was full of its fresh scent, as it came down gently in tremendous flakes. Here and there Eepersip saw one of the lovely blossoms of the talatuna, with those same ruby-red leaves. How beautiful they were, growing in great clusters, just peeping through the snow! Once in a while a pale cream-coloured mountain moth would flit before her. Occasional gusts brought swarms of tiny bottle-green, white-winged snow-beetles, and the air was a-buzz with them. Sometimes a blue or white insect like a firefly would hover past, a strange red light gleaming about its transparent body.
On and on Eepersip explored, seeing nothing but the wonderland about her—the fairy palaces of snow, the fluttering, hovering insects, and the beautiful mountain flowers. Following the icy river down, she came sometimes to a great cascade of the green water—a cascade coming over one of those great cliffs, washing down the snow, throwing up fountains and clouds of spray in its furious descent. Sometimes it cut under the banks, making a green cave hung with icicles gleaming strangely. One of these had been made when the river was in flood; now it was large enough for Eepersip to stand in, and, wading in water about up to her knees, she went back into its innermost recesses, where the roar of the stream was muffled. There
