15

Even though I would have wrapped the dear little doll in her shawl and carefully buried her.

Now, even I am very embarrassed to tell this — in the sand in the garden, under the tree that shaded my old window. I had no companion, except my little bird, which I took with me in a cage.

When the house was out of sight, I sat down, with the bird's cage on the straw at my feet, in front of the low seat, so that I could see through the high window.

Being that he was contemplating the icy trees that were covered with snow, in which they were similar to beautiful pieces of spar; and the fields, all soft and white with last night's snow, even though they saw the dim light of that sun in the sky, watching them, releasing its weak rays, in that misty city.

That sun was dark red, but radiating so little heat, even as the ice, dark as metal, from which the skaters and slides had swept the snow.