" T h e y went by as high as the houses!" Laura exclaimed. She was still excited. It was strange to see horses' hoofs and a sled and boots in front of your eyes, as a little animal, a gopher, for instance, might see them. "It's a wonder they don't sink in the drifts," Ma said. "Oh, no." Pa was wolfing his toast and drinking his tea rapidly. " T h e y won't sink. These winds pack the snow as hard as a rock. David's shoes don't even make tracks on it. T h e only trouble's where the grass is lodged and loose underneath."
A friend of mine moved to Newfoundland in the fall to attend school. She's been sharing pictures of the snowstorm they got walloped by the other day. Here's her car: Her apartment door, now doubling as a refrigerator: It reminds me of this section of Laura Ingalls Wilder's 1940 book The Long Winter, written about the brutal winter of 1880-81: One still morning, Laura came downstairs to find Ma looking surprised and Pa laughing. "Go look out the back door!" he told Laura. She ran through the lean-to and opened the back door. There was a rough, low tunnel going into shadows in gray-white snow. Its walls and its floor were snow and its snow roof solidly filled the top of the doorway. "I had to gopher my way to the stable this morning," Pa explained. "But what did you do with the snow?" Laura asked. "Oh, I made the tunnel as low as I could get through. I dug the snow out and pushed it back of me and up through a hole that I blocked with the last of it. There's nothing like snow for keeping out wind!" Pa rejoiced. "As long as that snowbank stands, I can do my chores in comfort." "How deep is the snow?" Ma wanted to know. "I can't say. It's piled up considerably deeper than the lean-to roof," Pa answered. "You don't mean to say this house is buried in snow!" Ma exclaimed. "A good thing if it is," Pa replied. "You notice the kitchen is warmer than it has been this winter?" Laura ran upstairs. She scratched a peephole on the window and put her eyes to it. She could hardly believe them. Main Street was level with her eyes. Across the glittering snow she could see the blank, square top of Harthorn's false front sticking up like a short piece of solid board fence. She heard a gay shout and then she saw horses' hoofs trotting rapidly before her eyes. Eight gray hoofs, with slender brown ankles swiftly bending and straightening, passed quickly by, and then a long sled with two pairs of boots standing on it. She crouched down, to look upward through the peephole, but the sled was gone. She saw only the sky sharp with sunlight that stabbed her eyes. She ran down to the warm kitchen to tell what she had seen. "The Wilder boys," Pa said. "They're hauling hay." "How do you know, P a ? " Laura asked him. "I only saw the horses' feet, and boots." "There's no one in town but those two, and me, that dares go out of town," said Pa. "Folks are afraid a blizzard'll come up. Those Wilder boys are hauling in all their slough hay from Big Slough and selling it for three dollars a load to burn." "Three dollars!" Ma exclaimed. "Yes, and fair enough for the risk they take. They're making a good thing out of it. Wish I could. But they've got coal to burn. I'll be glad if we have enough hay to last us through. I wasn't counting on it for our winter's fuel." " T h e y went by as high as the houses!" Laura exclaimed. She was still excited. It was strange to see horses' hoofs and a sled and boots in front of your eyes, as a little animal, a gopher, for instance, might see them. "It's a wonder they don't sink in the drifts," Ma said. "Oh, no." Pa was wolfing his toast and drinking his tea rapidly. " T h e y won't sink. These winds pack the snow as hard as a rock. David's shoes don't even make tracks on it. T h e only trouble's where the grass is lodged and loose underneath."
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