My Novel — Volume 02

If this simple tale is to be told at all, it may as well begin at the beginning and in the good old-fashioned and best of all ways—thus: Once upon a time in the Canadian city of Toronto, on the 17th of March, the sun rose bright and clear—which was a most surprising thing for the sun to do on St. Patrick's Day, but while the people were yet wondering over it the sunlight disappeared, clouds of dull gray spread themselves evenly over the sky, and then the snow fell—fell fast and furious, quickly whitening the streets and house-tops, softly lining every hollow, and was piling little cushions on top of all the hitching-posts, when the flakes grew larger, wetter, farther apart, and after a little hesitation turned to rain—a sort of walk-trot-gallop rain, which wound up with one vivid flash of lightning and a clap of thunder that fairly shook the city.