midnight
She examined the potatoes , which were buried among withered ferns ; but as there were not many , only brought in enough for a day , afraid of heat spoiling them . Then she thought of the cow , and made her way to the byre . She milked the poor animal , but got very little from her , and had great difficulty in pulling down hay out of the loft for her to eat ; besides , it was getting dark , and poor Agnes felt very frightened and unhappy . So she was thankful to get into the cottage again , and , barring the door , she put the infants comfortably to bed , and allowed the others to sit up with her until midnight , in the faint hope that some token of their dear parents not being lost might reach them before then . It was a wild night of wind and snow , and though the little watchers sometimes fancied they heard voices in the stormy blast , when the lull came , all was silence . Agnes did what she could to keep the snow from drifting in below the door or through a chink of the window , and also to make sure that the fire would not go out , and then they sadly went to bed . Next morning the snow-drifts were higher than ever !