Far as the eye could reach, nothing but snow, the air frosty and sharp, though the sun was shining once more.

Mirak was keen to snowball, but Roy would not hear of it; the snow was melting with the faint heat of the mid-day sun, he said, and a step might make the frost film break, and down into the powdery drift they might go, never to come up again.

So they only stood looking about them for a few minutes and then prepared to go back.
"Take care, my lord, take care!" cried Roy, as Mirak, who was preparing to descend legs foremost, as he had been told to do, suddenly looked up with a face full of mischief, let go with his hands, and pouf! disappeared down the slippery tunnel like a pea in a pea-shooter.

A burst of laughter from below told them he had arrived safely, and nothing would suit Bija but to do likewise, Roy being still too tight a fit to slide quickly.

In fact, the children were eager to climb up once more and do it again, but Head-nurse said she could not hear of it; their clothes were wet enough as it was; besides, it was most unlady-like for a real Princess! The days, therefore, did not pass so uncomfortably, though pressing anxiety sat on Foster-father's honest face, and every time Roy returned from a climb up to outer air he would ask him if he had seen anything.
"Nothing," Roy would reply, "and the snow wastes but little, we are so high up." At last one night, after the children were asleep, Foster-father summoned a council of war.