A dimly lit picture, all in sombre browns, relieved by
the scarlet shirts of the men, and the gaudy printed calicoes of the
women, just visible in the uncertain light of the flickering lamp, and
of the red glow from the stove. Then came an all-night drive in
sledges through the interminable forest of pines, the piercing cold
lashing our faces like a whip, and the stars blazing in the great
expanse of dull-polished steel above us with that hard diamond-like
radiance they only assume when the thermometer is down below zero.
Twenty-four hours later we were both in the vast halls of the Winter
Palace in full uniform, as bedizened with gold as a _nouveau riche's_
drawing-room. Though the world outside may have been frost-bound,
Winter's domain stopped at the threshold of the Palace, for once
inside, banks of growing hyacinths and tulips bloomed bravely, and the
big palms, from which the balls derived their name, stood aligned down
the great halls, as though they were in their native South Sea Isles,
with a supper-table for twelve persons arranged under each of them.
Those "Bals des Palmiers" were really like a scene from the Arabian
Nights, what with the varied uniforms of the men, the impressive
Russian Court dresses of the women, the jewels, the lights, and the
masses of flowers.
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