Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 2
Chapter 1
New Edition
1922
CONTENTS
AESOP
THE FALCON AND THE PARTRIDGE (From the Arabian Nights)
MINERVA AND THE OWL
THE SPARROW AND THE EAGLE (From the Arabian Nights)
THE OLD MAN AND DEATH
INFANT JOY ........ William Blake
THE BABY ........ George MacDonald
THE DISCONTENTED STONECUTTER (From the Japanese)
DISCREET HANS ........ Wilhelm and Jakob Grimm
THE POPPYLAND EXPRESS ........ St. Louis Star Sayings
BLUEBEARD
LULLABY
RUMPELSTILTZKIN ........ Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm
THE MIRROR OF MATSUYANA (From the Japanese)
A CONTRAST
THE GOLDEN TOUCH ........ Nathaniel Hawthorne
THE CHILD'S WORLD ........ W. B. Rands
THE FIR TREE ........ Hans Christian Andersen
HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN
PICTURE BOOKS IN WINTER ........ Robert Louis Stevenson
HOW THE WOLF WAS BOUND ........ Adapted by Anna McCaleb
THE DEATH OF BALDER ........ Adapted by Anna McCaleb
THE PUNISHMENT OF LOKI ........ Adapted by Anna McCaleb
SEVEN TIMES ONE ........ Jean Ingelow
SHUFFLE-SHOON AND AMBER-LOCKS ........ Eugene Field
AFTERWHILE ........ James Whitcomb Riley
WINDY NIGHTS ........ Robert Louis Stevenson
THE SNOW QUEEN ........ Hans Christian Andersen
THE CHIMERA ........ Nathaniel Hawthorne
A VISIT FBOM ST. NICHOLAS ........ Clement C. Moore
THE STORY OF PHAETHON
THE ENGLISH ROBIN ........ Harrison Weir
TOM, THE WATER BABY ........ Charles Kingsley
THE MILKMAID ........ Jeffreys Taylor
HOLGER DANSKE ........ Hans Christian Andersen
WHAT THE OLD MAN DOES is ALWAYS RIGHT ........ Hans Christian Andersen
THE FAIRIES OF CALDON-LOW ........ Mary Howitt
WHO STOLE THE BIRD'S NEST? ........ L. Maria Child
THE FIRST SNOWFALL ........ James Russell Lowell
THE KING OF THE GOLDEN RIVER ........ John Ruskin
THE STORY OF ESTHER
THE DARNING-NEEDLE ........ Hans Christian Andersen
THE POTATO ........ Thomas Moore
THE QUEEN OF THE UNDERWORLD
ORIGIN OF THE OPAL
IN TIME'S SWING ........ Lucy Larcom
WHY THE SEA IS SALT ........ Mary Howitt
PRONUNCIATION OF PROPER NAMES
For Classification of Selections, see General Index at end of Volume X.
ILLUSTRATIONS
KAY AND GERDA AT PLAY AMONG THE FLOWEBS ... (Color Plate) Arthur Henderson AESOP (Halftone) ..... From Painting by Velasquez THE OWL ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THE SPARROW AND THE EAGLE ..... Herbert N. Rudeen INFANT JOY ..... Lucille Enders JAPANESE GATE ..... Herbert N Rudeen THE STONECUTTER AND HIS SILKEN COUCH ..... Herbert N. Rudeen EVERYTHING REJOICED IN A NEW GROWTH ..... Herbert N. Rudeen BLUEBEARD ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THE PASS KEY ..... Uncredited SHE SLIPPED SILENTLY AWAY ..... Herbert N. Rudeen SISTER ANN WATCHING FROM THE TOWER ..... Herbert N. Rudeen RUMPELSTILTZKIN ..... Herbert N. Rudeen AWAITING THE RETURN OF THE FATHER ..... Herbert N. Rudeen JAPANESE LANTERN ..... Herbert N. Rudeen HER GREATEST PLEASURE WAS TO LOOK INTO THE MIRROR ..... Herbert N. Rudeen YEARNING LOVE ..... Lucille Enders THE FIGURE OF A STRANGER IN THE SUNBEAM ..... Arthur Henderson MARYGOLD WAS A GOLDEN STATUE ..... Arthur Henderson THE CHILD'S WORLD ..... Marion Miller THE SWALLOWS AND THE STORK CAME ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THE FAT MAN TOLD ABOUT KLUMPEY-DUMPEY ..... Herbert N. Rudeen HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN ..... (Halftone) Uncredited PICTURE BOOKS IN WINTER ..... Iris Weddell White THE GODS WERE AMAZED ..... A. H. Winkler HODER HURLED THE DART ..... Herbert N. Rudeen STRANGE OPAL LIGHTS FILTERED THROUGH THE WATER ..... A. H. Winkler THOR'S HAND GRIPPED HIM ..... W. O. Reese SHUFFLE-SHOON AND AMBER-LOCKS ..... Lucille Enders HOLLYHOCKS ..... Donn P. Crane THE GOBLIN AND THE MIRROR ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THE SNOW-FLAKE AT LAST BECAME A MAIDEN ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THEY FLEW OVER WOODS AND LAKES ..... Herbert N Rudeen "HE IS BLOWING BUBBLES" ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THE CROW STOPPED TO LOOK AT HER ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THE REINDEER RAN AS FAST AS IT COULD GO ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THE SNOW QUEEN'S CASTLE ..... Herbert N. Rudeen PEGASUS AT THE FOUNTAIN ..... Herbert N Rudeen PEGASUS DARTED DOWN ASLANT ..... Herbert N. Rudeen ST. NICHOLAS ..... Herbert N. Rudeen IN VAIN PHAETHON PULLED AT THE REINS ..... Donn P. Crane THERE WAS A LITTLE CHIMNEY SWEEP, AND HIS NAME WAS TOM ..... Donn P. Crane THEY CAME UP WITH A POOR IRISH WOMAN ..... Donn P. Crane BEES AND HIVES ..... Donn P. Crane HARTHOVER PLACE ..... Donn P. Crane ALL RAN AFTER TOM ..... Donn P. Crane TOM LOOKED DOWN THE CLIFF ..... Donn P. Crane THE OLD DAME LOOKED AT TOM ..... Donn P. Crane TOM LOOKED INTO THE CLEAR WATER ..... Donn P. Crane SIR JOHN SEARCHING FOR TOM ..... Donn P. Crane TOM WAS NOW A WATER BABY ..... Donn P. Crane "OH, YOU BEAUTIFUL CREATURE!" SAID TOM ..... Donn P. Crane TOM ESCAPED THE OTTER ..... Donn P. Crane THE SALMON, KING OF ALL THE FISH ..... Donn P. Crane TOM ON THE BUOY ..... Donn P. Crane PORPOISES ..... Donn P. Crane A LOBSTER ..... Donn P. Crane ELLIE AND THE PROFESSOR ..... Donn P. Crane MRS. BEDONEBYASYOUDID ..... Donn P. Crane SHE TOOK TOM IN HER ARMS ..... Donn P. Crane TOM FOUND THE CABINET ..... Donn P. Crane THE LAST OF THE GAIRFOWL ..... Donn P. Crane AND BEHOLD, IT WAS ELLIE ..... Donn P. Crane HOLGER DANSKE ..... Arthur Henderson THE FIGUREHEAD ..... Arthur Henderson "MY DEAR GOOD HUSBAND" ..... Herbert N. Rudeen THE FAIRIES OF CALDON-LOW ..... Iris Weddell White WHO STOLE THE BIRD'S NEST? ..... Herbert N. Rudeen "FATHER, WHO MAKES IT SNOW?" ..... Iris Weddell White "HELLO! I'M WET, LET ME IN" ..... Donn P. Crane "SORRY TO INCOMMODE YOU" ..... Donn P. Crane "PRAY SIR, WERE YOU MY MUG?" ..... Donn P. Crane "THOU HAST HAD THY SHARE OF LIFE" ..... Donn P. Crane HE CAST THE FLASK INTO THE STREAM ..... Donn P. Crane THE DWARF SHOOK THE DROPS INTO THE FLASK ..... Donn P. Crane MORDECAI IN THE KING'S GATE ..... Arthur Henderson HE PUT ON SACKCLOTH AND ASHES ..... Arthur Henderson THEN HAMAN WAS AFRAID ..... Arthur Henderson PLUTO SEIZED PROSERPINA ..... Arthur Henderson IN TIME'S SWING ..... Herbert N. Rudeen SO THE BARGAIN WAS MADE ..... Mildred Lyon
AESOP
Many centuries ago, more than six hundred years before Christ was born, there lived in Greece a man by the name of Aesop. We do not know very much about him, and no one can tell exactly what he wrote, or even that he ever wrote anything.
We know he was a slave and much wiser than his masters, but whether he was a fine, shapely man or a hunchback and a cripple we cannot be sure, for different people have written very differently about him.
No matter what he was or how he lived, many, many stories are still told about him, and the greater part of the fables we all like to read are said to have been written or told by him, and everybody still calls them Aesop's fables.
Some of the stories told about him are curious indeed. Here are a few of them.
In those days men were sold as slaves in the market, as cattle are sold now. One day Aesop and two other men were put up at auction. Xanthus, a wealthy man, wanted a slave, and he said to the men: "What can you do?"
The two men bragged large about the things they could do, for both wanted a rich master like Xanthus.
"But what can you do?" said Xanthus, turning to Aesop.
"The others can do so much and so well," said Aesop, "that there's nothing left for me to do."
"Will you be honest and faithful if I buy you?"
"I shall be that whether you buy me or not."
"Will you promise not to run away?"
"Did you ever hear," answered Aesop, "of a bird in a cage that promised to stay in it?"
Xanthus was so much pleased with the answers that he bought Aesop.
Some time afterward, Xanthus, wishing to give a dinner to some of his friends, ordered Aesop to furnish the finest feast that money could buy.
The first course Aesop supplied was of tongues cooked in many ways, and the second of tongues and the third and the fourth. Then Xanthus called sharply to Aesop:
"Did I not tell you, sirrah, to provide the choicest dainties that money could procure?"
"And what excels the tongue?" replied Aesop. "It is the great channel of learning and philosophy. By this noble organ everything wise and good is accomplished."
The company applauded Aesop's wit, and good humor was restored.
"Well," said Xanthus to the guests, "pray do me the favor of dining with me again to-morrow. And if this is your best," continued he turning to Aesop, "pray, to-morrow let us have some of the worst meat you can find."
The next day, when dinner-time came, the guests were assembled. Great was their astonishment and great the anger of Xanthus at finding that again nothing but tongue was put upon the table.
"How, sir," said Xanthus, "should tongues be the best of meat one day, and the worst another?"
"What," replied Aesop, "can be worse than the tongue? What wickedness is there under the sun that it has not a part in? Treasons, violence, injustice, and fraud are debated and resolved upon by the tongue. It is the ruin of empires, of cities, and of private friendships."
* * * * *
At another time Xanthus very foolishly bet with a scholar that he could drink the sea dry. Alarmed, he consulted Aesop.
"To perform your wager," said Aesop, "you know is impossible, but I will show you how to evade it."
They accordingly met the scholar, and went with him and a great number of people to the seashore, where Aesop had provided a table with several large glasses upon it, and men who stood around with ladles with which to fill the glasses.
Xanthus, instructed by Aesop, gravely took his seat at the table. The beholders looked on with astonishment, thinking that he must surely have lost his senses.
"My agreement," said he, turning to the scholar, "is to drink up the sea. I said nothing of the rivers and streams that are everywhere flowing into it. Stop up these, and I will proceed to fulfill my engagement."
* * * * *
It is said that at one time when Xanthus started out on a long journey, he ordered his servants to get all his things together and put them up into bundles so that they could carry them.
When everything had been neatly tied up, Aesop went to his master and begged for the lightest bundle. Wishing to please his favorite slave, the master told Aesop to choose for himself the one he preferred to carry. Looking them all over, he picked up the basket of bread and started off with it on the journey. The other servants laughed at his foolishness, for that basket was the heaviest of all.
When dinner-time came, Aesop was very tired, for he had had a difficult time to carry his load for the last few hours. When they had rested, however, they took bread from the basket, each taking an equal share. Half the bread was eaten at this one meal, and when supper-time came the rest of it disappeared.
For the whole remainder of the journey, which ran far into the night and was over rough roads, up and down hills, Aesop had nothing to carry, while the loads of the other servants grew heavier and heavier with every step.
The people of the neighborhood in which Aesop was a slave one day observed him attentively looking over some poultry in a pen that was near the roadside; and those idlers, who spent more time in prying into other people's affairs than in adjusting their own, asked why he bestowed his attention on those animals.
"I am surprised," replied Aesop, "to see how mankind imitate this foolish animal."
"In what?" asked the neighbors.
"Why, in crowing so well and scratching so poorly," rejoined Aesop.
Fables, you know, are short stories, usually about animals and things, which are made to talk like human beings. Fables are so bright and interesting in themselves that both children and grown-ups like to read them. Children see first the story, and bye and bye, after they have thought more about it and have grown older, they see how much wisdom there is in the fables.
For an example, there is the fable of the crab and its mother. They were strolling along the sand together when the mother said, "Child, you are not walking gracefully. You should walk straight forward, without twisting from side to side."
"Pray, mother," said the young one, "if you will set the example, I will follow it."
Perhaps children will think the little crab was not very respectful, but the lesson is plain that it is always easier to give good advice than it is to follow it.
There is another, which teaches us to be self-reliant and resourceful. A crow, whose throat was parched and dry with thirst, saw a pitcher in the distance. In great joy he flew to it, but found that it held only a little water, and even that was too near the bottom to be reached, for all his stooping and straining.
Next he tried to overturn the pitcher, thinking that he would at least be able to catch some of the water as it trickled out. But this he was not strong enough to do. In the end he found some pebbles lying near, and by dropping them one by one into the pitcher, he managed at last to raise the water up to the very brim, and thus was able to quench his thirst.
THE FALCON AND THE PARTRIDGE
From The Arabian Nights
Once upon a time a Falcon stooped from its flight and seized a Partridge; but the latter freed himself from the seizer, and entering his nest, hid himself there. The Falcon followed apace and called out to him, saying:
"O imbecile, I saw you hungry in the field and took pity on you; so I picked up for you some grain and took hold of you that you might eat; but you fled from me, and I know not the cause of your flight, except it were to put upon me a slight. Come out, then, and take the grain I have brought you to eat, and much good may it do you, and with your health agree."
When the Partridge heard these words he believed, and came out to the Falcon, who thereupon struck his talons into him and seized him.
