Thus he made a very liberal contribution to the food of the family, so that his visit was a source of profit to them, not of loss.
All the day, and during the long wintry night, the freezing blasts blew fiercely, and the weather grew more severely cold.

The next morning his friends urged him to remain another day.

They all knew that the water would be frozen over, but not sufficiently hard to bear his weight, and this would add greatly to the difficulty and the danger of his return.
It seemed impossible that any man could endure, on such a day, fording a swollen stream, a mile in breadth, the water most of the way up to his waist, in some places above his head, and breaking the ice at every step.

The prospect appalled even Crockett himself.

He therefore decided to remain till the next morning, though he knew that his family would be left in a state of great anxiety.