The Dolls Funeral TS

awakened in their beds with something of
the emotions that are his who oversleeps
himself on a day when he has an appoint-
ment to keep, and knows at last, by the
sun that shines in at his window, or—if he
dwell in London—by the volume of the
sound of traffic in the street below, that
he has missed the opportunity. For a
moment, at the time of their awaking, it
appeared to them that they must somehow
have lain asleep for a month or two, and
that the spring, for which they had
hoped to be prepared, was already upon
them.

There had been weeks and weeks of frost
hard enough to make all ancient natives
of these temperate seaside regions search
their memories through to find recollec-
tions of a season equally rigorous, and so
keep the young from undue forwardness.
The green of sprouting bulbs had lacked
the power to pierce the hard crust of the
-purplish-brown earth, and not a flower was
to be found in field or garden.