Winter Diseases—Foliage in White, after a Light Snow—Capture of a 'Possum—Chase in the Snow, with Bare Legs—'Possum's Habits when caught, etc.
- January, 1855.
Winter is seizing us all by the throat, in this part of the country. The sudden blanketings and un-blanketings of the hills—snows and thaws in wonderfully complete alternation—affect the Highland health. One of my stoutest neighbors, a river sloop-man used to all manner of exposure, died yesterday of the prevailing bronchitis. My family table assembles a half-dozen, varied influenzas—a putting out of tune of its usual accord of voices, which, to one who relies upon it for his only music, is quite an interruption of comfort.
On my favorite curative principle of counter-irritation, I started off, with a stuffed head, for a sharp trot in the snow-storm, a day or two ago, and so chanced to see one of those private theatricals with which Nature makes our country entertainments correspond to the dramatic season in the city. I had been gone two hours among the hills, and the sky and my mucous membranes had meantime been clearing up together. It had stopped snowing and I