Cried the Partridge, "Is this that which you told me you had brought me from the field, and whereof you told me to eat, saying, 'Much good may it do you, and with your health agree?' Thou hast lied to me, and may God cause what you eat of my flesh to be a killing poison in your maw!"
When the Falcon had eaten the Partridge his feathers fell off, his strength failed, and he died on the spot. Know that he who digs for his brother a pit, himself soon falls into it.
MINERVA AND THE OWL
"My most solemn and wise bird," said Minerva one day to her Owl, "I have hitherto admired you for your profound silence; but I have now a mind to have you show your ability in discourse, for silence is only admirable in one who can, when he pleases, triumph by his eloquence and charm with graceful conversation."
The Owl replied by solemn grimaces, and made dumb signs. Minerva bade him lay aside that affectation and begin; but he only shook his wise head and remained silent. Thereupon Minerva commanded him to speak immediately, on pain of her displeasure.
The Owl, seeing no remedy, drew up close to Minerva, and whispered very softly in her ear this sage remark: "Since the world is grown so depraved, they ought to be esteemed most wise who have eyes to see and wit to hold their tongues."
THE SPARROW AND THE EAGLE
From The Arabian Nights
Once a Sparrow, flitting over a flock of sheep, saw a great Eagle swoop down upon a newly weaned lamb and carry it up in his claws and fly away. Thereupon the Sparrow clapped his wings and said, "I will do even as this Eagle did."
So he waxed proud in his own conceit, and, mimicking one greater than he, flew down forthright and lighted on the back of a fat ram with a thick fleece, that was matted by his lying till it was like woolen felt. As soon as the Sparrow pounced upon the sheep's back he flopped his wings to fly away, but his feet became tangled in the wool, and, however hard he tried, he could not set himself free.
While all this was passing, the shepherd was looking on, having seen what happened first with the Eagle and afterward with the Sparrow. So in a great rage he came up to the wee birdie and seized him. He plucked out his wing feathers and carried him to his children.
"What is this?" asked one of them.
"This," he answered, "is he that aped a greater than himself and came to grief."
The Old Man and Death
A poor and toil-worn peasant, bent with years and groaning beneath the weight of a heavy fagot of firewood which he carried, sought, weary and sore-footed, to gain his distant cottage. Unable to bear the weight of his burden longer, he let it fall by the roadside, and lamented his hard fate.
"What pleasure have I known since I first drew breath in this sad world? From dawn to dusk it has been hard work and little pay! At home is an empty cupboard, a discontented wife, and lazy and disobedient children! O Death! O Death! come and free me from my troubles!"
At once the ghostly King of Terrors stood before him and asked, "What do you want with me?"
"Noth-nothing," stammered the frightened peasant, "except for you to help me put again upon my shoulders the bundle of fagots I have let fall!"
INFANT JOY
By William Blake
"I have no name; I am but two days old." "What shall I call thee?" "I happy am; Joy is my name." Sweet joy befall thee!
Pretty Joy! Sweet Joy, but two days old. Sweet Joy I call thee: Thou dost smile: I sing the while, "Sweet joy befall thee!"
THE BABY
By George Macdonald
Where did you come from, baby dear? Out of the everywhere into the here.
Where did you get your eyes so blue? Out of the sky as I came through.
What makes the light in them sparkle and spin? Some of the starry spikes left in.
Where did you get that little tear? I found it waiting when I got here.
What makes your forehead so smooth and high? A soft hand stroked it as I went by.
What makes your cheek like a warm white rose? Something better than any one knows.
Whence that three-cornered smile of bliss? Three angels gave me at once a kiss.
Where did you get that pearly ear? God spoke, and it came out to hear.
Where did you get those arms and hands? Love made itself into hooks and bands.
Feet, whence did you come, you darling things? From the same box as the cherub's wings.
How did they all just come to be you? God thought about me, and so I grew.
But how did you come to us, you dear? God thought of YOU, and so I am here.
THE DISCONTENTED STONECUTTER
Adapted from the Japanese
Once upon a time there was a man who worked from early morning till late at night cutting building stones out of the solid rock. His pay was small and hardly enough to keep his wife and children from starving. So the poor stonecutter grew discontented and sighed and moaned bitterly over his hard lot.
One day when his work seemed harder than usual and his troubles more than he could bear he cried out in despair:
"Oh, I wish I could be rich and lie at ease on a soft couch with a curtain of red silk!"
Just then a beautiful fairy floated down from heaven, and softly said, "Thy wish is granted thee." So the poor stonecutter found himself rich and powerful and resting easily on his silken couch with its red curtain. As he gazed out, however, he saw the king of the country ride by with many horsemen before and behind him, and with a great golden sunshade held over his head. It irritated the rich man to have no parasol over his head and to see another more powerful than himself, and in his discontentment he exclaimed, "Would that I were a king such as that one."
Once again his good fairy appeared, waved his wand, and said, "It shall be as thou desirest." Immediately the man was king, and before him and behind him rode his men-at-arms, and over his head was a golden sunshade. But elsewhere the sun shone fiercely down and dried up the vegetation with its terrible heat. It was reflected into the face of the king so that even the golden sunshade did not keep him from suffering. Once more he sighed discontentedly, "If I could only be the sun!"
Almost before he spoke he found himself to be the sun, and he began joyously to send his fiery rays above, below and everywhere roundabout him. He scorched the grass of the earth, and burned the faces of its rulers and felt his power unlimited until a little cloud placed itself between him and the earth and threw back his scorching rays. It still angered him to find something more powerful than himself, and he wished aloud that he might be the cloud.
Again his wish was granted, and he found himself floating where he wished through the sky. He ran between the sun and the earth and sheltered the latter so that the grass grew green, the trees leaved out again, and everything rejoiced in a new growth. Then he sent great floods of rain upon the earth, filled the rivers till they overflowed, swept homes and herds into the sea, and destroyed the works of man in every direction. But try as he would he could not move one great rock that stood right across his way. Though he sent waters that roared around its base and pushed hard against it, yet it remained immovable. Such a failure angered the man-cloud, and again he cried out, "Would that I were a rock, so strong and immovable is it."
This time, also, his guardian angel interfered, and he found himself a rock that withstood the sun, the wind and the waters. But then, one day, there came along a rude stonecutter, who with chisel and heavy hammer began to cut the great rock into small, regular building stones. "What does this mean?" cried the rock. "Has this man power to cut me in pieces? Surely I am weaker than he! Would I were a stonecutter!"
"As thou wishest, so shall it be," said his guardian angel, and immediately he was again a stonecutter, working hard as before and for small wages, but happy and contented with his lot.
DISCREET HANS
By Wilhelm and Jakob Grimm
Hans's mother asked, "Whither are you going, Hans?"
"To Grethel's," replied he.
"Behave well, Hans."
"I will take care; good-bye, mother."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans came to Grethel. "Good day," said he.
"Good day," replied Grethel. "What treasure do you bring today?"
"I bring nothing. Have you anything to give?"
Grethel presented Hans with a needle.
"Good-bye," said he.
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans took the needle, stuck it in a load of hay, and walked home behind the wagon.
"Good evening, mother."
"Good evening, Hans. Where have you been?"
"To Grethel's."
"And what have you given her?"
"Nothing; she has given me something."
"What has Grethel given you?"
"A needle," said Hans.
"And where have you put it?"
"In the load of hay."
"Then you have behaved stupidly, Hans; you should put needles on your coat sleeve."
"To behave better, do nothing at all," thought Hans.
"Whither are you going, Hans?"
"To Grethel's, mother."
"Behave well, Hans."
"I will take care; good-bye mother."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans came to Grethel. "Good day," said he.
"Good day, Hans. What treasure do you bring?"
"I bring nothing. Have you anything to give?"
Grethel gave Hans a knife.
"Good-bye, Grethel."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans took the knife, put it in his sleeve and went home.
"Good evening, mother."
"Good evening, Hans. Where have you been?"
"To Grethel's."
"And what did you take to her?"
"I took nothing; she has given something to me."
"And what did she give you?"
"A knife," said Hans.
"And where have you put it?"
"In my sleeve."
"Then you have behaved foolishly again, Hans; you should put knives in your pocket."
"To behave better, do nothing at all," thought Hans.
"Whither are you going, Hans?"
"To Grethel's, mother."
"Behave well, Hans."
"I will take care; good-bye, mother."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans came to Grethel. "Good day, Grethel."
"Good day, Hans. What treasure do you bring?"
"I bring nothing; have you anything to give?"
Grethel gave Hans a young goat.
"Good-bye, Grethel."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans took the goat, tied its legs and put it in his pocket. Just as he reached home it was suffocated.
"Good evening, mother."
"Good evening, Hans. Where have you been?"
"To Grethel's."
"And what did you take to her?"
"I took nothing; she gave to me."
"And what did Grethel give you?"
"A goat."
"Where did you put it, Hans?"
"In my pocket."
"There you acted stupidly, Hans; you should have tied the goat with a rope."
"To behave better, do nothing," thought Hans.
"Whither away, Hans?"
"To Grethel's, mother."
"Behave well, Hans."
"I will take care; good-bye, mother."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans came to Grethel. "Good day," said he.
"Good day, Hans. What treasure do you bring?"
"I have nothing. Have you anything to give?"
Grethel gave Hans a piece of bacon.
"Good-bye, Grethel."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans took the bacon, tied it with a rope, and swung it to and fro, so that the dogs came and ate it up. When he reached home he held the rope in his hand, but there was nothing on it.
"Good evening, mother," said he.
"Good evening, Hans. Where have you been?"
"To Grethel's, mother."
"What did you take her?"
"I took nothing; she gave to me."
"And what did Grethel give you?"
"A piece of bacon," said Hans.
"And where have you put it?"
"I tied it with a rope, swung it about, and the dogs came and ate it up."
"There you acted stupidly, Hans; you should have carried the bacon on your head."
"To behave better, do nothing," thought Hans.
"Whither away, Hans?"
"To Grethel's, mother."
"Behave well, Hans."
"I'll take care; good-bye, mother."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans came to Grethel. "Good day," said he.
"Good day, Hans. What treasure do you bring?"
"I bring nothing. Have you anything to give?"
Grethel gave Hans a calf. "Good-bye," said Hans. "Good-bye," said Grethel.
Hans took the calf, set it on his head, and the calf scratched his face.
"Good evening, mother."
"Good evening, Hans. Where have you been?"
"To Grethel's."
"What did you take to her?"
"I took nothing; she gave to me."
"And what did Grethel give you?"
"A calf," said Hans.
"And what did you do with it?"
"I set it on my head and it kicked my face."
"Then you acted stupidly, Hans; you should have led the calf home and put it in the stall."
"To behave better, do nothing," thought Hans.
"Whither away, Hans?"
"To Grethel's, mother."
"Behave well, Hans."
"I'll take care; good-bye, mother."
"Good-bye, Hans."
Hans came to Grethel. "Good day," said he.
"Good day, Hans. What treasure do you bring?"
"I bring nothing. Have you anything to give?"
Grethel said, "I will go with you, Hans."
Hans tied a rope round Grethel, led her home, put her in the stall and made the rope fast; then he went to his mother.
"Good evening, mother."
"Good evening, Hans. Where have you been?"
"To Grethel's."
"What did you take her?"
"I took nothing."
"What did Grethel give you?"
"She gave nothing; she came with me."
"And where have you left her, then?"
"I tied her with a rope, put her in the stall, and threw her some grass."
"Then you have acted stupidly, Hans; you should have looked at her with friendly eyes."
"To behave better, do nothing," thought Hans; and then he went into the stall, and made sheep's eyes at Grethel.
And after that Grethel became Hans's wife.
The Brothers Grimm, Jakob and Wilhelm, were very learned German scholars who lived during the first half of the nineteenth century. They were both professors at the University of Gottingen, and published many important works, among them a famous dictionary. In their own country it is, of course, these learned works which have given them much of their fame, but in other countries they are chiefly known for their Fairy Tales.
Most of these they did not themselves write; they simply collected and rewrote. They would hear of some old woman who was famous for telling stories remembered from childhood, and they would present themselves at her cottage to bribe or wheedle her into telling them her tales. Perhaps the promise that her words should appear in print would be enough to induce her to talk; perhaps hours would be wasted in trying to make her grow talkative, without success. At any rate, the Grimm brothers finally collected enough of these stories to make a big, fat book.
THE POPPYLAND EXPRESS
St. Louis Star Sayings
The first train leaves at 6 p. m. For the land where the poppy blows. The mother is the engineer, And the passenger laughs and crows.
The palace car is the mother's arms; The whistle a low, sweet strain. The passenger winks and nods and blinks And goes to sleep on the train.
At 8 p. m. the next train starts For the poppyland afar. The summons clear falls on the ear, "All aboard for the sleeping car!"
But "What is the fare to poppyland? I hope it is not too dear." The fare is this--a hug and a kiss, And it's paid to the engineer.
So I ask of Him who children took On His knee in kindness great: "Take charge, I pray, of the trains each day That leave at six and eight.
"Keep watch of the passengers," thus I pray, "For to me they are very dear; And special ward, O gracious Lord, O'er the gentle engineer."
BLUEBEARD
Once upon a time there lived a great lord who had many beautiful homes and who was fairly rolling in wealth. He had town houses and castles in the country, all filled with rich furniture and costly vessels of gold and silver. In spite of all his riches, however, nobody liked the man, because of his ugly and frightful appearance. Perhaps people could have endured his face if it had not been for a great blue beard that frightened the women and children until they fled at his very approach.
Now, it so happened that there was living near one of his castles a fine lady of good breeding who had two beautiful daughters. Bluebeard, for such was the name by which he was known through all the country, saw the two daughters and determined to have one of them for his wife. So he proposed to the mother for one, but left it to her to decide which of the daughters she would give him.
Neither of the daughters was willing to marry him, for neither could make up her mind to live all her life with such a hideous blue beard, however rich the owner might be. Moreover, they had heard, and the report was true, that the man had been married several times before, and no one knew what had become of his wives.
In order to become better acquainted with the women, Bluebeard invited them and their mother to visit him at one of his castles in the country. They accepted the invitation, and for nine delightful days they hunted and fished over his vast estates, and for nine wonderful evenings they feasted and danced in his magnificent rooms.
Everything went so much to their liking, and Bluebeard himself was so gracious, that the younger girl began to think that after all his beard was not so very blue; and so, soon after their return to town, the mother announced that the younger daughter was ready to marry him. In a few days the ceremony was performed, and Bluebeard took his wife to one of his castles, where they spent a happy month.
