So he opened the door and went out, leaving Jooly’s grandmother rocking the cradle, and his mother at work about the room as before.
When the hunter had gone out and shut the door, he went along the side of the house till he came to a small door leading to his cow-house, which was a sort of small barn.
He calls Bruno.
He opened the door of the cow-house and called out “
Bruno!”
Bruno, who was asleep at this time in his bed, in a box half filled with straw, started up on hearing his master’s voice, and, leaping over the side of the box, came to his master in the storm.
Bruno’s bed.
Bruno was glad to be called. And yet it was a dark and stormy night. The wind was blowing, and the snow was driving terribly. On the other hand, the bed where he had been lying was warm and comfortable. The cow was near him for company. He was enjoying, too, a very refreshing sleep, dreaming of races and frolics with other dogs on a pretty green. All this repose and comfort were disturbed. Still, Bruno was glad. He perceived at once that an unexpected emergency had occurred, and that some important duty was to be performed. Bruno had no desire to lead a useless life. He was always proud and happy when he had any duty to perform, and the more important and responsible the duty was, the more proud and happy it made him. He cared nothing at all for any discomfort, fatigue, or exposure that it might bring upon him.
A comparison.
Some boys are very different from Bruno in this respect. They do not share his noble nature. They never like duty. All they like is ease, comfort, and pleasure. When any unexpected emergency occurs, and they are called to duty, they go to their work with great reluctance, and with many murmurings and repinings, as if to do duty were an irksome task. I would give a great deal more for a dog like Bruno than for such a boy.
The hunter and Bruno in the snow.
Bruno and his master took the road which led to the village. The hunter led the way, and Bruno followed. The road was steep and narrow, and in many places the ground was so buried in snow that the way was very difficult to find. Sometimes the snow was very soft and deep, and the hunter would sink into it so far that he could scarcely advance at all. At such times Bruno, being lighter and stronger, would wallow on through the drift, and then look back to his master, and wait for him to come, and then go back to him again, looking all the time at the hunter with an expression of animation and hope upon his countenance, and wagging his tail, as if he were endeavoring to cheer and encourage him. This action had the effect, at any rate, of encouragement. It cheered the hunter on; and so, in due time, they both arrived safely at the village.
The doctor concluded, after hearing all about the case, that it would not be best for him to go up the mountain; but he gave the hunter some medicine for the baby.
The hunter attempts to return to the cottage.
The medicine was put in a phial, and the hunter put the phial in his pocket. When all was ready, the hunter set out again on his return home.
Difficulties in the way.
It was much harder going up than it had been to come down. The road was very steep. The snow, too, was getting deeper every hour. Besides, it was now dark, and it was more difficult than ever to find the way.
At last, when the hunter had got pretty near his own cottage again, his strength began to fail. He staggered on a little farther, and then he sank down exhausted into the snow. Bruno leaped about him, and rubbed his head against his master’s cheek, and barked, and wagged his tail, and did every thing in his power to encourage his master to rise and make another effort. At length he succeeded.
“Yes,” said the hunter, “I’ll get up, and try again.”
Getting lost.
So he rose and staggered feebly on a little farther. He looked about him, but he could not tell where he was. He began to feel that he was lost. Now, whenever a man gets really lost, either in the woods or in the snow, a feeling of great perplexity and bewilderment generally comes over his mind, which almost wholly deprives him of the use of his faculties. The feeling is very much like that which one experiences when half awake. You do not know where you are, or what you want, or where you want to go. Sometimes you scarcely seem to know who you are. The hunter began to be thus bewildered. Then it was bitter cold, and he began to be benumbed and stupefied.
Intense cold almost always produces a stupefying effect, when one has been long exposed to it. The hunter knew very well that he must not yield to such a feeling as this, and so he forced himself to make a new effort. But the snow seemed to grow deeper and deeper, and it was very hard for him to make his way through it. It was freshly fallen, and, consequently, it was very light and soft, and the hunter sank down in it very far. If he had had snow shoes, he could have walked upon the top of it; but he had no snow shoes.
At last he became very tired.
“Bruno,” said he, “I must lie down here and rest a little, before I can go on any further.”
Bruno tries to encourage and save his master.
But Bruno, when he saw his master preparing to lie down, jumped about him, and barked, and seemed very uneasy. Just then the hunter saw before him a deep black hole. He looked down, and saw that it was water. Instead of being in the road, he was going over some deep pit filled with water, covered, except in one place, with ice and snow. He perceived that he had had a very narrow escape from falling into this water, and he now felt more bewildered and lost than ever. He contrived to get by the dangerous hole, feeling his way with a stick, and then he sank down in the snow among the rocks, and gave up in despair.
The hunter comes very near perishing in the snow.
And yet the house was very near. The chimney and the gable end of it could just be distinguished in the distance through the falling snow. Bruno knew this, and he was extremely distressed that his master should give up when so near reaching home. He lay down in the snow by the side of his master, and putting his paw over his arm, to encourage him and keep him from absolute despair, he turned his head toward the house, and barked loud and long, again and again, in hopes of bringing somebody to the rescue.
In the picture you can see the hunter lying in the snow, with Bruno over him. His cap has fallen off, and is half buried. His stick, too, lies on the snow near his cap. That was a stick that he got to feel down into the hole in the ice with, in order to ascertain how deep the water was, and to find his way around it. The rocks around the place are covered with snow, and the branches of the trees are white with it.
Danger of going to sleep when out in a storm.
It is extremely dangerous to lie down to sleep in the snow in a storm like this. People that do so usually never wake again. They think, always, that they only wish to rest themselves, and sleep a few minutes, and that then they will be refreshed, and be ready to proceed on their journey. But they are deceived. The drowsiness is produced, not by the fatigue, but by the cold. They are beginning to freeze, and the freezing benumbs all their sensations. The drowsiness is the effect of the benumbing of the brain.
Sometimes, when several persons are traveling together in cold and storms, one of their number, who may perhaps be more delicate than the rest, and who feels the cold more sensibly, wishes very much to stop a few minutes to lie down and rest, and he begs his companions to allow him to do so. But they, if they are wise, will not consent. Then he sometimes declares that he will stop, at any rate, even if they do not consent. Then they declare that he shall not, and they take hold of his shoulders and arms to pull him along. Then he gets angry, and attempts to resist them. The excitement of this quarrel warms him a little, and restores in some degree his sensibility, and so he goes on, and his life is saved. Then he is very grateful to them for having disregarded his remonstrances and resistance, and for compelling him to proceed.2
But now we must return to the story.
Alarm in the cottage. They open the door.
The