3-065-700 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Grand skating fete on the Neva [in St Petersburg] in honour of the Duke of Edinburgh's marriage, 1874. Celebrations to mark the royal wedding of Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia, and Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. 'The English Neva Skating Club occupy in winter several acres of inclosed river ice...They had converted this space into an Elysian field of ice temples, magnesium lights, coloured lamps and fires, pavilions, and buffets. All round the ice-field were hung chains of lamps, red and blue and green, festooned in pretty patterns. At one side was the Royal pavilion, with a small supper-room behind, built on the ice. Opposite this were two kiosks for military bands. At each end of the skating-field were cloak and refreshment rooms for the general company. In the centre of the inclosure rose a castle of frozen water, a trophy of ice masonry, converted into a "chapelle ardente" by a blaze of fires and lanterns burning at its windows and battlements. Small citadels were also built at the corners of the inclosed space, their mimic architecture flushed with Bengal lights burning within. But the most beautiful decoration was the soft light streaming from electric or magnesium lamps fixed at intervals round the inclosure'. From "Illustrated London News", 1874.