A sleigh is pulled by three horses at a gallop along a muddy road in an icy landscape; its two occupants huddle together beneath their fur-lined cloaks. The figures may be intended as Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, and Tsar Alexander II, mirroring another painting by the artist, with which this forms a pair (see RCIN 406576).

Nikolai Egorovich Sverchkov (1817-98) taught himself through studying paintings in museums during his travels in France, Germany and Holland. In 1852, he became a member of the Academy in St Petersburg, and in 1859 he began exhibiting his work in Paris where, in 1863, his Return from the Bear Hunt was bought by Napoleon III. For this, and two other paintings Sverchkov was awarded the Order of the Legion of Honour. Sverchkov was raised on a stud farm, and his deep-seated love of horses is reflected in his paintings of the heads of stallions, and in his genre scenes which often feature troikas, hussars, and hunting scenes set against the frozen landscape of the steppes.