Here they encamped. Rollo cut some stakes, which he drove down into the snow, and contrived to make a rude sort of table with his boards. He also cut a large number of hemlock branches, which Lucy and Nathan dragged out and spread around the table for them to sit upon. Then Rollo built a fire of sticks, which he gathered in the wood. The ground was covered with snow, so that it would have been very difficult for him to have found any sticks, were it not that some kinds of trees, in the woods, have a great many small branches near the bottom, which are dead and dry. These Rollo cut off, and Lucy and Nathan dragged them out, and put them on the fire when he had kindled it. The fire was a little way from the table, with the carpet of hemlock boughs between. There was a high hill covered with snow at a little distance, and, after they had eaten their luncheon, Rollo said,-- "O Lucy, we will play go up the mountains. There is a hill for us. That shall be Chimborazo." "Well," said Lucy, "if you will cut us some long staves." Accordingly Rollo went into the wood, and selected some tall and slender young trees, about an inch in diameter, and cut two for Lucy, two for Nathan, and two for himself. These he trimmed up smoothly, and each of the children took one in each hand. They played that Rollo was the guide, and Lucy was the philosopher. Nathan was the philosopher's servant. Rollo conducted them safely to the summit; but just after they got there, it began to snow. The snow descended in large flakes, and Rollo was delighted to see it; but Lucy seemed a little anxious. She said that, if there should be much snow, it would make it hard for Nathan to get home, and she thought that they had better go down the mountain immediately, and set out for home. Rollo was rather unwilling to go, but he allowed himself to be persuaded, and so they all came down the mountain together. They packed up their things as quick as they could, leaving the fire to burn itself out, only Rollo first piled on all the hemlock branches,--which made a great crackling. The snow began to fall faster. The air was full of the large flakes, which floated slowly down, and lodged gently upon the old snow. The children went along very successfully for some time, but at length Rollo lost his way. The air was so full of snow-flakes, that he could see only a very little way before him; and the old snow covered the ground, so as to hide all the old marks, and to alter the general aspect of the fields so much, that Rollo was completely lost. He, however, did not say anything about it, but wandered on, Lucy and Nathan wondering all the while why they did not get home; until at length they came across a track in the snow. "O! see this track," said Rollo. "Here is a track, where somebody else has been along with a sled." "Yes," said Lucy, "some boys, who have gone out to slide, perhaps."