he Southern States; and the huge cold of the North had
been a new and rather terrifying experience to her. She had been growing
nervous all the evening, as the signs and portents of the weather
accumulated. She was really half frightened.

"Aren't you afraid it will get so cold it will never be able to get warm
again,--and then what would become of us?" she asked.

Of course we laughed at her, but I think her fears infected me with
a slight, vague anxiety, as the evidences of extraordinary and still
increasing cold went on multiplying. I had so far gotten over my bravado
earlier in the evening that I should have been secretly relieved if the
thermometer had taken a turn.

At length, one by one, the members of the family, with an anticipatory
shiver over the register, went to their rooms, and were doubtless in bed
in the shortest possible time, and I fear without saying their prayers.
Finally my wife suggested that we had better go before we got too cold
to do so.

The bedroom was shockingly cold. Going to bed is a test of character.
I pride myself on the fact that generally, even when my room is cold,
I can, with steady nerve and resolute hand, remove the last habiliment,
and without undignified precipitation reach for and indue the nocturnal
garment, I admit, however, that on this occasion I gave way to a weak
irresolution at the critical instant and shivered for some moments in
constantly increasing demoralization, before I could make up my mind
to the final change. Then ensued the slow and gradual conquest of the
frozen bed to a tolerable warmth, a result attained only by clever
strategic combinations of bedclothes and the most methodical policy. As
I lay awake, I heard the sides of the house crack in the cold. "What,"
said I to myself with a shiver, "should I do if anything happened that
required me to get up and dress again?" It seemed to me I should be
capable of letting a man die in the next room for need of succor.
Being of an imaginative temperament, not to feel prepared for possible
contingencies is for me to feel guilty and miserable. The last thing
I remember before dropping off to sleep was solemnly promising my wife
never to trust ourselves North another winter. I then fell asleep and
dreamed of the ineffable cold of the interstellar spaces, which the
scientific people talk about.

The next thing I was sensible of was a feeling of the most utter
discomfort I ever experienced. My whole body had become