three in the afternoon
Ellen cried ; and we began to think that the venture might be worth trying . It snowed hard that night , and instead of going up the stream on the ice with two hand sleds , as we had at first planned , Addison and I set a hayrack on two traverse sleds , and with two of the work-horses drove up the winter road . Axes and ropes were taken , feed for the team , and food enough for two days . The sun had come out bright and warm ; there was enough snow to make the sleds run easily , and we got on well until past three in the afternoon , when we were made aware of a very unusual change of temperature , for Maine in December . It grew warm rapidly ; clouds overspread the sky ; a thunderpeal rumbled suddenly . Within ten minutes a thundershower was falling , and almost as if by magic , all that snow melted away . We were left with our rack and traverse sleds , scraping and bumping over logs and stones .