THE SNOW QUEEN'S PALACE. 
alike vast, empty, icily cold. and dazzlingly white. No sounds of mirth ever resounded through 
these dreary spaces: no cheerful scene refreshed the sight—not even so much as a bear's 
ball, such as one might imagine sometimes takes place; the tempest forming a band of 
musicians, and the polar bears standing on their hind paws and exhibiting themselves in 
‘he oddest positions. Nor was there ever a card assembly wherein cards might be 
acld in the mouth, and dealt out by the paws: nor even a small select coffee-party for the 
white young Tady foxes. Vast, empty, and cold were the Snow Queen's chambers, and 
the Northern Lights flashed now high, now low, in regular gradations. In the midst of 
the empty, interminable snow-saloon lay a frozen lake, it was broken into a thousand 
neces, but these pieces so exactly resembled cach other, that the breaking of them might 
well be deemed a work of more than human skill. The Snow Queen, when at home, 
always sat in the centre of this lake: she used to say that ~he was sitting on the Mirror of 
Reason, and that hers was the best, indeed the only one in the world. 
Little Kay was quite blue, nav. almost black with cold, but he did not observe it, 
for the Snow Queen had kissed away the shrinking feeling he used to experience, and his 
acart was like a lump of ice. He was busied among the sharp icy fragments, laying and 
loining them together in every possible way, just as people do with what are called Chinese 
Puzzles. Kay could form the most curious and complete figures,— this was the ice puzzle 
of reason, —and in his eves these figures were of the utmost importance. He often formed 
whole words, but there was one word he could never succeed in forming, it was Eternity. 
Ihe Snow Queen had said to him, “When thou canst put that figure together, thou shalt 
necome thine own master. and I will give thee the whole world, and a new pair of skates 
desides.” But he could never do it. 
“Now Lam going to the warm countries,” said the Snow Queen; “I shall flit 
through the air, and look into the black cauldrons™- -she meant the burning mountains, 
Etna and Vesuvius. + 1 shall whiten them a little; that will be good for the citrons and 
vineyards.” So away flew the Snow Queen, leaving Kay sitting all alone in the large 
empty hall of ice. He looked at the fragments, and thought and thought till his head 
whed: he sat so still and so stiff that ne might have fancied that he too was frozen. 
Cold and cutting blew the winds, when little Gerda passed through the palace 
fates. but she repeated her evening prayer, and they immediately sank to rest. She 
tered the large, cold, empty hall. She saw Kay, she recognised him, she flew upon his 
week, she held him fase, and cried, © Kay! dear, dear Kay! I have found thee at last!” 
But he sat still ax before: cold, silent, motionless. His unkindness wounded poor 
lierda deeply, hot and bitter were the tears she shed. they fell upon his breast, they reached 
nis heart, they thawed the ice. and dissolved the tinv splinter of glass within it; he looked 
it her while she sang her hvinn, 
“Our roses bloom and fade away, 
Our Infant Lord abides alway? 
May we he blessed His face to see, 
Aud ever little children be!™ 
Then Kay burst into tears, he wept till the glass splinter floated in his eve, and fell with 
Ws tears; he knew his old companion immediately, and exclaimed with joy, © Gerda, my 
lear little Gerda, where hast thou been ail this time?—-And where have I been?”