Cottier. "We ought, by rights, to give these things to the revenue
officer."

"Yes," I said, "but if we do that, we shall have to say how they came,
and why they came, and then perhaps the exciseman will get a clue, and
we shall have brought the night-riders into trouble."

It was cowardly of me to speak like this; but you must remember that I
had been in "Captain Sharp's" hands the night before, and I was still
terrified by his threat--

"When I know,
Your neck'll go
Like so."

"Well," said Mrs Cottier, looking at me rather sharply, "we will keep
the things, and say nothing about them: but we must find out what duty
should be paid on them, and send it to the exciseman at
Dartmouth. That will spare our consciences."

After breakfast, Mrs Cottier went to give orders to the servant, while
Hugh and I slipped down the lane to see how the snow had drifted in
our little orchard by the brook. We had read somewhere that the Red
Indians often make themselves snow-houses, or snow-burrows, when the
winter is severe. We were anxious to try our hands at making a
snow-house. We wanted to know whether a house with snow walls could
really be warm, and we pictured to ourselves how strange it would be
to be shut in by walls of snow, with only one little hole for air,
seeing nothing but the white all round us, having no window to look
through. We thought that it would be wonderful to have a snow-house,