Before the story ended, a noise like thunder came rolling to us through the forests. Owing to the strange time of the year for a thunder storm, we were slow in realizing that one was brooding, but repeated peals and long rumbling echoes, preceded by vivid flashes of light in the northern sky, soon convinced us of this fact. The wind changed, grew stronger, and soughed dismally through the trees. Rain began pattering on the bark roof: it came in slight showers, ceasing with each gust and flaw, then descending in torrents. The fire grew fiercer under these attempts to smother it, and with the shifting of the wind, much to our discomfiture, smoke and sparks were driven under the roof. Occasionally, a strong blast would make us draw up our feet as the flames, leveled to the ground, whirled in on us. The situation became unendurable, and in a lull of the storm we crawled out in the open air; tore down our camp, and changed it around with its back wall towards the wind. This occupied but a few minutes, and we were soon ensconced again. It was a wretched night. We lay tight together, like spoons, the six middle men being well protected from cold, but not from leaks in the roof. The two end men fared less comfortably with one side exposed. No one slept unless it was the gray-headed Medford, hardened by 1001 nights of like experience. The rain ceased before morning, but the temperature was considerably below the freezing point, and icicles had formed on the end of the roof fartherest from the fire. All night we had shifted and changed our positions, and the gray light of dawn found us in the ashes, seemingly close enough to the fire to blister our faces, suffering in martyr-like submission with smoke in our eyes and backs cold. I never saw a man with a good appetite for breakfast after a night of wakefulness beside a camp fire. After a long tramp, you can eat the roughest food with relish, but there is nothing tempting about hot coffee without sugar and cream, dry cornbread and fat meat, in the ashes, on a cold, raw morning before the stars have paled in the sky. However, on the unpleasant prospect of seven hours elapsing before another snack, on this occasion we did stuff down some solid food, and drank copiously of the coffee.