vied, criticised, and carped.
Women were muffled up in furs and carried huge muffs, their wide hats
tied down under their chins with great bows, some wearing the silken
mask, in much the fashion of a veil, to protect their skins from frosty
touches. The skaters, in skirts that betrayed trim and slender ankles,
spun along like a whirl of the wind, or with hands crossed with a
partner, went through graceful rocking evolutions, almost like a waltz.

The scarlet uniforms of the officers made a brilliant pageant. It was
indeed a winter long to be remembered, and recalled with keen relish
when the British, with lovers and friends, had flown.

Captain Nevitt had insisted upon taking his sister out, as Primrose was
a very fair skater, and, under his tuition, improved wonderfully. She
looked so pretty in her skating dress with her soft, yellow hair flying
in the wind, and her lovely face half hidden in her hat, to be revealed
like a vision at the various turns.

Nevitt had been taken on General Howe's staff for the present. Foiled in
his endeavor to call out Washington by any maneuver, and feeling that
another battle was quite impossible and useless in the extreme cold,
which was more bitter than for years, he too, gave himself over to
diversion, and looked leniently on the frivolities of his officers and
the ruder dissipations of his men.

The most fascinating game on the ice was skating after a ball. A man
called the hurlie propelled half a dozen balls along with a long,
sharp-pointed stick, between two given points, often far enough apart to
make a trial of speed and endurance. The fortunate one was he or she who
caught a ball before it reached the goal, and then the merriest shout
would ring out on the air.

A tall, fine-looking young fellow in civilian attire had captured two of
the balls one afternoon and was flying at his most vigorous speed for
another. Primrose had paused for a moment while her brother stopped to
chaff a companion. The ball rolled swiftly along, and from some slight
inequality in the ice deflected. The arm was outstretched to catch it,
and she could not quite remember afterward whether she had stooped, but
he came against her with sufficient force to knock her over. He caught
the ball and held it up in triumph, with a joyous hurrah, and then
turned to see what the oath and the exclamation meant.

"Good Heavens! you have killed her, you brute!" Captain Nevitt cried
angrily.

"I was under such hea