When this wonderful ice-palace was completed it was thrown open to the public, and such crowds came to see it that sentinels were stationed in the house to prevent disorder.
This beautiful palace stood from the beginning of January until the end of March. Then, as the weather became warmer, it began to melt on the south side; but even after it lost its beauty and symmetry as a palace it did not become entirely useless, for the largest blocks of ice were transferred to the ice-houses of the imperial palace, and thus afforded grateful refreshment during the summer, as well as a pleasant reminder of “The Plaything of an Empress.”
CHARLIE’S WEEK IN BOSTON.
BY CHARLES E. HURD.
CHARLIE was going to Boston.
The ceaseless clatter of his little copper-toed boots over all the bare places in the house, and the pertinacious hammering he kept up upon everything capable of emitting sound, rendered it impossible for his mamma or the new baby to get any rest, and so it was that the decision came about. Aunt Mary, who had lent her presence to the household for the preceding fortnight, was to return home the following day, and with her, after infinite discussion, it was decided that he was to go for a week.
The momentous news was withheld from Charlie until the next morning, for fear of the result upon his night’s sleep, but it was injudiciously let out by Aunt Mary before breakfast, the effect being to at once plunge the young gentleman into the highest state of excitement. He had played “go to Boston” a thousand times with his little cart and wheelbarrow, but to take such a journey in reality was something he could hardly imagine possible.
“Am I going to Boston, real ’live?” he wildly inquired. “Where’s my rubber boots, and my little chair, and my cart, and I want my piece of gum mamma tooked away, and where’s my sled?”