A cold
afternoon: even the seeds hid in the mould down below the snow were
chilled to the heart, and thought they surely could not live the winter
out: the cows, when Bone went out drearily to feed them by himself, were
watching the thin, frozen breath steaming from their nostrils with tears
in their eyes, he thought.
A cold day: cold for the sick and wounded soldiers that were jolted in
ambulances down the mountain-roads through its creeping hours. For the
Federal troops had evacuated Romney. The Rebel forces, under Jackson,
had nearly closed around the mountain-camp before they were discovered:
they were twenty thousand strong. Lander's force was but a handful in
comparison: he escaped with them for their lives that day, leaving the
town and the hills in full possession of the Confederates.
A bleak, heartless day: coldest of all for Dode, lying on the floor of
her little room. How wide and vacant the world looked to her! What could
she do there? Why was she born? She must show her Master to others,--of
course; but--she was alone: everybody she loved had been taken from her.
She wished that she were dead. She lay there, trying to pray, now and
then,--motionless, like some death in life; the gray sunlight looking in
at her, in a wondering way. It was quite contented to be gray and cold,
till summer came.
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