When I opened my door this morning, I was surprised by a great carpet
of hoar-frost around the windmill. Grass sparkled and crackled like
shattered glass; the whole hillside tinkled and twinkled.... For a day,
my beloved Provence was dressed up as a northern land. It was here,
amongst these ice-fringed pines, and clumps of lavender in crystal
bouquets, that I wrote both these Germanic-style fantasies, prompted by
the white frost gleaming at me and great _V_'s of storks from Heinrich
Heine's land made their way in a clear sky to the Camargue screaming,
"It's cold ... it's cold ... it's cold."
I