Quote from "The Bird of Folklore" (1864)
It is wintertime, the wind still as sharp as an elfin-forged sword; the snow is drifting – it has been drifting, it seems to us, for days and weeks – and it lies like a monstrous snow mountain over the big town; it is like a weighty dream in the winter night. All beneath it is hidden and seemingly nonexistent; only the golden cross on the church, the symbol of faith, rises above the snow grave and glitters against the blue sky in the clear sunshine.