At the end of that time Bluebeard told his wife that he was obliged to make a long journey and would be away from home about six weeks. He added that he hoped his wife would enjoy herself, and that he wished her to send for her friends if she wanted them, and to spend his money as freely as she liked in their entertainment.
"Here," he said, "are the keys of my two great storerooms, where you will find everything you need for the house; here are the keys of the sideboards, where you will find all the gold and silver plate for the table; here are the keys of my money chests, where you will find gold and silver in abundance [Illustration: a key] and many caskets containing beautiful jewels which you have not yet seen; and here is a pass key which will open all the rooms in the castle excepting one.
"But here is a little key which fits the lock in the door of the little room at the end of the long gallery on the first floor. This little room you must not enter. Open everything else, go everywhere you like, treat everything as though it was your own; but I strictly forbid you to enter the little room. If you even so much as put the key in the lock you may expect to suffer direfully from my anger."
The young wife promised faithfully to observe her husband's wishes to the letter, and he, pleased with the readiness with which she consented to obey him, kissed her fondly, sprang into his carriage and departed on his journey.
No sooner had Bluebeard left than the friends of his wife began to arrive. Many of them did not wait for an invitation, but came as soon as they heard that her husband had gone with his terrible blue beard. Then was there great merrymaking all over the house, and it was overrun from top to bottom with the excited guests, for all were consumed with the desire to see the treasures the castle contained. These were truly wonderful. Rich tapestries hanging on the walls, great mirrors that reflected the whole image of a person from head to foot, wonderful pictures in frames of pure gold, gold and silver vessels of graceful shape and elegant design, cabinets filled with curiosities, lights gleaming with crystals, caskets filled with sparkling diamonds and other precious stones without number, all served to charm and delight the guests so that they had little time to think about their hostess.
The wife, however, soon wearied of the splendor of her home, for she kept continually thinking about the little room at the end of the long gallery on the first floor. The more she thought about it the more curious she became, and finally, forgetting her good manners, she left her guests, slipped silently away from them, and in her excitement nearly fell the whole length of the secret stairway that led to the long gallery. Her courage did not fail her till she reached the door of the little room. Then she remembered how false she was to her trust, and hesitated. Her conscience, however, was soon silenced by her curiosity, and with a beating heart and trembling hand she pushed the little key into the lock, and the door flew open.
The shutters of the window in the little room were closed, and at first she could see nothing; but as her eyes became accustomed to the dim light she saw that clotted blood covered the floor, and that hanging from the walls by their long hair were the bloody heads of Bluebeard's other wives, while on the floor lay their dead bodies.
When the young wife realized at what she was looking, the key fell from her shaking hand, her heart stopped beating, and she almost fell to the floor in horror and amazement. Recovering herself after a while, she stooped and picked up the key, locked the door and hurried back to her chamber. In vain she tried to compose herself and meet her guests again. She was too frightened to control herself, and when she looked at the little key of that awful little room at the end of the long gallery on the first floor, she saw that it was stained with blood. She wiped the key and wiped it, but the blood would not come off. She washed it, and scrubbed it with sand and freestone and brick dust, but the blood would not come off; or, if she did succeed in cleaning one side and turned the key over, there was blood on the other side, for it was a magic key which a fairy friend of Bluebeard's had given him.
That night the wife was terrified to hear Bluebeard returning, though she tried to welcome him with every show of delight and affection. He explained his sudden change of plans by saying that he had met a friend on the road who told him that it was unnecessary for him to make the long journey, as the business he was intending to transact had been all done.
It was a very unhappy night she passed, but Bluebeard said nothing to disturb her until morning, and then he presently asked her for his keys. She gave them to him, but her hand trembled like an old woman's. Bluebeard took the keys and looked them over carelessly.
"I see the key of the little room at the end of the long gallery on the first floor is not with the others. Where is it?"
"It must have fallen off in the drawer where I kept the keys," she said.
"Please get it for me at once," said Bluebeard, "as I wish to go to the room."
The wife, as white as a sheet, and almost too faint to walk, went back to her chamber and returned, saying she could not find the key.
"But I must have it," said Bluebeard; "go again and look more carefully for it. Certainly you cannot have lost it."
So back to the chamber went the terrified woman, and, seeing no hope of escape, she carried the key down to her waiting husband.
Bluebeard took the key, and looking at it closely, said to his wife, "Why is this blood spot on the key?"
"I do not know," said the wife, faintly.
"You do not know!" said Bluebeard. "Well, I know. You wanted to go to the little room. Very well; I shall see that you get there and take your place with the other ladies."
In despair the young woman flung herself at his feet and begged for mercy, repenting bitterly of her curiosity. Bluebeard turned a deaf ear to all her entreaties and was not moved in the least by her piteous beauty.
"Hear me, madam. You must die at, once," he said.
"But give me a little time to make my peace with God," she said. "I must have time to say my prayers."
"I will give you a quarter of an hour," answered Bluebeard, "but not a minute more."
He turned away, and she sent for her sister, who came quickly at her summons.
"Sister Ann," she said excitedly, "go up to the top of the tower and see if my brothers are coming. They promised to come and see me to-day. If they are on the road make signs to them to hurry as fast as they can. I am in awful despair."
Without waiting for an explanation the sister went to the top of the tower and began her watch.
She was scarcely seated when her sister called up, "Sister Annie, do you see any one coming?"
Annie answered, "I see nothing but the sun on the golden dust and the grass which grows green."
In the meantime, Bluebeard, who had armed himself with a sharp, curved scimitar, stood at the foot of the stairs waiting for his wife to come down.
"Annie, sister Annie, do you see any one coming down the road?" cried the wife again.
"No, I see nothing but the golden dust."
Then Bluebeard called out, "Come down quickly now, or I will come up to you."
"One minute more," replied his wife; and then she called softly, "Annie, sister Annie, do you see any one coming?"
"I think I see a cloud of dust a little to the left."
"Do you think it is my brothers?" said the wife.
"Alas, no, dear sister, it is only a shepherd boy with his sheep."
"Will you come down now, madam, or shall I fetch you?" Bluebeard bawled out.
"I am coming,--indeed I will come in just a minute."
Then she called out for the last time, "Annie, sister Annie, do you see any one coming?"
"I see," replied her sister, "two horsemen coming, but they are still a great way off."
"Thank God," cried the wife, "it is my brothers. Urge them to make haste." Annie replied, "I am beckoning to them. They have seen my signals. They are galloping towards us."
Now Bluebeard called out so loudly for his wife to come down that his voice shook the whole house. His lady, not daring to keep him waiting any longer, hurried down the stairs, her hair streaming about her shoulders and her face bathed in tears. She threw herself on the floor at his feet and begged for mercy.
"There is no use in your pleading," said Bluebeard; "you must certainly die."
Then, seizing her by the hair with his left hand, he raised his scimitar, preparing to strike off her head. The poor woman turned her eyes upon him and begged for a single moment to collect her thoughts. "No," he said; "not a moment more. Commend yourself to God."
He raised his arm to strike. Just at that moment there was a loud knocking at the gate, and Bluebeard stopped short in his bloody work. Two officers in uniform sprang into the castle and ran upon Bluebeard with drawn swords. The cruel man, seeing they were his wife's brothers, tried to escape, but they followed and overtook him before he had gone twenty steps. Though he begged for mercy they listened not to a single word, but thrust him through and through with their swords.
The poor wife, who was almost as dead as her lord, could hardly rise to greet her brothers, but when she learned of Bluebeard's death she quickly recovered and embraced them heartily.
Bluebeard, it was found, had no heirs, and so all his riches came into the possession of his wife. She was filled with thankfulness at her rescue, and in repentance for her curiosity she gave her sister a generous portion of her money, and established her brothers in high positions in the army.
As for herself, she afterwards married a worthy gentleman and lived happily to a hale old age. The beautiful town and country houses were constantly filled with guests, who, after they had convinced themselves that the cruel master was actually dead, made the rooms ring with their joyous laughter and talking.
LULLABY
Come hither, little restless one, 'Tis time to shut your eyes; The sun behind the hills has gone, The stars are in the skies.
See, one by one they show their light-- How clear and bright they look! Just like the fireflies in the night, That shine beside the brook.
You do not hear the robins sing-- They're snug within their nest; And sheltered by their mother's wing, The little chickens rest.
The dog, he will not frolic now, But to his kennel creeps; The turkeys climb upon the bough, And e'en the kitten sleeps.
The very violets in their bed Fold up their eyelids blue, And you, my flower, must droop your head And close your eyelids, too.
Then join your little hands and pray To God, who made the light, To keep you holy all the day And guard you through the night.
RUMPELSTILTZKIN
By Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm
There was once upon a time a poor miller who had a beautiful daughter. It happened one day that he had an audience with the King, and in order to appear important he told the King that he had a daughter who could spin straw into gold.
"Now that's a talent worth having," said the King to the miller; "if your daughter is as clever as you say, bring her to my palace tomorrow, and I'll test her."
When the girl was brought to him, he led her into a room full of straw, gave her a spinning-wheel and spindle, and said, "Now set to work and spin all night, and if by early dawn you haven't spun the straw into gold you shall die." Then he closed the door behind him and left her alone inside.
So the poor miller's daughter sat down. She hadn't the least idea of how to spin straw into gold, and at last she began to cry. Suddenly the door opened, and in stepped a tiny little man who said: "Good evening, Miss Miller-maid; why are you crying so bitterly?"
"Oh!" answered the girl, "I have to spin straw into gold, and haven't the slightest notion how it's done." "What will you give me if I spin it for you?" asked the manikin.
"My necklace," replied the girl.
The little man took the necklace, sat down at the wheel, and whir, whir, whir, round it went until morning, when all the straw was spun away, and all the bobbins were full of gold.
As soon as the sun rose, the King came, and when he saw the gold he was astonished and delighted, but he wanted more of the precious metal. He had the miller's daughter put into another room, much bigger than the first and full of straw, and bade her, if she valued her life, spin it all into gold before morning.
When the girl began to cry the tiny little man appeared again and said: "What'll you give me if I spin the straw into gold for you?"
"The ring from my finger," answered the girl. The manikin took the ring, and when morning broke he had spun all the straw into glittering gold.
The King was pleased beyond measure at the sight, but he was still not satisfied, and he had the miller's daughter brought into a yet bigger room full of straw, and said:
"You must spin all this away in the night; but if you succeed this time you shall become my wife."
When the girl was alone, the little man appeared for the third time, and said: "What'll you give me if I spin the straw for you this third time?"
"I've nothing more to give," answered the girl.
"Then promise me when you are Queen to give me your first child."
Seeing no other way out of it, she promised the manikin, and he set to work.
When the King came in the morning, and found the gold, he straightway made her his wife. When a beautiful son was born to her, she did not think of the little man, till all of a sudden one day he stepped into her room and said: "Now give me what you promised."
The Queen offered the little man all the riches in her kingdom if he would only leave her the child.
But the manikin said, "No, a living creature is dearer to me than all the treasures in the world."
Then the Queen began to cry and sob so bitterly that the little man was sorry for her, and said, "I'll give you three days, and if in that time you guess my name, you may keep your child."
The Queen pondered the whole night over all the names she had ever heard, and sent messengers to scour the land, and to pick up far and near any names they should come across. When the little man arrived she began with Kasper, Melchior, Belshazzer, Sheepshanks, Cruickshanks, Spindleshanks, and so on through the long list. At every name the little man shook his head.
At last a messenger reported, "As I came upon a high hill round the corner of the wood, where the foxes and hares bid each other good-night, I saw a little house, and in front of the house burned a fire, and round the fire sprang the most grotesque little man, hopping on one leg and crying,
'Tomorrow I brew, today I bake, And then the child away I'll take; For little deems my royal dame That Rumpelstiltzken is my name!'"
When the little man stepped in afterward and asked his name she said, "Is your name Conrad?"
"No."
"Is your name, perhaps, Rumpelstiltzken?"
"Some demon has told you that, some demon has told you that," screamed the little man, as he vanished into the air.
THE MIRROR OF MATSUYANA
The following pretty little story comes from Japan, where it may be found in a collection of tales for children. A long time ago a young couple lived in the country with their only child, a beautiful little girl whom they loved tenderly. The names of the parents cannot be told now, for they have long been forgotten, but we know that the place where they lived was Matsuyana, in the province of Echigo.
Now it happened when the child was still very little that her father was obliged to go to the capital of the kingdom. As it was so long a journey, neither his wife nor his child could go with him and he departed alone, promising to bring them many pretty gifts on his return.
The mother had never been away from the neighborhood and was not able to get rid of some fear when she thought of the long journey her husband must take. At the same time, however, she could not but feel pride and satisfaction that it was her husband who was the first man in all that region to go to the rich city where the king and the nobles lived, and where there were so many beautiful and marvelous things to be seen.
At last, when the good wife knew that her husband would return, she dressed her child gaily in the best clothes she had and herself in the blue dress that she knew he liked very much.
It is not possible to describe the joy of the good woman when she saw her husband return safe and sound. The little one clapped her hands and laughed with delight when she saw the toys her father had brought, and he never tired of telling of the wonderful things he had seen on his journey and at the capital.
"To you," he said to his wife, "I have brought a thing of wonderful power, that is called a mirror. Look and tell me what you see inside." He handed her a little flat box of white wood, and when she opened it she saw a metal disk. One side was white as frosted silver and ornamented with birds and flowers raised from the surface; the other side was shining and polished like a window-pane. Into this the young wife gazed with pleasure and astonishment, for from the depths she saw looking out at her a smiling face with parted lips and animated eyes. "What do you see?" repeated the husband, charmed by her amazement and proud to prove that he had remembered her in his absence.
"I see a pretty young woman, who looks at me and moves her lips as if talking, and who wears--what a wonderful thing! a blue dress exactly like mine."
"Silly one! What you see is your own sweet face," replied the man, delighted to know that his wife did not recognize herself. "This circle of metal is called a looking-glass. In the city, every woman has one, although here in the country no one has seen one until to-day."
Enchanted with her gift, the woman passed several days in wonderment, because, as I have said, this was the first time she had seen a mirror, and consequently the first time she had seen the image of her own pretty face. This wonderful jewel she thought too precious to be used every day, and the little box she guarded carefully, concealing it among her most precious treasures.
Years passed, the good man and his wife living happily through them all. The delight of his life was the child, who was growing into the living image of her dear mother, and who was so good and affectionate that everybody loved her.
