Ptarmigan-hunting—Hamilton’s shooting powers severely¹ tested—A snowstorm.

At about four o’clock on the following morning, the sleepers² were awakened⁴ by the cold, which had become very intense. The fire had burned down to a few embers, which merely emitted enough light to make darkness visible. Harry⁵, being the most active of the party, was the first to bestir himself. Raising himself on his elbow, while his teeth chattered⁶ and his limbs trembled with cold, he cast a woebegone and excessively sleepy glance towards the place where the fire had been; then he scratched his head slowly; then he stared at the fire again; then he languidly glanced at Hamilton’s sleeping visage; and then he yawned. The accountant observed all this; for although he appeared to be buried in the depths of slumber⁸, he was wide awake in reality, and moreover intensely cold. The accountant, however, was sly—deep, as he would have said himself—and knew that Harry’s active habits would induce him to rise, on awaking, and rekindle⁹ the fire,—an event which the accountant earnestly desired to see accomplished¹¹, but which he as earnestly resolved should not be performed by him. Indeed, it was with this end in view that he had given vent¹⁰ to the terrific snore which had aroused his young companion a little sooner than would have otherwise been the case.

“My eye,” exclaimed Harry, in an undertone, “how precious cold it is!”

His eye making no reply to this remark, he arose, and going down on his hands and knees, began to

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