THE GOLD OF FAIRNILEE. 279

strongest shepherds could not hold their own
against the tempest, and were “‘smoored” (or
smothered) in the waste. The flocks moved
down from the hill-sides, down and down, till
all the sheep on a farm would be gathered
together in a crowd, under the shelter of a
wood in some deep dip of the hills. The storm
seemed as if it would never cease; for thirteen
days the snow drifted and the wind blew.
There was nothing for the sheep to eat, and if
there had been hay enough, it would have been
impossible to carry it to them. The poor
beasts bit at the wool on each other’s backs,
and so many of them died that the shepherds
built walls with the dead bodies to keep the
wind and snow away from those that were left
alive.

There could be little work done on the farm
that spring; and summer came in so cold and
wet that the corn could not ripen, but was
levelled to the ground. Then autumn was
rainy, and the green sheaves lay out in the
fields, and sprouted and rotted; so that little
corn was reaped, and little flour could be made
that year. Then in winter, and as spring came
on, the people began to starve. They had no
grain, and there were no potatoes in those
days, and no rice; nor could corn be brought
in from foreign countries. So men and women
and children might be seen in the fields, with
white pinched faces, gathering nettles to make