New Year’s Day, 1607. The god of winter, holding high carnival in the vaulted heavens, snatched the icy stalactites from his frozen caverns, and crushing them in his iron grasp, hurled them down upon the shivering voyagers vainly trying to make headway against the storm. His bellowing laugh swayed the writhing trees until they clashed their branches together in unbridled fury. Countless millions of snowy flowers whirled and rioted in the icy blast.