The walls of the palace were formed of the driven snow, its doors and windows of the cutting winds. There were above a hundred halls, the largest of them many miles in extent, all illuminated by the Northern Lights, all 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 the oddest positions.
Nor was there ever a card-assembly, wherein the cards might be held in the mouth and dealt out by paws; nor even a small select coffee-party for the white young lady foxes.
Vast, empty, and cold were the Snow Queen’s chambers, and the Northern Lights flashed, now high, now low, in regular gradations.

PART THE SEVENTH
WHICH TREATS OF THE SNOW QUEEN’S PALACE, AND OF WHAT CAME TO PASS THEREIN