The mother, remembering her own passing vanity over her beauty, kept the mirror hidden, to protect her daughter from any chance of vanity. As for the father, no one had spoken of the glass, and he had forgotten all about it. Thus the child grew up frank and guileless as her mother wished, knowing nothing of her own beauty or what the mirror might reflect.
But there came a day of terrible misfortune to this family, till then so happy. The devoted and loving mother fell sick, and although her daughter watched her with affectionate and tender devotion, the dear woman grew worse and worse each day.
When she knew that she must soon pass away, she was very sad, grieving for husband and daughter that she must leave behind on earth; and especially was she anxious for the future of her loving daughter. Calling the girl to the bedside, she said:
"My beloved child, you see that I am so very sick that soon I must die and leave you and your father alone. Promise me that when I am gone, every morning when you get up and every night when you go to bed, you will look into the mirror which your father gave me long ago. In it, you will see me smiling back at you, and you will know that I am ever near to protect you."
Having spoken these words, she pointed to the place where the mirror was hidden, and the girl, with tears on her cheeks, promised to do as her mother wished. Tranquil and resigned, the mother then passed quickly away.
The dutiful daughter, never forgetting her mother's wishes, each morning and evening took the glass from the place where it was hidden and gazed at it intently for a long time. There she saw the face of her dead mother brilliant and smiling, not pallid and ill as it was in her last days, but young and beautiful. To this vision each night she confided the troubles and little faults of the day, looking to it for help and encouragement in doing her duty. In this manner the girl grew up as if watched over and helped by a living presence, trying always to do nothing that could grieve or annoy her sainted mother. Her greatest pleasure was to look into the mirror and feel that she could truthfully say: "Mother, to-day I have been as you wished that I should be."
After a time the father observed that his daughter looked lovingly into the mirror every morning and every evening, and appeared to converse with it. Wondering, he asked her the cause of her strange behavior. The girl replied:
"Father, I look every day into the glass to see my dear mother and to speak with her."
She then related to him the last wishes of her dying mother, and assured him that she had never failed to comply with them.
Wondering at such simplicity and loving obedience, the father shed tears of pity and affection. Nor did he ever find the heart to explain to the loving daughter that the image she saw in the mirror was but the reflection of her own beautiful face. Thus, by the pure white bond of her filial love, each day the charming girl grew more and more like her dead mother.
A CONTRAST
Light blue eyes: Flaxen hair; Rosy cheeks-- Dimples there! These are Baby's.
Pudgy fists; Ruddy toes; Kissy lips-- Mother knows! These are Baby's.
Cooing voice; Winning smiles; Pleading arms-- Wanton wiles! These are Baby's.
Yearning love; Growing fears; Grief and worry-- All the years. These are Mother's.
THE GOLDEN TOUCH
By Nathaniel Hawthorne
Once upon a time there lived a very rich man, and a king besides, whose name was Midas; and he had a little daughter whom nobody but myself ever heard of, and whose name I either never knew or have entirely forgotten. So, because I love odd names for little girls, I choose to call her Marygold.
This King Midas was fonder of gold than of anything else in the world. He valued his royal crown chiefly because it was composed of that precious metal. If he loved anything better or half so well, it was the one little maiden who played so merrily around her father's footstool. But the more Midas loved his daughter, the more did he desire and seek for wealth. He thought, foolish man! that the best thing he could possibly do for this dear child would be to bequeath her the immensest pile of yellow, glistening coin that had ever been heaped together since the world was made. Thus he gave all his thoughts and all his time to this one purpose. If he ever happened to gaze for an instant at the gold-tinted clouds of sunset, he wished that they were real gold and that they could be squeezed safely into his strong box.
When little Marygold ran to meet him with a bunch of buttercups and dandelions, he used to say, "Pooh, pooh, child! If these flowers were as golden as they look, they would be worth the plucking!"
And yet in his earlier days, before he was so entirely possessed with this insane desire for riches, King Midas had shown a great taste for flowers. He had planted a garden in which grew the biggest and beautifulest and sweetest roses that any mortal ever saw or smelled. These roses were still growing in the garden, as large, as lovely, and as fragrant as when Midas used to pass whole hours in gazing at them and inhaling their perfume. But now, if he looked at them at all, it was only to calculate how much the garden would be worth if each of the innumerable rose-petals were a thin plate of gold. And though he once was fond of music (in spite of an idle story about his ears, which were said to resemble those of an ass), the only music for poor Midas now was the chink of one coin against another.
At length (as people always grow more and more foolish unless they take care to grow wiser and wiser) Midas had got to be so exceedingly unreasonable that he could scarcely bear to see or touch any object that was not gold. He made it his custom, therefore, to pass a large portion of every day in a dark and dreary apartment underground, at the basement of his palace. It was here that he kept his wealth. To this dismal hole- -for it was little better than a dungeon--Midas betook himself whenever he wanted to be particularly happy. Here, after carefully locking the door, he would take a bag of gold coin, or a gold cup as big as a washbowl, or a heavy golden bar, or a peck measure of gold dust, and bring it from the obscure corners of the room into the one bright and narrow sunbeam that fell from the dungeon-like window. He valued the sunbeam for no other reason but that his treasure would not shine without its help. And then would he reckon over the coins in the bag, toss up the bar and catch it as it came down, sift the gold dust through his fingers, look at the funny image of his own face as reflected in the burnished circumference of the cup, and whisper to himself, "O Midas, rich King Midas, what a happy man art thou!" But it was laughable to see how the image of his face kept grinning at him out of the polished surface of the cup. It seemed to be aware of his foolish behavior, and to have a naughty inclination to make fun of him.
Midas called himself a happy man, but felt that he was not yet quite so happy as he might be. The very tip-top of enjoyment would never be reached unless the whole world were to become his treasure-room and be filled with yellow metal which should be all his own.
Now, I need hardly remind such wise little people as you are that in the old, old times, when King Midas was alive, a great many things came to pass which we should consider wonderful if they were to happen in our own day and country. And, on the other hand, a great many things take place nowadays which seem not only wonderful to us, but at which the people of old times would have stared their eyes out. On the whole, I regard our own times as the stranger of the two; but, however that may be, I must go on with my story.
Midas was enjoying himself in his treasure-room one day as usual, when he perceived a shadow fall over the heaps of gold, and, looking suddenly up, what should he behold but the figure of a stranger standing in the bright and narrow sunbeam! It was a young man with a cheerful and ruddy face. Whether it was the imagination of King Midas threw a yellow tinge over everything, or whatever the cause might be, he could not help fancying that the smile with which the stranger regarded him had a kind of golden radiance in it. Certainly, although his figure intercepted the sunshine, there was now a brighter gleam upon all the piled-up treasures than before. Even the remotest corners had their share of it, and were lighted up, when the stranger smiled, as with tips of flame and sparkles of fire.
As Midas knew that he had carefully turned the key in the lock, and that no mortal strength could possibly break into his treasure-room, he of course concluded that his visitor must be something more than mortal. It is no matter about telling you who he was. In those days, when the earth was comparatively a new affair, it was supposed to be often the resort of beings endowed with supernatural powers, who used to interest themselves in the joys and sorrows of men, women, and children half playfully and half seriously. Midas had met such beings before now, and was not sorry to meet one of them again. The stranger's aspect, indeed, was so good-humored and kindly, if not beneficent, that it would have been unreasonable to suspect him of intending any mischief. It was far more probable that he came to do Midas a favor. What could that favor be unless to multiply his heaps of treasure?
The stranger gazed about the room, and when his lustrous smile had glistened upon all the golden objects that were there, he turned again to Midas.
"You are a wealthy man, friend Midas," he observed. "I doubt whether any other four walls on earth contain so much gold as you have contrived to pile up in this room."
"I have done pretty well--pretty well," answered Midas in a discontented tone. "But, after all, it is but a trifle when you consider that it has taken me my whole life to get it together. If one could live a thousand years, he might have time to grow rich."
"What!" exclaimed the stranger. "Then you are not satisfied?"
Midas shook his head.
"And pray what would satisfy you?" asked the stranger. "Merely for the curiosity of the thing, I should be glad to know."
Midas paused and meditated. He felt a presentiment that this stranger, with such a golden luster in his good-humored smile, had come hither with both the power and the purpose of gratifying his utmost wishes. Now, therefore, was the fortunate moment when he had but to speak and obtain whatever possible or seemingly impossible thing it might come into his head to ask.
So he thought, and thought, and thought, and heaped up one golden mountain upon another in his imagination, without being able to imagine them big enough. At last a bright idea occurred to King Midas. It seemed really as bright as the glistening metal which he loved so much.
Raising his head, he looked the lustrous stranger in the face.
"Well, Midas," observed his visitor, "I see that you have at length hit upon something that will satisfy you. Tell me your wish."
"It is only this," replied Midas. "I am weary of collecting my treasures with so much trouble, and beholding the heap so diminutive after I have done my best. I wish everything that I touch to be changed to gold."
The stranger's smile grew so very broad that it seemed to fill the room like an outburst of the sun gleaming into a shadowy dell where the yellow autumnal leaves--for so looked the lumps and particles of gold-- lie strewn in the glow of light.
"The Golden Touch!" exclaimed he. "You certainly deserve credit, friend Midas, for striking out so brilliant a conception. But are you quite sure that this will satisfy you?"
"How could it fail?" said Midas.
"And will you never regret the possession of it?"
"What could induce me?" asked Midas. "I ask nothing else to render me perfectly happy."
"Be it as you wish, then," replied the stranger, waving his hand in token of farewell. "To-morrow at sunrise you will find yourself gifted with the Golden Touch."
The figure of the stranger then became exceedingly bright, and Midas involuntarily closed his eyes. On opening them again he beheld only one yellow sunbeam in the room, and all around him the glistening of the precious metal which he had spent his life in hoarding up.
Whether Midas slept as usual that night the story does not say. Asleep or awake, however, his mind was probably in the state of a child's to whom a beautiful new plaything has been promised in the morning. At any rate, day had hardly peeped over the hills when King Midas was broad awake, and stretching his arms out of bed, began to touch the objects that were within reach. He was anxious to prove whether the Golden Touch had really come, according to the stranger's promise. So he laid his finger on a chair by the bedside and on various other things, but was grievously disappointed to perceive that they remained of exactly the same substance as before. Indeed, he felt very much afraid that he had only dreamed about the lustrous stranger, or else that the latter had been making game of him. And what a miserable affair would it be if, after all his hopes, Midas must content himself with what little gold he could scrape together by ordinary means instead of creating it by a touch.
All this while it was only the gray of the morning, with but a streak of brightness along the edge of the sky, where Midas could not see it. He lay in a very disconsolate mood, regretting the downfall of his hopes, and kept growing sadder and sadder until the earliest sunbeam shone through the window and gilded the ceiling over his head. It seemed to Midas that this bright yellow sunbeam was reflected in rather a singular way on the white covering of the bed. Looking more closely, what was his astonishment and delight when he found that this linen fabric had been transmuted to what seemed a woven texture of the purest and brightest gold! The Golden Touch had come to him with the first sunbeam!
Midas started up in a kind of joyful frenzy, and ran about the room grasping at everything that happened to be in his way. He seized one of the bed-posts, and it became immediately a fluted golden pillar. He pulled aside a window-curtain in order to admit a clear spectacle of the wonders which he was performing, and the tassel grew heavy in his hand-- a mass of gold. He took up a book from the table. At his first touch it assumed the appearance of such a splendidly bound and gilt-edged volume as one often meets with nowadays, but on running his fingers through the leaves, behold! it was a bundle of thin golden plates, in which all the wisdom of the book had grown illegible. He hurriedly put on his clothes, and was enraptured to see himself in a magnificent suit of gold cloth, which retained its flexibility and softness, although it burdened him a little with its weight. He drew out his handkerchief, which little Marygold had hemmed for him. That was likewise gold, with the dear child's neat and pretty stitches running all along the border in gold thread!
Somehow or other, this last transformation did not quite please King Midas. He would rather that his little daughter's handiwork should have remained just the same as when she climbed his knee and put it into his hand.
But it was not worth while to vex himself about a trifle. Midas now took his spectacles from his pocket, and put them on his nose in order that he might see more distinctly what he was about. In those days spectacles for common people had not been invented, but were already worn by kings, else how could Midas have had any? To his great perplexity, however, excellent as the glasses were, he discovered that he could not possibly see through them. But this was the most natural thing in the world, for on taking them off the transparent crystals turned out to be plates of yellow metal, and of course were worthless as spectacles, though valuable as gold. It struck Midas as rather inconvenient that, with all his wealth, he could never again be rich enough to own a pair of serviceable spectacles.
"It is no great matter, nevertheless," said he to himself, very philosophically. "We cannot expect any great good without its being accompanied with some small inconvenience. The Golden Touch is worth the sacrifice of a pair of spectacles at least, if not of one's very eyesight. My own eyes will serve for ordinary purposes, and little Marygold will soon be old enough to read to me."
Wise King Midas was so exalted by his good fortune that the palace seemed not sufficiently spacious to contain him. He therefore went downstairs and smiled on observing that the balustrade of the staircase became a bar of burnished gold as his hand passed over it in his descent.
He lifted the doorlatch (it was brass only a moment ago, but golden when his fingers quitted it) and emerged into the garden. Here, as it happened, he found a great number of beautiful roses in full bloom and others in all the stages of lovely bud and blossom. Very delicious was their fragrance in the morning breeze. Their delicate blush was one of the fairest sights in the world, so gentle, and so full of sweet tranquility did these roses seem to be.
But Midas knew a way to make them far more precious, according to his way of thinking, than roses had ever been before. So he took great pains in going from bush to bush, and exercised his magic touch most indefatigably, until every individual flower and bud, and even the worms at the heart of some of them, were changed to gold. By the time this good work was completed, King Midas was summoned to breakfast, and, as the morning air had given him an excellent appetite, he made haste back to the palace.
What was usually a king's breakfast in the days of Midas I really do not know and cannot stop now to investigate. To the best of my belief, however, on this particular morning the breakfast consisted of hot cakes, some nice little brook trout, roasted potatoes, fresh boiled eggs, and coffee for King Midas himself, and a bowl of bread and milk for his daughter Marygold. At all events, this is a breakfast fit to set before a king, and, whether he had it or not, King Midas could not have had a better.
