the interior.
They carried into the bedroom the sleeping-accommodations from the
_Porpoise_; they were arranged in a circle about a large stove.
Benches, chairs, sofas, tables, wardrobes, were arranged in the
sitting-room, which was also used as a dining-room; the kitchen
received the cooking-stoves of the ship, and the various utensils.
Sails, stretched on the floor, formed the carpet, and also served as
hangings to the inner doors, which had no other way of closing. The
walls of the house averaged five feet in thickness, and the recesses
for the windows looked like embrasures in a fort. It was all built
with great solidity; what more was to be desired? Ah, if they had
listened to the doctor, there is no knowing what they would not have
made of this ice and snow, which can be so easily manipulated! He all
day long would ponder over plans which he never hoped to bring about,
but he thereby lightened the dull work of all by the ingenuity of his
suggestions. Besides, he had come across, in his wide reading, a
rather rare book by one Kraft, entitled "Detailed Description of the
Snow-Palace built at St. Petersburg, in January, 1740, and of all the
Objects it contained." The recollection of this book impressed him.
One evening he gave his companions a full account of the wonders of
that snow-palace.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

"Why couldn't we do here," he asked, "what they did at St. Petersburg?
What do we need? Nothing, not even imagination!"

"So it was very handsome?" said Johnson.

"It was fairy-like, my friend. The house, built by order of the
Empress Anna, and in which she had celebrated the marriage of one of
her buffoons in 1740, was nearly as large as ours; but in front stood
six cannons of ice; they were often fired without bursting; there were
also mortars to hold sixty-pound shells; so we could have some
formidable artillery; the bronze is handy, and falls even from heaven.
But the triumph of taste and art was on the front of the palace, which
was adorned with handsome statues; the steps were garnished with vases
of flowers of the same material; on the right stood an enormous
elephant, who played water through his trunk by day, and burning
naphtha by night. What a menagerie we might have if we only wanted
to!"

"As for animals," answered Johnson, "we sha'n't lack them, I fancy,
and they won't be any the less interesting for not being made of ice."

"Well," said the doctor, "we shall be able to def