But for undistracted people winter is one long delight of the eye. In other lands one knows the snow as a nuisance that comes and goes, and is sorely man-handled and messed at the last. Here it lies longer on the ground than any crop, from November to April sometimes, and for three months life goes to the tune of sleigh-bells, which are not, as a southern visitor once hinted, ostentation, but safeguards. The man who drives without them is not loved. The snow is a faithful barometer, foretelling good sleighing or stark confinement to barracks.

Letters of Travel (1892-1913) by Rudyard Kipling.