I remembered the gradual patience That fell from that cloud like snow, Flake by flake, healing and hiding The scar on our deep-plunged woe. And again to the child I whispered, "The snow that husheth all, Darling, the merciful Father Alone can make it fall." Then, with eyes that saw not, I kissed her; And she, kissing back, could not know That _my_ kiss was given to her sister, Folded close under deepening snow. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. =HELPS TO STUDY= When did the snow begin? How do you know? What time is it now? Is snow still falling? Read the lines that show this. Of what sorrow does the snow remind the poet? Read the lines which show that peace had come to the parents. Make a list of the comparisons (or similes) used by the poet. Read the lines which show that the storm was a quiet one. Which lines do you like best? OLD EPHRAIM For some days after our arrival on the Bighorn range we did not come across any grizzly. There were plenty of black-tail deer in the woods, and we encountered a number of bands of cow and calf elk, or of young bulls; but after several days' hunting, we were still without any game worth taking home, and we had seen no sign of grizzly, which was the game we were especially anxious to kill, for neither Merrifield nor I had ever seen a bear alive. Sometimes we hunted in company; sometimes each of us went out alone. One day we had separated; I reached camp early in the afternoon, and waited a couple of hours before Merrifield put in an appearance. At last I heard a shout, and he came in sight galloping at speed down an open glade, and waving his hat, evidently having had good luck; and when he reined in his small, wiry cow-pony, we saw that he had packed behind his saddle the fine, glossy pelt of a black bear. Better still, he announced that he had been off about ten miles to a perfect tangle of ravines and valleys where bear sign was very thick; and not of black bear either, but of grizzly. The black bear (the only one we got on the mountains) he had run across by accident. Merrifield's tale made me decide to shift camp at once, and go over to the spot where the bear-tracks were plentiful. Next morning we were off, and by noon pitched camp by a clear brook, in a valley with steep, wooded sides. That afternoon we again went out, and I shot a fine bull elk. I came home alone toward nightfall, walking through a reach of burnt forest, where there was nothing but charred tree-trunks and black mold. When nearly through it I came across the huge, half-human footprints of a great grizzly, which must have passed by within a few minutes. It gave me rather an eery feeling in the silent, lonely woods, to see for the first time the unmistakable proofs that I was in the home of the mighty lord of the wilderness.