Little Marygold had not yet made her appearance. Her father ordered her to be called, and, seating himself at the table, awaited the child's coming in order to begin his own breakfast. To do Midas justice, he really loved his daughter, and loved her so much the more this morning on account of the good fortune which had befallen him. It was not a great while before he heard her coming along the passageway crying bitterly. This circumstance surprised him, because Marygold was one of the cheerfulest little people whom you would see in a summer's day, and hardly shed a thimbleful of tears in a twelvemonth. When Midas heard her sobs he determined to put little Marygold into better spirits by an agreeable surprise; so, leaning across the table, he touched his daughter's bowl (which was a china one with pretty figures all around it) and transmuted it to gleaming gold.
Meanwhile, Marygold slowly and disconsolately opened the door and showed herself with her apron at her eyes, still sobbing as if her heart would break.
"How now, my little lady!" cried Midas. "What is the matter with you this morning?"
Marygold, without taking the apron from her eyes, held out her hand, in which was one of the roses which Midas had so recently transmuted.
"Beautiful!" exclaimed her father. "And what is there in this magnificent golden rose to make you cry?"
"Ah, dear father!" answered the child, as well as her sobs would let her, "it is not beautiful, but the ugliest flower that ever grew. As soon as I was dressed I ran into the garden to gather some roses for you, because I know you like them, and like them the better when gathered by your little daughter. But--oh dear! dear me!--what do you think has happened? Such a misfortune! All the beautiful roses, that smelled so sweetly and had so many lovely blushes, are blighted and spoiled! They are grown quite yellow, as you see this one, and have no longer any fragrance. What can be the matter with them?"
"Pooh, my dear little girl! pray don't cry about it!" said Midas, who was ashamed to confess that he himself had wrought the change which so greatly afflicted her. "Sit down and eat your bread and milk. You will find it easy enough to exchange a golden rose like that, which will last hundreds of years, for an ordinary one, which would wither in a day."
"I don't care for such roses as this!" cried Marygold, tossing it contemptuously away. "It has no smell, and the hard petals prick my nose."
The child now sat down to table, but was so occupied with her grief for the blighted roses that she did not even notice the wonderful transmutation of her china bowl. Perhaps this was all the better, for Marygold was accustomed to take pleasure in looking at the queer figures and strange trees and houses that were painted on the circumference of the bowl, and these ornaments were now entirely lost in the yellow hue of the metal.
Midas, meanwhile, had poured out a cup of coffee; and, as a matter of course, the coffeepot, whatever metal it may have been when he took it up, was gold when he set it down. He thought to himself that it was rather an extravagant style of splendor, in a king of his simple habits, to breakfast off a service of gold, and began to be puzzled with the difficulty of keeping his treasures safe. The cupboard and the kitchen would no longer be a secure place of deposit for articles so valuable as golden bowls and coffeepots.
Amid these thoughts he lifted a spoonful of coffee to his lips, and sipping it, was astonished to perceive that the instant his lips touched the liquid it became molten gold, and the next moment hardened into a lump.
"Ha!" exclaimed Midas, rather aghast.
"What is the matter, father?" asked little Marygold, gazing at him with the tears still standing in her eyes.
"Nothing, child, nothing," said Midas. "Eat your milk before it gets quite cold."
He took one of the nice little trouts on his plate, and, by way of experiment, touched its tail with his finger. To his horror, it was immediately transmuted from an admirably fried brook trout into a gold fish, though not one of those gold fishes which people often keep in glass globes as ornaments for the parlor. No; but it was really a metallic fish, and looked as if it had been very cunningly made by the nicest goldsmith in the world. Its little bones were now golden wires, its fins and tail were thin plates of gold, and there were the marks of the fork in it, and all the delicate, frothy appearance of a nicely fried fish exactly imitated in metal. A very pretty piece of work, as you may suppose; only King Midas, just at that moment, would much rather have had a real trout in his dish than this elaborate and valuable imitation of one.
"I don't quite see," thought he to himself, "how I am to get any breakfast."
He took one of the smoking hot cakes, and had scarcely broken it when, to his cruel mortification, though a moment before it had been of the whitest wheat, it assumed the yellow hue of Indian meal. To say the truth? if it had really been a hot Indian cake Midas would have prized it a good deal more than he now did, when its solidity and increased weight made him too bitterly sensible that it was gold. Almost in despair, he helped himself to a boiled egg, which immediately underwent a change similar to those of the trout and the cake. The egg, indeed, might have been mistaken for one of those which the famous goose in the storybook was in the habit of laying; but King Midas was the only goose that had had anything to do with the matter.
"Well, this is a quandary!" thought he, leaning back in his chair and looking quite enviously at little Marygold, who was now eating her bread and milk with great satisfaction. "Such a costly breakfast before me, and nothing that can be eaten!"
Hoping that, by dint of great dispatch, he might avoid what he now felt to be a considerable inconvenience, King Midas next snatched a hot potato, and attempted to cram it into his mouth and swallow it in a hurry. But the Golden Touch was too nimble for him. He found his mouth full, not of mealy potato, but of solid metal, which so burned his tongue that he roared aloud, and, jumping up from the table, began to dance and stamp about the room both with pain and affright.
"Father, dear father!" cried little Marygold, who was a very affectionate child, "pray what is the matter? Have you burned your mouth?"
"Ah, dear child," groaned Midas dolefully, "I don't know what is to become of your poor father."
And truly, my dear little folks, did you ever hear of such a pitiable case in all your lives? Here was literally the richest breakfast that could be set before a king, and its very richness made it absolutely good for nothing. The poorest laborer sitting down to his crust of bread and cup of water was far better off than King Midas, whose delicate food was really worth its weight in gold. And what was to be done? Already, at breakfast, Midas was excessively hungry. Would he be less so by dinner-time? And how ravenous would be his appetite for supper, which must undoubtedly consist of the same sort of indigestible dishes as those now before him! How many days, think you, would he survive a continuance of this rich fare?
These reflections so troubled wise King Midas that he began to doubt whether, after all, riches are the one desirable thing in the world, or even the most desirable. But this was only a passing thought. So fascinated was Midas with the glitter of the yellow metal that he would still have refused to give up the Golden Touch for so paltry a consideration as a breakfast. Just imagine what a price for one meal's victuals! It would have been the same as paying millions and millions of money (and as many millions more as would take forever to reckon up) for some fried trout, an egg, a potatoes a hot cake, and a cup of coffee.
"It would be quite too dear," thought Midas.
Nevertheless, so great was his hunger and the perplexity of his situation that he again groaned aloud, and very grievously, too. Our pretty Marygold could endure it no longer. She sat a moment gazing at her father and trying with all the might of her little wits to find out what was the matter with him. Then, with a sweet and sorrowful impulse to comfort him, she started from her chair, and, running to Midas, threw her arms affectionately about his knees. He bent down and kissed her. He felt that his little daughter's love was worth a thousand times more than he had gained by the Golden Touch.
"My precious, precious Marygold!" cried he.
But Marygold made no answer.
Alas, what had he done? How fatal was the gift which the stranger bestowed! The moment the lips of Midas touched Marygold's forehead a change had taken place. Her sweet, rosy face, so full of affection as it had been, assumed a glittering yellow color, with yellow tear-drops congealing on her cheeks. Her beautiful brown ringlets took the same tint. Her soft and tender little form grew hard and inflexible within her father's encircling arms. Oh, terrible misfortune! The victim of his insatiable desire for wealth, little Marygold was a human child no longer, but a golden statue!
Yes, there she was, with the questioning look of love, grief, and pity hardened into her face. It was the prettiest and most woeful sight that ever mortal saw. All the features and tokens of Marygold were there; even the beloved little dimple remained in her golden chin. But, the more perfect was this resemblance, the greater was the father's agony at beholding this golden image, which was all that was left him of a daughter. It had been a favorite phrase of Midas, whenever he felt particularly fond of the child, to say that she was worth her weight in gold. And now the phrase had become literally true. And now at last, when it was too late, he felt how infinitely a warm and tender heart that loved him exceeded in value all the wealth that could be piled up betwixt the earth and sky.
It would be too sad a story if I were to tell you how Midas, in the fullness of all his gratified desires, began to wring his hands and bemoan himself, and how he could neither bear to look at Marygold, nor yet to look away from her. Except when his eyes were fixed on the image, he could not possibly believe that she was changed to gold. But, stealing another glance, there was the precious little figure, with a yellow tear-drop on its yellow cheek, and a look so piteous and tender that it seemed as if that very expression must needs soften the gold and make it flesh again. This, however, could not be. So Midas had only to wring his hands and to wish that he were the poorest man in the wide world if the loss of all his wealth might bring back the faintest rose- color to his dear child's face.
While he was in this tumult of despair he suddenly beheld a stranger standing near the door. Midas bent down his head without speaking, for he recognized the same figure which had appeared to him the day before in the treasure-room and had bestowed on him this disastrous faculty of the Golden Touch.
The stranger's countenance still wore a smile which seemed to shed a yellow luster all about the room, and gleamed on little Marygold's image and on the other objects that had been transmuted by the touch of Midas.
"Well, friend Midas," said the stranger, "pray how do you succeed with the Golden Touch?"
Midas shook his head.
"I am very miserable," said he.
"Very miserable, indeed!" exclaimed the stranger. "And how happens that? Have I not faithfully kept my promise with you? Have you not everything that your heart desired?"
"Gold is not everything," answered Midas, "and I have lost all that my heart really cared for."
"Ah! so you have made a discovery since yesterday?" observed the stranger. "Let us see, then. Which of these two things do you think is, really worth the most--the gift of the Golden Touch, or one cup of clear, cold water?"
"Oh, blessed water!" exclaimed Midas. "It will never moisten my parched throat again."
"The Golden Touch," continued the stranger, "or a crust of bread?"
"A piece of bread," answered Midas, "is worth all the gold on earth."
"The Golden Touch," asked the stranger, "or your own little Marygold, warm, soft, and loving, as she was an hour ago?"
"Oh, my child, my dear child!" cried poor Midas, wringing his hands. "I would not have given that one small dimple in her chin for the power of changing this whole big earth into a solid lump of gold!"
"You are wiser than you were, King Midas," said the stranger, looking seriously at him. "Your own heart, I perceive, has not been entirely changed from flesh to gold. Were it so, your case would indeed be desperate. But you appear to be still capable of understanding that the commonest things, such as lie within everybody's grasp, are more valuable than the riches which so many mortals sigh and struggle after. Tell me now, do you sincerely desire to rid yourself of this Golden Touch?"
"It is hateful to me!" replied Midas.
A fly settled on his nose, but immediately fell to the floor, for it, too, had become gold. Midas shuddered.
"Go, then," said the stranger, "and plunge into the river that glides past the bottom of your garden. Take likewise a vase of the same water, and sprinkle it over any object that you may desire to change back again from gold into its former substance. If you do this in earnestness and sincerity, it may possibly repair the mischief which your avarice has occasioned."
King Midas bowed low, and when he lifted his head the lustrous stranger had vanished.
You will easily believe that Midas lost no time in snatching up a great earthen pitcher (but alas me! it was no longer earthen after he touched it) and hastening to the riverside. As he scampered along and forced his way through the shrubbery, it was positively marvelous to see how the foliage turned yellow behind him, as if the autumn had been there and nowhere else.
On reaching the river's brink he plunged headlong in, without waiting so much as to pull off his shoes.
"Poof! poof! poof!" snorted King Midas, as his head emerged out of the water. "Well, this is really a refreshing bath, and I think it must have washed away the Golden Touch. And now for filling my pitcher."
As he dipped the pitcher into the water it gladdened his very heart to see it change from gold into the same good, honest earthen vessel which it had been before he touched it. He was conscious also of a change within himself. A cold, hard, and heavy weight seemed to have gone out of his bosom. No doubt his heart had been gradually losing its human substance and transmuting itself into insensible metal, but had now softened back again into flesh. Perceiving a violet that grew on the bank of the river, Midas touched it with his finger, and was overjoyed to find that the delicate flower retained its purple hue, instead of undergoing a yellow blight. The curse of the Golden Touch had therefore really been removed from him.
King Midas hastened back to the palace, and I suppose the servants knew not what to make of it when they saw their royal master so carefully bringing home an earthen pitcher of water. But that water, which was to undo all the mischief that his folly had wrought, was more precious to Midas than an ocean of molten gold could have been. The first thing he did, as you need hardly be told, was to sprinkle it by handfuls over the golden figure of little Marygold.
No sooner did it fall on her than you would have laughed to see how the rosy color came back to the dear child's cheek, and how she began to sneeze and sputter, and how astonished she was to find herself dripping wet and her father still throwing more water over her.
"Pray do not, dear father!" cried she. "See how you have wet my nice frock, which I put on only this morning."
For Marygold did not know that she had been a little golden statue, nor could she remember anything that had happened since the moment when she ran with outstretched arms to comfort poor King Midas.
Her father did not think it necessary to tell his beloved child how very foolish he had been, but contented himself with showing how much wiser he had now grown. For this purpose he led little Marygold into the garden, where he sprinkled all the remainder of the water over the rose- bushes, and with such good effect that above five thousand roses recovered their beautiful bloom. There were two circumstances, however, which, as long as he lived, used to put King Midas in mind of the Golden Touch.
One was that the sands of the river sparkled like gold; the other, that little Marygold's hair had now a golden tinge which he had never observed in it before she had been transmuted by the effect of his kiss. The change of hue was really an improvement, and made Marygold's hair richer than in her babyhood.
When King Midas had grown quite an old man and used to trot Marygold's children on his knee, he was fond of telling them this marvelous story, pretty much as I have told it to you. And then he would stroke their glossy ringlets and tell them that their hair likewise had a rich shade of gold, which they had inherited from their mother.
"And to tell you the truth, my precious little folks," quoth King Midas, diligently trotting the children all the while, "ever since that morning I have hated the very sight of all other gold save this."
Hawthorne was by no means the first man who ever told about King Midas, nor are the children who have lived since his time the first who ever heard this story; for hundreds and hundreds of years ago, in a country very different from ours, the little Greek children heard it told in a language that would seem very strange to us. However, Hawthorne has by no means told the story just as the Greek mothers or Greek nurses might have told it to their children; he has added much which makes the story seem more real and the characters more human.
For instance, as he says, the old myth told nothing about any daughter of Midas's, and yet I think we are all ready to admit that we should not love the story half so well without dear little Marygold.
Then too, the talk about Midas's spectacles and about his trotting his grandchildren on his knee is but a little pleasant fooling on the part of Hawthorne, for spectacles were not even thought of for centuries after the time of old King Midas, and it is much more than unlikely that any old Greek ever trotted children on his knee.
Hawthorne had a perfect right to make these changes in the story; for the old myths have come down to us from so long ago that they seem to belong to everybody, and every one forms his own ideas of them.
