And the snow falls quietly, ceaselessly, softly lapping them in its gentle folds, and the roar of the wind comes now from very far away--their last lullaby, heard vaguely through "death's twilight dim." The desire to sleep, men say, is irresistible, and once yielded to, sleep's twin brother, death, is very near at hand. There was found many years ago in the Border hills the body of a man, who had taken off his plaid, folded it carefully to make a pillow, on it had rested his head, and so had passed to his long rest, contented enough, if one might judge from the smile on his face. But men do not always thus loose consciousness when buried in the snow. There was the case of Mr. Alexander Laidlaw of Bowerhope, on St. Mary's Loch, in the year 1842. One wild day of storm and deep-lying snow he started out to see after the safety of his sheep. Hours had passed, darkness had fallen, and he did not come home. Then a shepherd remembered having seen him crossing a certain hill where snow lay extra deep. To this hill in the morning the searchers betook themselves, to find that a great avalanche had taken place, leaving the hill bare but for the night's coating of snow. At the hill-foot the old snow was piled in giant masses. Here a dog sniffed, and whimpered, and began to scrape. They found Laidlaw buried there in tons of snow, uninjured save in one arm, and after fourteen hours burial in his snowy sepulchre he was still partly conscious. When the tumbling snow mass overwhelmed him he had had presence of mind and strength to clear from before his face breathing space sufficient to preserve life. Laidlaw lived for many years after, in no permanent respect a sufferer from his burial and resurrection.