The Republican journal., 1904-12-29
EXTRACTS FROM SNOW BOUND.

The sun that Drlef December Gay
Rose cherries over hills Of gray,
And, darkly circled, gave at noon
A sadder light than waning moon.
Slow tracing down the thickening sky,
Its mute and UHinOus prophecy,
A pOrtent seeMi e less than threat,
1t sank from sight before it set.
A chill, no coat, however stout
or hOmespun uff could quite shut out,
A hard, dull bitterness Of cold,
That checked, mid vein, the circling race
OF life-bl00d in the sharpened face,
The coming of the snOwStOrm told.
The wind blew East; we heard the roar
OF Ocean on his wintry shore,
Beat with low rhythm our inland air.
Unwarmed by any sunset light
The gray day darkened into night,
A night made hOary with the swarm,
And whirl-dance of the binding storm,
As ZigZag, wavering to and fro,
Crossed and re-crOssed the winged snow;
And ere the early bedtime came
The white drift piled the window frame
And through the glass the clothes line posts
Looked in like tall and sheeted ghosts.
So all night long the storm rOared on;
The morning broke without sun;
In tiny spherule traced with lines
OF Natures geOmetric signs,
In starry fake, and pelicle,
All day the hoary meteor fell;
And, when the second morning ShOne,
We looked upon a world unknown,
OF nothing we could call our own.
Around the glistening wonder bent
The blue walls of the armament,
No cloud above, no earth below
A universe of sky and snow!
The old familiar sights of ours
Took marvellous shapes strange dOmeS and
towers,
Rose up where sty or corn-crib stood,
Or garden-wall, or belt of wood,
A smooth white mound the brush-pile show
ed,
A fenceless drift what once was road;
The bridle-post an old man sat
With loose-flung coat and high cooked hat;
The well-curb lad Chinese roof;
And even the long sweep, high aloof,
In its slant splendor, seemed to tell
OF Pisa's leaning miracle.
All day the gusty North wind bore
The loosening drift its breath before;
Low circling round its Southern zone,
The sun through dazzling snow-mist shone,
No church-bell lent its Christian tone
To the savage air, no social smoke
Curled over wood of Snow-hung oak
A solitude made more intense
By dreary voiced elements,
The shrieking of the mindless wind
The moaning tree,boughs swaying blind,
And on the glass the unmeaning beat
Of ghostIy inger-tips of sleet,
Beyond the circle of our hearth
No welcome sound of toll or mirth
Unbound the spell, and testified
Of human life and thought outside.
We minded that the sharpest ear
The buried booklet could not hear,
The music of whose liquid lip
Had been to us companionship,
And, in our lonely life, had grown
To have an almost human tone.
AS night drew on, and from the crest
OF wooded knobs that ridged the West,
The sun, showdown traveller, sank
From sight, beneath the smothering bank,
We piled, with care our nightly stack
OF wood against the chimney-back,-
The Oaken log, green, huge, and thick,
And on it's top, the stout back stick;
The knotty forestick laid apart
And filled between with curious art
The ragged brush; then, lowering near
We watched the first red blaze appear,
Heard the sharp crackle, caught the CLEAN
On whitewashed wall and sagging beam,
Until the old rude-furnished room
Burst, fower-like, into rosy bloom;
While radiant with mimic flame
Outside the sparkling drift became,
And through the bare oughed lilac tree
Our own warm hearth seemed blazing free,
The crane and pendent trammels showed
The Turks heads on the andironS glowed :;
While childish fancy prompt to tell
The meaning of the miracle,
Whispered the rhyme: "Under the tree,
When fire outdoors burns merrily
There the witches are making tea
1866. Whittier.