Hark ! the rushing snow ! The sun-awakened avalanche ! whose mass. Thrice sifted by the storm, had gathered there Flake after flake, in heaven-defying minds As thought by thought is piled, till some great truth Is loosened, and the nations echo round, Shaken to their roots, as do the mountains now.^
1 H. C. McCook, The Gospel in Nature, 94.
2 An A^wstle of the North : Memoirs of Bishop Bompas, 77. ^ Shelley, Prometheus Unbound.
JOB XXXVIII. 22 139
3. Another thing that is worth observing in the snow is the silence of its falling. What should you think of a lace mill in which more than a thousand different patterns of lace were being made ? Would you not say that this was a very " treasury of lace " ? But if you could find such a mill you would see whirring wheels, grinding gears, humming spindles, great leathern belts, and many men and deft-fingered women at work. You would also expect to see a big, tall chimney to furnish the draught to burn large quantities of coal under the boilers to make the steam, to furnish the power, to drive the gears, belts, spindles, and wheels to make the lace. And then if you should look closely at the lace under a microscope the threads would look as rough as a clothes- line. What shall we say of the treasuries of the snow — the silent treasure-house out of which falls, without chimney or belt or wheel or spindle or noise or fuss, most beautiful crystals, which, examined under a microscope, only grow more beautiful — so many kinds that we cannot remember even the names of them all, much less their shape, and so many in number as to cover a vast tract of country a foot deep with them in twelve hours ?
The snow had begun in the gloaming,
And busily all the night Had been heaping field and highway
With a silence deep and white.
Every pine and fir and hemlock Wore ermine too dear for an earl.
And the poorest twig on the elm-tree Was ridged inch deep with pearl.
From sheds new-roofed with Carrara
Came Chanticleer's muffled crow, The stiff rails softened to swan's-down,
And still fluttered down the snow.
I stood and watched by the window
The noiseless work of the sky, And the sudden flurries of snow-birds.
Like brown leaves whirling by.
I thought of a mound in sweet Auburn
Where a little headstone stood; How the flakes were folding it gently,
As did robins the babes in the wood.
I40 THE TREASURIES OF THE SNOW
Up spoke our own little Mabel,
Saying, " Father, who makes it snow ? "
And I told of the good All-father Who cares for vis here below.
Again I looked at the snow-fall,
And thought of the leaden sky- That arched o'er our first great sorrow, When that mound was heaped so high.
I remembered the gradual patience That fell from that cloud like snow,
Flake by flake, healing and hiding The scar that renewed our 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.^
III.
The Use of Snow.
1. Snow is a warm sheath for the earth. Its very colour is unfavourable to the radiation of heat. It follows that when heavy beds are laid upon the earth they act precisely as do bed-coverings or clothes to the human body. The warmth of the covered soil is kept within itself. Moreover, to some extent the rays of the sun penetrate the snow even when it is of considerable thickness. From these two facts results a third fact ; viz. that the upper or surface stratum of the ground, even though it be frozen at the first fall of the snow, is soon thawed out, and does not again fall below the freezing-point during the winter, at least while the snow lasts.
1 J. R. Lowell, The First Snow Fall.
JOB XXXVIII. 22 141
From its loose texture, and from the fact that it contains several times its bulk of air, snow is a very bad conductor of heat. It is ranked with wool among the poorest of conductors, and thus it forms an admirable covering for the ground from the effects of radiation. It is relatively as warm to the earth in its thick enswathement of white packed crystals as is the softest wool to the human body. It has happened not infrequently in times of great cold that the soil is forty degrees warmer than the surface of the overlying snow. These facts will suffice to show the value of the snowy mantle which God sends to the earth during the severe frosts of winter.
^ In Vermont, for four successive days of one winter, the temperature immediately above the snow was thirteen degrees below zero. Beneath the snow, which was four inches deep, the temperature was nineteen degrees above zero, a difference of thirty- two degrees within four or five inches. Under a drift of snow two feet deep the temperature was twenty-seven degrees above zero, thus making a difference of forty degrees, showing that the soil beneath the snow-beds was from thirty-two to forty degrees higher than the temperature of the air. The value of this fact in preserving the life and vigour of plants is at once apparent. It is for this reason that in the borders and glades of woods and forests violets and other small plants begin to vegetate as soon as the snow has thawed the soil around their roots ; and they are not infrequently found in full flower under two or three feet of snow.^