When the nights were dry and clear, and puffs of wind raised the hoar frost beneath their footsteps and fell on their faces like taps from a switch, they refrained from sitting down.

They walked quickly to and fro, wrapped in the pelisse, their cheeks blue with cold, and their eyes watering; and they laughed heartily, quite quivering with mirth, at the rapidity of their march through the freezing atmosphere.

One snowy evening they amused themselves with making an enormous snowball, which they rolled into a corner.

It remained there fully a month, which caused them fresh astonishment each time they met in the path.

Nor did the rain frighten them.