice-laden crest, absolutely roared as
it engulfed the bushes. Two goodly elms bowed their heads into the
flood and snapped off. The ropes parted like packthread; the building
slewed round, reeled for a moment with a drunken air, caught on a
shallow spot, and hung there.

"Ach! mine goot old hause--farvell!" exclaimed Winklemann, in tones of
deepest pathos.

The house bowed as if in recognition of the old familiar voice, sloped
into deeper water, gurgled out its latest breath, like a living thing,
through its doors and windows, and sank beneath the wreck and ruin of
its old surroundings.

It was what men aptly term a clean sweep, but Winklemann's w