almost wished themselves back in their shroud of snow.

So, with alternate feasting and fasting we passed the long weeks of
that Arctic winter until the frogs in the neighboring swamp crying:
"Knee deep, knee deep," and "better go round, better go round,"
proclaimed the season of freshets when the vast plain below us was
traversible only in boats. Then the birds returned from the far South,
but brought no seed-time or harvest, for that was the ever to be
remembered "Year without a summer," and but for the wild ducks and
geese shot on the lake, and the wary and uncertain fish caught with
the hook, all human lives in that region would have returned to the
invisible from whence they came.

It seemed as if chaos and dark night had come back to those wild
woods. The migratory fever seized upon us all, and my parents
determined to seek some unknown far away, to sail to the beautiful
land of somewhere, for they felt sure that--

Somewhere the sun is shining,
Elsewhere the song-birds dwell;
And they hushed their sad repining
In the faith that somewhere all is well.

Somewhere the load is lifted
Close by an open gate;
Out there the clouds are rifted,
Somewhere the angels wait.