Snowchild

And she wrote her letters: one to Joyce, that told of her safety without disclosing her place of refuge; another a longer, fuller one, to Mr. Chester, telling him of all that had happened, of her doubts and difficulties, and begging him to come to her; “for, you know, dear old Gabriel,” she said, “that my mother made you a sort of guardian, and, as you have plenty of money, and can go where you please, do let it please you to come to the poor “snowchild,” who has fled out into the snow, and is shivering all alone in the cold world.” This latter clause was purely metaphorical, as Doris was sitting comfortably by the fireside, with Mrs. Howell blandly contemplating her from the opposite corner, and meditating, like Aunt Lotty, on the possibility of a wedding, with Mr. Chester and Doris for bridegroom and bride.

Another example of the stylised mould into which earlier stories are fashioned to become nouvelles is that of the snowchild (Montaiglon et Raynaud, Fabliaux, Vol. I, No. XIV; Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, XIX) to which reference has already been made.

The play, entitled “Snowflake”, was based on a Russian legend about a childless couple who were given a snowchild by the children of the village. The snowchild comes to life when the Snow King takes pity on the couple and turns the children’s snowchild into a real child.

Todd still gripped the misshapen reddish chimneytop in the fist that had collapsed the roof, flattening the gingerbread house and with it the little cookie snowman and snowwoman and snowchild.

Fir trees, pregnant with snowchild, sway heavily in the gilding sun.

Christ Almighty, a child in Christ. I’m getting hot, hot’s what I’m getting. The top of my skull is lifting off. For Christ’s sake, a child. It’ll be a snowchild. The first snowbody will now become somebody. A child. It’s already on a journey.

Lyn and I made a snowchild in the shade of a grove of gums.

“Let us make a snowchild,” said the old man to his wife. What a lovely snowchild it was, that they made. Small, with a tiny nose and mouth and eyes and ears. And as they watched, the snowchild’s eyes suddenly blinked. The old lady could not believe her eyes. Was the snow playing tricks? Slowly, in front of their eyes, the snowchild turned into a lovely baby girl.