She ran on as fast as she could; a whole regiment of snow-flakes came to meet her.
They did not fall from the sky, which was cloudless and bright with the Northern Lights;
they ran straight along the ground, and the farther Gerda advanced the larger they grew.
Gerda then remembered how large and curious the snow-flakes had appeared to her when one day she had looked at them through a burning-glass; these, however, were very much larger, they were living forms, they were in fact the Snow Queen’s guards.
Their shapes were the strangest that could be imagined; some looked like great ugly porcupines, others like snakes rolled into knots with their heads peering forth, and others like little fat bears with bristling hair—all, however, were alike dazzlingly white—all were living snow-flakes.

PART THE SIXTH
THE LAPLAND WOMAN AND THE FINLAND WOMAN