IMH 75:2 161-162

"Chronicles of Upper Burnet" (1)

1881

Wednesday, January 19th.

A kind of "jook"(39) day. I took the old musket and roamed
the woods not with any desire for killing anything but simply
to do something to get rid of the morbid, restless discontented,
almost despairing feeling that has been on me for ten days. I
met various persons during my tour and finally got to No.7
Schoolhouse.(40) Effie's(41) scholars I did'n't count but should esti­
mate at twenty. The order was excellent the pupils were fairly
industrious, and the recitations, what I heard of them, were
well conducted but only fairly recited. I was back home before
our clock struck two. Alvin was on a hunt in the woods for
material for squizzes and was late at his supper. Father took a
jaunt at night in the direction of Robert Foster's. Nothing of
any importance was done at home. Alvin spent the most of the
time squizzing. Mother felt a little better. The sun was seen
once to-day and only once. The snow got soft and wet, the ice
got a little melted and the clouds hung like a pall over creation
making the day, dreary, disconsolate, and depressing.