正是严冬天气，彤云密布，朔风渐起，却早纷纷扬扬卷下一天大雪来。那雪早下得密了，但见：

凛凛严凝雾气昏，

空中祥瑞降纷纷。

须臾四野难分路，

顷刻千山不见痕。

银世界，玉乾坤，

望中隐隐接昆仑。

若还下到三更后，

仿佛填平玉帝门。

——第十回  林教头风雪山神庙  陆虞候火烧草料场

It was in the depth of winter. Red clouds filled the sky, a bitter wind was blowing and soon snow began to fall, the flakes eddying down till the earth was blanketed:

An icy murk holds the world in thrall. Heaven’s white missives fall ever thicker and faster. In a moment everywhere’s a pathless waste; in no time at all a thousand peaks can have vanished without trace. World of silver, world of white jade, where the traveler may think to be gazing on Mountain Kunlun, If it goes on snowing till midnight, even those high passes will be rendered a level plain.

----Translated by John and Aler Dent-Young