FREE AND INDEPENDENT
All the days of that storm Almanzo was thinking. He did not crack jokes as usual, and when doing the chores he curried and brushed his horses mechanically. He even sat thoughtfully whittling and let Royal make the supper pancakes.

COLD AND DARK
That blizzard seemed never to end. It paused sometimes, only to roar again quickly and more furiously out of the northwest.

WHERE THERE' SAW ILL
The hay made a quick, hot fire, but it burned away more swiftly than kindling. Ma kept the stove's drafts closed and all day long she was feeding the fire.

SEED WHEAT
The cold and the dark had come again. The nails in the roof were white with frost, the windowpanes were gray. Scraping a peephole only showed the blank, whirling whiteness against the other side of the glass.

No T R A I N S
It was not worth while to get up in the morning.
The daylight was dim, the windows were white and so were the nails in the roof. Another blizzard was roaring, screaming, and swishing around the house. There would be no school.

THREE DAYS' BLIZZARD
When Laura's eyes opened in the morning she saw that every clinched nail in the roof overhead was furry-white with frost. Thick frost covered every windowpane to its very top. The daylight was still and dim inside the stout walls that kept out the howling blizzard.

INDIAN SUMMER
There were only slivers of ice on the water pail next morning and the day was sunny andwarm. Pa took his traps to set them for muskrats in Big Slough, and Carrie and Grace played outdoors.