And the father who has not forgotten his own shortcomings of long ago is apt to wisely overlook some such transgression of parental authority, when the ice beckons, and, in spite of good intentions, all outdoors seems to grip a fellow in fetters of steel.
Some little time later Hugh might have been seen in a neighbor's family sleigh heading out of town.

There was plenty of snow for this sort of thing, though the ice had been kept well cleared through the use of brooms handled by many willing hands.

The skating had not been injured in the least, for they flooded the pond each night afresh, giving it a glittering new surface by morning.
Hugh had to go a couple of miles out.

He, too, was bound for a farm, to fetch back a sack of potatoes that his mother had purchased, and which should have been delivered before then, only that the one horse on the place had taken a notion to fall sick, and that rendered the farmer helpless.
It was already well on toward sunset when Hugh started out.

He expected to be overtaken by twilight before getting back home; but that was a small matter, since he knew the road very well, and with the snow on the ground it would not be really dark at any time.
It was certainly bitter cold.