Thus you will see that while the author of this story thought of Marygold as a little child who climbed up onto her father's knee, the artists in dealing with the subject have thought of her as almost a young woman. Which of these two ideas do you like better?
THE CHILD'S WORLD
By W. B. Rands
Great, wide, beautiful, wonderful World, With the wonderful water round you curled, And the wonderful grass upon your breast-- World, you are beautifully dressed.
The wonderful air is over me, And the wonderful wind is shaking the tree; It walks on the water, and whirls the mills, And talks to itself on the tops of the hills.
You, friendly Earth! how far do you go With the wheat-fields that nod and the rivers that flow, With cities and gardens, and cliffs, and isles, And people upon you for thousands of miles?
Ah, you are so great, and I am so small, I tremble to think of you, World, at all; And yet, when I said my prayers to-day, A whisper inside me seemed to say:
"You are more than the Earth, though you are such a dot-- You can love and think, and the Earth cannot!"
THE FIR TREE
By Hans Christian Andersen
Out in the forest stood a pretty little Fir Tree. It had a good place; it could have sunlight, air there was in plenty, and all around grew many larger comrades--pines as well as firs. But the little Fir Tree wished ardently to become greater. It did not care for the warm sun and the fresh air; it took no notice of the peasant children, who went about talking together, when they had come out to look for strawberries and raspberries. The children often came with a whole basketful, or with a string of berries which they had strung on a straw. Then they would sit down by the little Fir Tree and say, "How pretty and small this one is!" The Fir Tree did not like that at all.
Next year he had grown bigger, and the following year he was taller still.
"Oh, if I were only as tall as the others!" sighed the little Fir. "Then I would spread my branches far around and look out from my crown into the wide world. The birds would then build nests in my boughs, and when the wind blew I would nod grandly."
It took no pleasure in the sunshine, in the birds, or in the red clouds that went sailing over it morning and evening.
When it was winter, and the snow lay all around, white and sparkling, a hare would often come jumping along and spring right over the little Fir Tree. O, that made him so angry! But two winters went by, and when the third came, the little Tree had grown so tall that the hare was obliged to run around it.
"Oh, to grow, to grow, and become old; that's the only fine thing in the world," thought the Tree.
In the autumn the woodcutters always came and felled a few of the largest trees; that was done this year, too, and the little Fir Tree, that was now quite well grown, shuddered with fear, for the stately trees fell to the ground with a crash, and their branches were cut off, so that the trees looked quite naked, long and slender, and could hardly he recognized. Then they were laid upon wagons, and the horses dragged them away out of the wood. Where were they going? What destiny awaited them?
In the spring, when the Swallows and the Stork came, the Tree asked them, "Do you know where the big firs were taken? Did you meet them?"
The Swallows knew nothing about it, but the Stork looked thoughtful, nodded his head and said: "Yes, I think so. I met many new ships when I flew out of Egypt; on the ships were tall masts; I fancy these were the trees. They smelt like fir. I can assure you they're stately--very stately."
"Oh, that I were big enough to go over the sea. What kind of a thing is this sea, and how does it look?"
"It would take long to explain all that," said the Stork, and he went away.
"Rejoice in thy youth," said the Sunbeams; "rejoice in thy fresh growth, and in the young life that is within thee."
And the wind kissed the Tree, and the Dew wept tears upon it; but the Fir Tree did not understand.
When Christmas time approached, quite young trees were felled, sometimes trees which were neither so old nor so large as this Fir Tree, that never rested, but always wanted to go away. These beautiful young trees kept all their branches; they were put upon wagons, and horses dragged them away out of the wood.
"Where are they all going?" asked the Fir Tree. "They are not greater than I--indeed, one of them was much smaller. Why do they keep all their branches? Whither are they taken?"
"We know that! We know that!" chirped the Sparrows. "Yonder in the town we looked in at the windows. We know where the fir trees go. We have looked in at the windows and have seen that they are planted in the middle of a warm room and dressed up in the greatest splendor with the most beautiful things--gilt apples, honey-cakes, playthings, and many hundreds of candles."
"And then?" asked the Fir Tree, trembling through all its branches. "And then? what happens then?" "Why, we have not seen anything more. But it was wonderful!"
"Perhaps I may be destined to this glorious end one day!" cried the Fir Tree, rejoicing. "That is even better than traveling across the sea. How I long for it! If it were only Christmas! Now I am great and grown up like the rest who were led away last year. Oh, if I were only on the wagon! If I were only in the warm room amidst all the pomp and splendor! And then? Yes, then something even better will come, something far more charming, else why should they adorn me so? There must be something grander, something greater still to come; but what? Oh! I'm suffering, I'm longing! I don't know myself what is the matter with me!"
"Rejoice in us," said Air and Sunshine. "Rejoice in thy fresh youth here in the woodland."
The Fir Tree did not rejoice at all, but it grew and grew; winter and summer it stood there, green, dark green. The people who saw it said, "That's a handsome tree!" and at Christmas time it was felled before any of the others. The axe cut deep into its marrow, and the tree fell to the ground with a sigh; it felt a pain, a sensation of faintness, and could not think at all of happiness, for it was sad at parting from its home, from the place where it had grown up; it knew that it should never again see the dear old companions, the little bushes and the flowers all around, perhaps not even the birds. The Tree came to itself only when it was unloaded in a yard, with other trees, and heard a man say:
"This one is famous; we want only this one!"
Now two servants came in gay liveries, and carried the Fir Tree into a large, beautiful room. All around the walls hung pictures, and by the great stove stood large Chinese vases with lions on the covers; there were rocking chairs, silken sofas, great tables covered with picture books, and toys worth a hundred times a hundred dollars; at least, the children said so. And the Fir Tree was put into a great tub filled with sand; but no one could see that it was a tub, for it was hung round with green cloth, and stood on a large, many-colored carpet. Oh, how the Tree trembled! What was to happen now? The servants, and the young ladies also, decked it out. On one branch they hung little bags cut out of colored paper, and every bag was filled with sweetmeats. Golden apples and walnuts hung down as if they grew there, and more than a hundred little candles, red, white, and blue, were fastened to the different boughs. Dolls that looked exactly like real people--the Tree had never seen such before--swung among the foliage, and high on the summit of the Tree was fixed a tinsel star. It was splendid.
"This evening," said all, "this evening it will shine."
"Oh," thought the Tree, "that it were evening already! Oh that the lights may be soon lit! When will that be done? I wonder if trees will come out of the forest to look at me? Will the Sparrows fly against the panes? Shall I grow fast here, and stand adorned in summer and winter?"
But the Tree had a backache from mere longing, and the backache is just as bad for a tree as the headache for a person.
At last the candles were lighted. What a brilliance, what splendor! The Tree trembled so in all its branches that one of the candles set fire to a green twig, and it was scorched, but one of the young ladies hastily put the fire out.
Now the Tree might not even tremble. Oh, that was terrible! It was so afraid of setting fire to some of its ornaments, and it was quite bewildered with all the brilliance. And now the folding doors were thrown open, and a number of children rushed in as if they would have overturned the whole Tree, while the older people followed more deliberately. The little ones stood quite silent, but only for a minute; then they shouted till the room rang; they danced gleefully round the Tree; and one present after another was plucked from it.
"What are they about?" thought the Tree. "What's going to be done?"
And the candles burned down to the twigs, and as they burned down they were extinguished, and then the children were given permission to plunder the Tree. They rushed in upon it, so that every branch cracked again; if it had not been fastened by the top and by the golden star to the ceiling, the Tree certainly would have fallen down.
The children danced about with their pretty toys. No one looked at the Tree except one old man, who came up and peeped among the branches, but only to see if a fig or an apple had not been forgotten.
"A story! A story!" shouted the children, as they drew a little fat man toward the Tree. He sat down just beneath it--"for then we shall be in the green wood," said he, "and the Tree may have the advantage of listening to my tale. But I can tell only one. Will you hear the story of Ivede-Avede, or of Klumpey-Dumpey, who fell downstairs, and still was raised up to honor and married the princess?"
"Ivede-Avede," cried some; "Klumpey-Dumpey," cried others, and there was a great crying and shouting. Only the Fir Tree was silent, and thought, "Shall I not be in it? Shall I have nothing to do in it?" But he had been in the evening's amusement and had done what was required of him.
And the fat man told about Klumpey-Dumpey, who fell downstairs, and yet was raised to honor and married the princess. And the children clapped their hands, and cried, "Tell another, tell another!" for they wanted to hear about Ivede-Avede; but they got only the story of Klumpey-Dumpey.
The Fir Tree stood quite silent and thoughtful; never had the birds in the wood told such a story as that. Klumpey-Dumpey fell downstairs, and yet came to honor and married the princess!
"Yes, so it happens in the world!" thought the Fir Tree, and believed it must be true, because that was such a nice man who told it. "Well, who can know? Perhaps I shall fall downstairs, too, and marry a princess!" And it looked forward with pleasure to being adorned again, the next evening, with candles and toys, gold and fruit. "To-morrow I shall not tremble," it thought. "I shall rejoice in all my splendor. To-morrow I shall hear the story of Klumpey-Dumpey again, and perhaps that of Ivede- Avede, too."
And the Tree stood all night quiet and thoughtful.
In the morning the servants and the chambermaid came in.
"Now my splendor will begin afresh," thought the Tree.
But they dragged him out of the room and up-stairs to the garret, and there they put him in a dark corner where no daylight shone.
"What's the meaning of this?" thought the Tree. "What am I to do here? What is to happen?"
And he leaned against the wall, and thought, and thought. And he had time enough, for days and nights went by, and nobody came up; and when at length some one came, it was only to put some great boxes in a corner. Now the Tree stood quite hidden away, and the supposition is that it was quite forgotten.
"Now it's winter outside," thought the Tree. "The earth is hard and covered with snow, and people cannot plant me; therefore I suppose I'm to be sheltered here until spring comes. How considerate that is! How good people are! If it were only not so dark here, and so terribly solitary! Not even a little hare! It was pretty out there in the wood, when the snow lay thick and the hare sprang past; yes, even when he jumped over me; but then I did not like it. It is terribly lonely up here!"
"Piep! Piep!" said a little Mouse, and crept forward, and then came another little one. They smelt at the Fir Tree, and then slipped among the branches.
"It's horribly cold," said the two little Mice, "or else it would be comfortable here. Don't you think so, you old Fir Tree?"
"I'm not old at all," said the Fir Tree. "There are many much older than I."
"Where do you come from?" asked the Mice. "And what do you know?" They were dreadfully inquisitive.
"Tell us about the most beautiful spot on the earth. Have you been there? Have you been in the storeroom, where cheeses lie on the shelves, and hams hang from the ceiling; where one dances on tallow candles, and goes in thin and comes out fat?"
"I don't know that," replied the Tree; "but I know the wood, where the sun shines and the birds sing." And then it told all about its youth.
And the little Mice had never heard anything of the kind; and they listened, and said:
"What a number of things you have seen! How happy you must have been!"
"I?" replied the Fir Tree; and it thought about what it had told. "Yes, those were really quite happy times." But then he told of the Christmas Eve, when he had been hung with sweatmeats and candles.
"Oh!" said the little Mice, "how happy you have been, you old Fir Tree!"
"I'm not old at all," said the Tree. "I came out of the wood only this winter. I'm only rather backward in my growth."
"What splendid stories you can tell!" said the little Mice.
And next night they came with four other little Mice, to hear what the Tree had to relate; and the more it said, the more clearly did it remember everything, and thought, "Those were quite merry days. But they may come again. Klumpey-Dumpey fell downstairs, and yet he married the princess. Perhaps I may marry a princess, too!" And then the Fir Tree thought of a pretty little Birch Tree that grew out in the forest; for the Fir Tree, that Birch was a real princess.
"Who's Klumpey-Dumpey?" asked the little Mice.
And then the Fir Tree told the whole story. It could remember every single word; and the little Mice were ready to leap to the very top of the tree with pleasure. Next night a great many more Mice came, and on Sunday two Rats even appeared; but these thought the story was not pretty, and the little Mice were sorry for that, for now they also did not like it so much as before.
"Do you know only one story?" asked the Rats.
"Only that one," replied the Tree. "I heard that on the happiest evening of my life; I did not think then how happy I was."
"That's a very miserable story. Don't you know any about bacon and tallow candles--a storeroom story?"
"No," said the Tree.
"Then we'd rather not hear you," said the Rats. And they went back to their own people. The little Mice at last also stayed away; and then the Tree sighed and said, "It was very nice when they sat around me, the merry little Mice, and listened when I spoke to them. Now that's past, too. But I shall remember to be pleased when they take me out."
But when did that happen? Why, it was one morning that people came and rummaged in the garret; the boxes were put away, and the Tree was brought out; they certainly threw him rather roughly on the floor, but a servant dragged him away at once to the stairs, where the daylight shone.
"Now life is beginning again," thought the Tree.
It felt the fresh air and the first sunbeams, and then it was out in the courtyard. Everything passed so quickly that the Tree quite forgot to look at itself, there was so much to look at all around. The courtyard was close to a garden, and there everything was blooming; the roses hung fresh and fragrant over the little paling, the linden trees were in blossom, and the swallows cried, "Quinze-wit! quinze-wit! my husband's come!" But it was not the Fir Tree that they meant.
"Now I shall live!" cried the Tree, rejoicingly, and spread its branches far out; but, alas! they were all withered and yellow, and it lay in the corner among nettles and weeds. The tinsel star was still upon it, and shone in the bright sunshine.
In the courtyard a couple of the merry children were playing who had danced round the Tree at Christmas time, and had rejoiced over it. One of the youngest ran up and tore off the golden star.
"Look what is sticking to the ugly old Fir Tree!" said the child, and he trod on the branches till they cracked under his boots.
And the Tree looked at all the blooming flowers and the splendor of the garden, then looked at itself, and wished it had remained in the dark corner of the garret; it thought of its fresh youth in the wood, of the merry Christmas Eve, and of the little Mice which had listened so pleasantly to the story of Klumpey-Dumpey.
"Past! past!" said the old Tree. "Had I but rejoiced when I could have done so! Past! past!"
And the servant came and chopped the Tree into little pieces; a whole bundle lay there; it blazed brightly under the great brewing copper, and it sighed deeply, and each sigh was like a little shot; and the children, who were at play there, ran up, seated themselves by the fire, looked into it, and cried "Puff! puff!" But at each explosion, which was a deep sigh, the Tree thought of a summer day in the woods, or of a winter night there, when the stars beamed; he thought of Christmas Eve and of Klumpey-Dumpey, the only story he had ever heard or knew how to tell; and thus the Tree was burned.
