It was quite a new idea to Heidi that she should go and pay
anybody a visit, and she could not get it out of her head; so
the first thing she said to her grandfather the next day was, "I
must go down to see the grandmother to-day; she will be expecting
me."

"The snow is too deep," answered the grandfather, trying to put
her off. But Heidi had made up her mind to go, since the
grandmother had sent her that message. She stuck to her
intention and not a day passed but what in the course of it she
said five or six times to her grandfather, "I must certainly go
to-day, the grandmother will be waiting for me."

On the fourth day, when with every step one took the ground
crackled with frost and the whole vast field of snow was hard as
ice, Heidi was sitting on her high stool at dinner with the
bright sun shining in upon her through the window, and again
repeated her little speech, "I must certainly go down to see the
grandmother to-day, or else I shall keep her waiting too long."

The grandfather rose from table, climbed up to the hay-loft and
brought down the thick sack that was Heidi's coverlid, and said,
"Come along then!" The child skipped out gleefully after him
into the glittering world of snow.

The old fir trees were standing now quite silent, their branches
covered with the white snow, and they looked so lovely as they
glittered and sparkled in the sunlight that Heidi jumped for joy
at the sight and kept on calling out, "Come here, come here,
grandfather! The fir trees are all silver and gold!" The