But before we accompany her there, let us see what Kay is doing. He is certainly not thinking of little Gerda; least of all can he imagine that she is now standing at the palace gate. [Illustration] PART THE SEVENTH WHICH TREATS OF THE SNOW QUEEN’S PALACE, AND OF WHAT CAME TO PASS THEREIN 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. In the midst of the empty, interminable snow saloon lay a frozen lake; it was broken into a thousand pieces, but these pieces so exactly resembled each 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 she was then sitting on the Mirror of Reason, and that hers was the best, indeed the only one, in the world. Little Kay was quite blue, nay, 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 heart was like a lump of ice. He was busied among the sharp icy fragments, laying and joining 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 eyes 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. The Snow Queen had said to him, ‘When thou canst put that figure together, thou shalt become thine own master and I will give thee the whole world, and a new pair of skates besides.’ But he could never do it. ‘Now I am going to the warm countries,’ said the Snow Queen. ‘I shall flit through the air, and look into the black caldrons’--she meant the burning mountains, Etna and Vesuvius. ‘I 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 ached. He sat so still and so stiff that one might have fancied that he too was frozen.