The boys played in the garden, and the youngest had on his breast a golden star, which the Tree had worn on its happiest evening. Now that was past, and the Tree's life was past, and the story is past, too: past! past!--and that's the way with all stories.
HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN
When a man writes as beautiful and as interesting stories as Hans Christian Andersen has written for children, we like to know something about him; and we find that nothing that he ever wrote was much more interesting than his own life. Certainly no one who knew him while he was a child could have thought that he would ever have much chance of becoming a famous man.
He was born on April 2nd, 1805, in the city of Odense, in Denmark. The room in which he was born was kitchen, parlor, bedroom and workshop for the whole family, for the family of Andersen had little to do with, and little knowledge of how to make the best of what they had. The father was a cobbler, but a cobbler who was much more interested in other things than he was in his trade, into which he had been forced quite contrary to his own wishes. The mother was a careless, easy-going person, who was kind to her child, but had not the slightest idea of training him, or of restraining any of his odd tastes. These tastes were determined more or less by his father, who was a great reader, particularly of plays; and we see the results of this early introduction to the drama in Hans Christian Andersen throughout his life.
Little Hans Christian was a most extraordinary child. He was ugly, as he remained all his life; for his body and neck were too long and too thin, his feet and his hands were too large and too bony, his nose was large and hooked, and his eyes were small and set like a Chinaman's. However, it was not his looks, but his oddity, which cut him off from other children. He would sit all day and make doll clothes, or cut dolls and animals out of paper; and these were not things which would be likely to make other boys like him and admire him. He had little schooling, and even when he was a grown man he knew none too much of the grammar of his own language.
After his father's death, when he himself was about eleven, little Hans Christian was more solitary than before, and shut himself up still more with his doll's clothes, his toy theaters, and his books, for he was, like his father, very fond of reading. Especially did he like those books which had anything about ghosts or witches or fairies in them. While he was but a child, he wrote a play of his own, in which most of the characters were kings and queens and princesses; and because he felt that it could not be possible that such lofty personages would talk the same language as ordinary people, he picked out from a dictionary, which he managed somehow to get hold of, French words, German words, English words, and high-sounding Danish words, and strung them all together to make up the conversation of his characters.
It was no more than natural that such a strange, unattractive-looking child should be made fun of by the prosaic, commonplace people of his neighborhood, and this was untold pain to the sensitive boy. There were, however, in the town, people of a higher class, who perceived in the boy something beyond the ordinary, and who interested themselves in his behalf. They had him sent to school, but he preferred to dream away his time rather than to study, and his short period of schooling really taught him nothing.
His mother, careless as she was, began to see that matters must change-- that the boy could not go on all his life in this aimless fashion; but since he steadily declined to be a tailor or a cobbler, or indeed to take up any trade, it seemed no easy question to settle. However, in 1818, there came to Odense a troupe of actors who gave plays and operas. Young Andersen, who by making acquaintance with the billposter was allowed to witness the performances from behind the scenes, decided at once that he was cut out to be an actor. There was no demand for actors in his native town, and he therefore decided to go to Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark, there to seek his fortune.
With about five dollars in his pocket, Andersen reached Copenhagen in September, 1819, but he found that a fortune was by no means as easily made as he had fancied. He himself felt convinced that he should be a famous actor, but how was he to convince any one else of this fact? From one actor to another, from one theater manager to another he went, but all told him that for one reason or another he was not fitted for the stage. Particularly did Andersen resent the excuse of one manager, who told him that he was too thin. This fault Andersen assured him that he was only too willing to remedy, if he would only give him a chance and a salary; but still the manager refused.
Finally the boy was destitute of money and knew not where to turn for more, for he was too proud to go back to his native town. However, an Italian singing teacher, Siboni, into whose home Andersen had almost forced himself while a dinner party was in progress, became interested in him, and with some friends provided him with enough to live on. He also gave him singing lessons until the boy's voice gave out. Other influential people gradually became interested in the strange creature, who certainly did appear to have some talent, but who had even more obvious defects; and so he lived on, supported in the most meager fashion.
Determined to write plays if he could not play them, Andersen composed drama after drama. He would rush into the house of a total stranger, of whom perhaps he had heard as a patron of genius, declaim some scenes from his plays, and then rush out, leaving his auditor in gasping amazement. Finally he made the acquaintance of one of the directors of the Royal Theatre, Jonas Collin, who was ever afterward his best friend. Through the influence of this kindly man, Anderson was sent to school at Slagelse, and as he said later, the days of his degradation were over once and for all.
Andersen did not have an entirely pleasant time at school. He loved systematic study no more than he had early in his life, and he did not fall in very readily with his young companions. However, he persisted, for he was ashamed to disappoint his patron, Collin, and by the time he left school in 1827, he had an education of which he needed not to be ashamed. After his return to Copenhagen, he was able to pass his examinations satisfactorily.
From this time on, Andersen's life was in the main happy, although he was so sensitive and so sentimental that he was constantly fancying grievances where none existed, and making himself miserable over imaginary snubs. It is true that his dramatic works were not well received, but this was because there was no real merit in them, and not, as Andersen persisted in believing, because the critics to whom they were submitted had grudges against him. His first works that made a distinctly favorable impression were travel sketches, for Andersen was all his life a great traveler, and knew how to write most charmingly and humorously of all that he saw. His trips to other countries were all treated most delightfully, and every book that appeared increased the author's fame. His visit to Italy, the country which all his life he loved above any other, also resulted in a novel, THE IMPROVISATORE, which became immensely popular and caused Andersen to be hailed as a future great novelist.
However, it was neither for travel sketches nor for novels that he was to be best known, but for something entirely different, which he himself was inclined at first to look down upon, and which many of his critics at the outset regarded as mere child's play. These were the fairy tales which he began in 1835, and which he published at intervals from that time until his death. The children loved The Ugly Duckling, The Fir Tree and The Snow Queen; but it was not only the children who loved them. Gradually people all over the world began to realize that here was a man who knew how to tell tales to children in so masterly a manner that even grown folks would do well to listen to him.
Now that Andersen was at the height of his fame, he had no lack of friends; for whether he was in Germany, or Spain, or England, he was everywhere given ovations that were fit for a king, and was everywhere entertained by the best people in the most sumptuous manner. At one time he stayed for five weeks with Charles Dickens in his home at Gad's Hill, and the two were ever afterward firm friends. All of these people loved Andersen, not because of his fame, but because of the stories which had brought him fame, and because he was distinctly lovable in spite of his oddity; for Andersen was still odd. He was ugly and ungainly, and, owing to his fondness for decoration, often dressed in the most peculiar fashion. Then, too, he was so childishly vain of the fame which had come to him that he was at any time quite likely to stop in a crowded street and call across to a friend on the other side about some favorable notice which he had just received. After people became accustomed to this trait, however, they saw that it was but another phase of the childlikeness which made Andersen so charming and so unlike many other famous men.
Despite his intimate knowledge of children, Andersen was never really fond of them. They worried him, and he, for some reason or other, never seemed very attractive to them. But if he could be induced to tell them or read them one of his stories, illustrating it with the queer antics and faces which he alone knew how to make, he was certain of an intensely interested audience.
Andersen's fame and the love felt for him at home and abroad grew with his every year, and when he died, in 1875, his death was looked upon as a more than national calamity. The highest people in Denmark, including the king and queen, who had come to look upon Andersen's friendship as a great honor, followed him to his grave; and children all over the world sorrowed when they were told that the author of the beloved Fairy Tales would never write them another story.
PICTURE-BOOKS IN WINTER
By Robert Louis Stevenson
Summer fading, winter comes-- Frosty mornings, tingling thumbs, Window robins, winter rooks, And the picture story-books.
Water now is turned to stone Nurse and I can walk upon; Still we find the flowing brooks In the picture story-books.
All the pretty things put by Wait upon the children's eye-- Sheep and shepherds, trees and crooks, In the picture story-books.
We may see now all things are-- Seas and cities, near and far, And the flying fairies' looks-- In the picture story-books.
How am I to sing your praise, Happy chimney-corner days, Sitting safe in nursery nooks, Reading picture story-books!
What we like about so fine a little poem as this is that it sets our thoughts to flying. As we read it, we see autumn coming on, with the red and the gold and the orange tinting the leaves. We can hear the last notes of the birds as they wing their way through the soft blue sky to gayer places in the warm southland. The cold comes fast, and in the morning, as we try to play ball or gather the ripe nuts from the hazel bushes, our thumbs tingle with the frost.
The little Scotch boy sees his robin, a little bird with a reddish- yellow breast, come to his window, and hears the cawing of the rooks. We in the United States can hear the rough voice of the blue-jay, or perhaps see the busy downy woodpecker tapping industriously at the suet we have hung in the tree for him.
A few days later the water in the pond becomes hard as stone, and we can walk over its smooth, glittering surface, or, if we are old enough, can make our way back and forth in widening circles to the music of our ringing skates. When the cold grows too severe and our cheeks burn in the wind, we can run inside, curl up in a big chair where it is warm and cheery, and, burying our faces in our favorite books, can see once more the little waves dancing on the pebbly shore of the pond, and hear the babble of the brook.
What can we find in the books? Everything that makes life merry, and everything that helps us to be true and manly. Out in the pasture the sheep are grazing, and among them walk the shepherds, singing gaily to the wide sky and the bright sun. When, perchance, a frisking lamb strays near the woods where perils lie, the shepherd follows, and with the crook at the end of his staff draws the wanderer back to safety.
These wonderful books of ours will carry us across the seas, even. We, for instance, might go to Scotland and play with the boy Stevenson. What a delight it would be; for the man who can write so charmingly about children must have been a wonderfully interesting boy to play with. And the cities we should see--quaint old Edinburgh, with its big, frowning castle on the top of that high rugged hill, and in the castle yard, old Mons Meg, the big cannon that every Scotch lad feels that he must crawl into.
If that is too far away from us, we will come back to Boston, and walk through the Common, and hear again the Yankee boys bravely complaining to General Gage because the British soldiers have trampled down the snow fort the youngsters have built.
But those are only real things; the more wonderful things are the flying fairies whose deeds we may read in this very book.
But how can we write in prose the praise of the picture story-books when Stevenson thinks he cannot do it in his pretty rhymes? Moreover, we have just found out that the poet's chimney corner is filled with the little ones who can read only the simplest things, and need big, fine pictures and easy words. He was not writing for us at all--but that does not matter. His little poem pleases us just the same.
Let us turn back and read it again--I suspect that, after all, we are all of us small enough to sit in a chimney corner; and perhaps every book is but a picture story-book to the man or woman who is old enough and big enough to read it rightly.
HOW THE WOLF WAS BOUND
Adapted by Anna McCaleb
It seems strange that any one who might have lived with the gods in their beautiful city of Asgard [Footnote: The Norse peoples believed that their gods lived above the earth in a wonderful city named Asgard. From this city they crossed to the earth on a bridge, which by people on earth was known as the rainbow.] and have shared in their joys and their good works should have preferred to associate with the ugly, wicked giants. But that was the case with Loki--Red Loki, as he was called, because of his red hair. He was handsome like a god; he was wise and clever like a god--more clever than any of the other gods. In one way, however, he differed from the others; he had a bad heart, and liked much better to use his cleverness in getting gods and men into trouble than in making them happy. Besides this, he was very proud, and could not bear to submit even to Odin, the king of the gods.
"Who is Odin," [Footnote: Odin, chief of the Norse gods, had been induced to part with one eye in exchange for wisdom.] he muttered, "that he should be set over me? Is he more clever than I am? Is he more handsome, with his one eye and his gray beard?" And Loki held his handsome head high.
Proud as he was, however, he was not too proud to do a disgraceful thing. He went off to the home of the giants and married the ugliest and fiercest of all the giantesses. Just why he did it does not seem very clear, for he certainly could not have loved her. Perhaps he did it just to spite the other gods and to show them that he cared nothing for what they thought.
But he must have repented of his act when he saw the children which the giantess bore him, for they were certainly the most hideous and frightful children that were ever born into the world. The daughter, Hela, was the least awful, but even she was by no means a person one would care to meet. She was half white and half blue, and she had such gloomy, angry eyes that any one who looked at her sank into unconquerable sadness and finally into death. But the other two! One was a huge, glistening, scaly serpent, with a mouth that dripped poison, and glaring, beady eyes; and the other was a white-fanged, red-eyed wolf.
These two monsters grew so rapidly that the king of the gods, looking down from his throne in the heavens, was struck with fear.
"The gods themselves will not be safe if those monsters are allowed to go unchecked," he said. "Down there in the home of the giants they will be taught to hate the gods, and at the rate they're growing, they'll soon be strong enough to shake our very palaces."
He sent, therefore, the strongest of his sons to fetch the children of Loki before him. Well was it for those gathered about Odin's throne that they were gods and goddesses, else would the eyes of Hela have sent them to their death. Upon her, Odin looked more in pity than in anger--she was not all bad.
"You, Hela," he said, "although it is not safe to allow you to remain above ground, where you may do great harm to men, are not all wicked. Honor, therefore, shall be yours, and ease; but happiness shall be far from you. I shall make you queen over the regions of the dead--that kingdom which is as large as nine worlds."
Then it was believed that the only honorable form of death was death in battle; and the bravest of the heroes who died in battle were brought by Odin's messengers, the Valkyries, who always hovered on their cloud- horses above battlefields, to the great palace of Valhalla. Therefore only the cowards or the weak, who died in their beds, went to the underground realm, and Hela knew that they were not subjects of whom she could be proud. Nevertheless, she went without a word.
Odin, then, without speaking, suddenly stooped and seized in his strong arms the wriggling, slippery serpent. Over the wall of the city he threw it, and the gods watched it as it fell down, down, down, until at last it sank from sight into the sea. This was by no means the last of the serpent, however; under the water it grew and grew until it was so large that it formed a girdle about the whole earth, and could hold its tail in its mouth.
The question as to what should be done with the great wolf, Fenris, was not so easily answered. It seemed to all the gods that he had grown larger and fiercer in the brief time he had stood before them, and none of them dared touch him. At length some one whispered, "Let us kill him," and the wolf turned and showed his teeth at the speaker; for as he was the son of Loki, he could understand and speak the language of the gods.
"That cannot be," said Odin. "Have we not sworn that the streets of our city shall never be stained with blood? Let us leave the matter until another time."
