maiden, dressed in finest white gauze.

She was so beautiful and dainty, but all of ice, hard bright ice.

Still she was alive; her eyes glittered like two clear stars, but
there was no rest or peace in them. She nodded at the window,
and beckoned with her hand. The little boy was frightened, and
sprang down from the chair. It seemed as if a great white bird
had flown past the window.

The next day there was a harder frost than before.

Then came the spring, then the summer, when the roses grew and
smelt more beautifully than ever.

Kay and Gerda were looking at one of their picture-books--the
clock in the great church-tower had just struck five, when Kay
exclaimed, 'Oh! something has stung my heart, and I've got
something in my eye!'

The little girl threw her arms round his neck; he winked hard
with both his eyes; no, she could see nothing in them.

'I think it is gone now,' said he; but it had not gone. It was
one of the tiny splinters of the glass of the magic mirror which
we have heard about, that turned everything great and good
reflected in it small and ugly. And poor Kay had also a splinter
in his heart, and it began to change into a lump of ice. It did
not hurt him at all, but the splinter was there all the same.