And what could she _do_ without rubber boots, when she wanted to wade
through a brook, like this one, and the brooks were as they were now,
all running spang full to the very edge with snow-water, the way this
one did? Oo . . . Ooh . . . Ooh! how queer it did feel, to be standing most
up to your knees this way, with the current curling by, all cold and
snaky, feeling the fast-going water making your boot-legs shake like
Aunt Hetty's old cheeks when she laughed, and yet your feet as _dry_
inside! How could they feel as cold as that, without being wet, as
though they were magicked? That was a _real_ difference, even more than
the wind cool inside your hair and the sun warm on the outside; or your
hair tied tight at one end and all wobbly loose at the other. But this
wasn't a nice difference. It didn't add up to make a nice feeling, but a
sort of queer one, and if she stood there another minute, staring down
into that swirly, snatchy water, she'd fall right over into it . . . it
seemed to be snatching at _her!_ Oh gracious! This wasn't much better!
on the squelchy dead grass of the meadow that looked like real ground
and yet you sank right into it. Oh, it was _horridly_ soft, like
touching the hand of that new man that had come to live with the old
gentleman next door. She must hurry as fast as she could . . . it felt as
though it was sucking at her feet, trying to pull her down altogether
like the girl with the red shoes, and she didn't have any loaves of
bread to throw down to step on . . .

Well, there! this was better, as the ground started uphill. There was
firm ground under her feet. Yes, not mud, nor soaked, flabby
meadow-land, but solid earth, _solid, solid!_ She stamped on it with
delight. It was just as nice to have solid things _very_ solid, as it
was to have floaty things like clouds _very_ floaty. What was horrid was
to have a thing that _looked_ solid, and yet was all soft, like gelatine
pudding when you touched it.