The snow patches become larger and more numerous, and soon I came into an open and saw a village up the hill. This was October, and the sight ahead was strange and weird. The roofs of the buildings were white with snow; there were scattered patches of it all about, and a high pasture southward was completely covered. It seemed as if I had left realities behind; as if in some way I was an explorer in the regions of the far north; as if here was a little town taken complete possession of by the frost; as if no life could remain, and I would find the houses deserted or the inhabitants all frozen and dead. There was a little saw-mill here and some big piles of boards; everywhere marks of former life; but the premature frost seemed to have settled down like a shroud on all about. I entered the village and found a man working beside a house, and learned from him that I had still three miles to travel before I came to the church. [Illustration: IN HAYING TIME] I took a steep southward road and led the horse, with frequent rests, up the hills. Darkness had been fast gathering, the sunset colors had faded, one bright star glowed in the west, and at its right a gloomy cloud mass reached up from the horizon. The neighboring fields got more and more snow-covered, until the black ribbon of the muddy road was about the only thing which marred their whiteness. There were rocky pastures about, intermitting with patches of woodland. Here and there were stiff dark lines of spruce along the hilltops, and these, with the white pastures, made the country seem like a bit of Norway. Snow clung to the evergreen arms of the spruces and whitened the upper fence-rails, and the muddy trail of the road ceased in the crisp whiteness.