While the service was taking place a huge clod of snow slipped from the roof and fell right against the church door.

It was some time before the prisoners could make up their minds to leave by the windows.

What the Auld Lichts would have done in a similar predicament I cannot even conjecture.
That was the first warning of the thaw.

It froze again; there was more snow; the thaw began in earnest; and then the streets were a sight to see.

There was no traffic to turn the snow to slush, and, where it had not been piled up in walls a few feet from the houses, it remained in the narrow ways till it became a lake.