So the wolf was permitted to roam about Asgard, and the gods all tried to be kind to him, for they thought that by their kindness they might tame him. However, he grew stronger and stronger and more and more vicious, until only Tyr, [Footnote: Tyr was the Norse war-god.] the bravest of all the gods, dared go near him to give him food. One day, as the gods sat in their council hall, they heard the wolf howling through the streets.
"How long," said Odin, "is our city to be made hideous by such noises? We must bind Fenris the wolf."
Silence followed his words, for all knew what a serious thing it was that Odin proposed. Fenris must be bound--that was true; but who would dare attempt the task? And what chain could ever hold him? At length Thor [Footnote: Thor, god of thunder, was the strongest of all the gods] arose, and all sighed with relief; for if any one could bind the wolf, it was Thor. "I will make a chain," he said, "stronger than ever chain was before, and then we shall find some way to fasten it upon him."
Thor strode to his smithy, and heaped his fire high. All night he worked at his anvil; whenever any of the gods awakened they could hear the clank! clank! clank! of his great hammer, and could see from their windows the sparks from his smithy shining through the gloom. In the morning the chain was finished, and all wondered at its strength, Then Thor called to the huge wolf and said:
"Fenris, you are stronger than any of the gods. We cannot break this chain, but for you it will be mere child's play. Let yourself be bound with it, that we may see how great your strength really is."
Now the wolf knew his might better than any of them did, and he suffered himself to be bound fast. Then he arose, stretched himself as if he were just waking from a nap, and calmly walked off, leaving the fragments of the chain on the ground. The amazed gods looked at each other with fright in their eyes--what could they do?
"I will make a stronger chain," said Thor, undiscouraged. And again he went to his smithy, where he worked all day and all night.
"This is the strongest chain that can ever be made," he said, when he presented it to the gods. "If this will not hold him, nothing can."
Calling the wolf, they flattered him and praised his strength, and finally persuaded him to let himself be bound with this chain, "just for a joke." You may be sure, however, that they said nothing about its being the strongest chain that could ever be made.
Fenris pretended to lie helpless for a time; then he struggled to his feet, shook his mighty limbs, tossed his hideous head--and the chain snapped, and fell into a hundred pieces! Then indeed there was consternation among the gods; but Odin, the all-wise, had a sudden helpful thought. Calling his swiftest messenger, he said:
"Go to the dwarfs in their underground smithy. Tell them to forge for us a chain which cannot be broken; and do you make all haste, for the wolf grows stronger each moment."
Off hastened the messenger, and in less time than it takes to tell it he was with the dwarfs, giving them the message from Odin. The little men bustled about here and there, gathering up the materials of which the chain was to be made; and when these were all collected and piled in a heap, you might have looked and looked, and you would have seen nothing! For this extraordinary chain was made of such things as the roots of mountains, the sound of a cat's footsteps, a woman's beard, the spittle of birds and the voice of fishes. When it was finished the messenger hurried back to Asgard and displayed it proudly to the anxious gods. It was as fine and soft as a silken string, but the gods knew the workmanship of the dwarfs, and had no fear.
"It will be easy," they said, "to persuade Fenris to let himself be bound with this."
But they were mistaken. The wolf looked at the soft, shining cord suspiciously, and said:
"If that is what it looks to be, I shall gain no honor from breaking it; if it has been made by magic, I shall never free myself."
"But we will free you," cried the gods. "This is but a game to test your strength."
"Not you," growled the wolf. "I've lived here long enough to know that if I don't look out for myself, no one else will look out for me."
"All right, if you are afraid," said Thor, with a shrug of his shoulders. And the wolf replied, "To show that I am no more cowardly than the gods, I will suffer myself to be bound if one of you will put his hand into my mouth."
To refuse to do this was, as the gods knew, to admit that they had meant trickery, and thus to make Fenris hate them worse than ever. But what one of them was willing to sacrifice his hand? Thor was no coward, but he knew that he was the chief defender of the gods, and he could not let himself be maimed. However, they did not have to wait long, for Tyr came forward, and thrust his hand into the wolf's mouth.
The wolf, his suspicions quieted, let himself be wrapped and bound with the cord; and then, as he had done with the other chains, he stretched himself--or tried to. For the magic rope but drew tighter and tighter for all his struggling, until it cut into his very skin. Enraged, he brought his great teeth sharply together, and bit off Tyr's hand at the wrist. Then he howled and snapped and growled, until the gods, unwilling to have their peace disturbed, thrust a sword into his mouth, so that the hilt rested upon his lower jaw and the point pierced the roof of his mouth. They next fastened the cord to a rock, and left the wolf to writhe and struggle and shake the earth. So they were freed for a time from their enemy, but at the cost of Tyr's hand.
THE DEATH OF BALDER
Adapted by Anna McCaleb
Of all the gods in Asgard, Balder was most beloved; for no one had ever seen him frown, and his smile and the light of his eyes made all happy who looked at him. And of all who dwelt in Asgard or ever gained admission there, Loki was most hated. Clever as he was, he used his cleverness to harass the other gods and to make them wretched, and often he attempted real crimes against them. It was natural enough that Loki, slighted and frowned upon, should hate Balder the beautiful, even though Balder himself had never spoken an unkind word to him.
"I cannot bear the sight of his shining hair and happy eyes," muttered Loki to himself. "If I could just blot them out of Asgard I should be revenging myself upon the gods for their bitterness toward me, for harm to Balder would hurt them more than harm to themselves."
One morning the assembled gods noticed that when Balder came among them he looked less radiant than usual, and they gathered about him, begging that he tell them what was wrong.
"It's nothing! It's nothing!" said Balder; and he forced a smile, but it was not his old smile. It reminded them all of the faint light the sun sheds when a thin cloud has drifted before it.
All day long, as they went about their tasks and their pleasures, the gods were conscious of a feeling of gloom; and when they stopped and questioned themselves, they found that the cause lay in the diminished brightness of Balder's smile. When, the next morning, Balder again came slowly to the great hall of the gods and showed a careworn face, Odin and Frigga, his father and mother, drew him apart and implored him to tell them the cause of his grief.
"My son," spoke Odin, "it is not well that this gloom should rest on all the gods, and they not know the cause. Perhaps we, your father and your mother, may help you."
At last Balder told them that for two nights he had had strange, haunting dreams; what they were he could not remember clearly when he awoke, but he could not shake off their depressing effect.
"I only know," he said, "that there was ever a thick cloud, which drifted between me and the sun, and there were confused sounds of woe, and travelings in dark, difficult places."
Now the gods knew well that their dreams were messages given them by the Norns, or Fates, and not for a moment did Odin and Frigga venture to laugh at Balder's fears. They soothed him, however, by promising to find some means of warding off any danger that might be threatening him. Somewhat cheered, Balder went home to his palace to comfort his distressed wife, Nanna, while Odin and Frigga discussed measures for their son's safety.
"I," said Odin, "shall ride to the domains of Hela, queen of the dead, and question the great prophetess who lies buried there, as to what Balder's dream may mean." And mounting Sleipnir, his eight-footed steed, he rode away.
Across the rainbow bridge he passed, out of the light, and down, down, down into the dark, hopeless realm of Hela. As he rode by the gate he saw that preparations for a feast were being made within. A gloomy feast it would have to be in those drear regions, but evidently it was being spread for some honored guest, for rich tapestries and rings of gold covered the couches, and vessels of gold graced the tables. Past the gate rode Odin, to a grave without the wall, where for ages long the greatest of all prophetesses had lain buried. Here, in this dark, chill place, was to be spoken the fate of Balder, bringer of light.
Solemnly Odin chanted the awful charms that had power to raise the dead, and king of gods as he was, he started when the grave opened, and the prophetess, veiled in mist, rose before him.
"Who art thou?" she demanded in hollow, ghost-like tones. "And what canst thou wish to know so weighty that only I, long dead, can answer thee?"
Knowing that she would refuse to answer him should she know who he really was, Odin concealed his identity, and simply asked for whom the feast was preparing in Hela's realm.
"For Balder, light of gods and men," replied the prophetess.
"And who shall dare to strike him down?" cried Odin.
"By the hand of his blind brother Hoder shall he fall. And now let me rest." And the prophetess sank again into her tomb, leaving Odin with a heart more heavy and chill than the darkness which closed round him.
Meanwhile Frigga had busied herself with a plan which her mother love had suggested. First to all the gods in Asgard, then through all the earth did she go, saying, "Promise me--swear to me--that you will never hurt Balder." Every bird, every beast, every creeping thing; all plants, stones and metals; all diseases and poisons known to gods and men; fire, water, earth, air--all things gladly took oath to do Balder no harm.
"For do not we," they cried to Frigga, "love him even as you do? And why then should we harm him?"
Gladly Frigga took her way toward home, feeling certain that she had saved Balder forever. As she was about to enter Odin's palace, Valhalla, she noticed on a branch of an oak that grew there, a tiny, weak-looking shrub. "That mistletoe is too young to promise, and too weak to do any harm," said Frigga; and she passed it by.
All the gods rejoiced with her when she told of her success; even Odin partially shook off his fears, as he told the younger gods and the heroes who dwelt with him in his palace to go and seek enjoyment after their period of gloom. To the great playground of the gods they hastened, and there they invented a new game. Balder, smiling as of old, took his stand in the midst, and all the others hurled at him weapons, stones and sticks, and even hit at him with their battle-axes. They grew very merry over this pastime, for do what they would, none of them could harm Balder; the missiles either fell short, or dropped to his feet harmless.
Loki, passing by, was at first amazed when he saw Balder being used as a target; then, when he saw that Balder remained unhurt through all, he became angry--he could not bear this proof of the fact that all things loved Balder. Hastening away, he disguised himself as an old woman and hobbled off to Fensalir, the mansion of Frigga.
"Do you know," said this old woman, entering the room where Frigga sat spinning, "that the gods and heroes are playing a very dangerous game? They are hurling all sorts of things at your son Balder, who stands in their midst."
"That is not a dangerous game," replied Frigga, smiling serenely. "Last year it might have been, but now all things have given me their solemn oath not to harm Balder."
"Well, well, well," said the old woman, "isn't that wonderful? To think that any being should be so much beloved that everything should promise not to hurt him! You said EVERYTHING, did you not?"
"Yes," replied Frigga. "That is, it really amounts to everything. There is one tiny parasite, the mistletoe, which grows on the Valhalla oak, which I did not bother with."
Once out of sight of Frigga, Loki moved rapidly enough; and shortly he appeared, in his own form, among the gods, who were still shouting with joy over their game. In his hand he carried a dart; but who could have guessed, to look at it, that it had been fashioned from the mistletoe on the Valhalla oak?
Outside of the circle of the gods stood Hoder, Balder's blind brother, and there was no smile on his face. Loki approached him and asked craftily:
"Why do you not join in the game? Are you not afraid that Balder will think you are jealous of his good fortune if you take no part in this sport they have invented in his honor?"
"Alas!" said poor Hoder, "I am left out of all the sports of the gods. How can I, with my sightless eyes, tell where Balder is? And you see that I have nothing in my hand. What, then, could I throw?"
"I have here a little dart that I will give you," replied Loki. "And since you cannot direct your aim, I will guide your arm."
Joyfully Hoder thanked him, and when Loki indicated the direction in which he was to throw, he hurled the dart with all his might. Unswervingly flew the mistletoe dart, and instead of falling at Balder's feet, it lodged in his heart, so that he fell dead on the grass.
Then, instead of the laughter which Hoder waited to hear, there went up a shuddering wail of terror; and angry hands seized Hoder and angry voices were in his ear.
"What have I done?" he pleaded. "I but wished to show honor to Balder as the rest have done."
"And you have killed him!" they cried. "You shall die yourself."
"Peace! Peace!" said Heimdal. "Such a deed of violence must not stain the home of the gods. Moreover, Hoder did it all unwittingly. It was Loki who directed his aim, and we are all to blame that we allowed him to set foot on our playground."
Bitter indeed was Hoder's grief, and he implored his heart-broken mother, Frigga, that he might be allowed to take Balder's place in dark Hela's realm.
"Not you alone," she replied, "but any of the gods, would willingly die for Balder. But not in that way can he be brought back to Asgard. There is one chance--speak to Hermod, fleetest of the gods; tell him to take Odin's horse, Sleipnir, and ride to Hela's abode. Perchance, if he entreat her, she may give Balder up." Hermod, at the word of the despairing Hoder, mounted the eight-footed steed, and set off on the perilous journey.
Meanwhile, the other gods prepared the funeral pyre for Balder, determined that it should be worthy of the beloved and honored god. Great pine trees were felled and piled upon the deck of Ringhorn, Balder's ship; tapestry hangings, garlands of flowers and ornaments of gold and silver were heaped upon the pyre.
And finally, in sad procession, came the gods, bearing Balder's body, which they placed upon the flowers. His horse and his dogs were killed and placed beside him, that they might be with him to serve him in the underworld. Then one after one of the gods stepped forward and chanted their farewells; but when Nanna's turn came, she was unable to speak. Her heart broke, and her spirit fled to join that of her husband. The gods could not sorrow for her death; they knew that the abode of the dead would have less terrors for the loving pair if they could be together there, so without tears they laid her beside her husband.
Last of all, Odin advanced and cast upon the pyre his treasured ring, Draupnir, gift of the dwarfs, as an offering to his dead son. Then Thor, with a touch of his hammer, which caused the lightning, set fire to the pile, and the ship, with sails set, was launched.
In solemn silence the gods watched the ship float out upon the sea.
"And wreathed in smoke, the ship stood out to sea. Soon with a roaring rose the mighty fire, And the pile crackled; and between the logs Sharp quivering tongues of flame shot out, and leapt, Curling and darting, higher, till they lick'd The summit of the pile, the dead, the mast, And ate the shriveling sails; but still the ship Drove on, ablaze above her hull with fire. And the gods stood upon the beach and gazed, And while they gazed, the sun went lurid down Into the smoke-wrapt sea, and night came on. Then the wind fell, with night, and there was calm; But through the night they watched the burning ship Still carried o'er the distant waters on, Farther and farther, like an eye of fire. And long, in the far dark, blazed Balder's pile; But fainter, as the stars rose high, it flared; The bodies were consumed, ash choked the pile. And as, in a decaying winter fire, A charr'd log, falling, makes a shower of sparks-- So with a shower of sparks the pile fell in, Reddening the sea around; and all was dark." [Footnote: The poetic quotations in this story are from Matthew Arnold's Balder Dead.]
Then, when all was over, the gods went mournfully back to their homes, there to await the return of Hermod. Their palaces were brightly illuminated, but no lights shone from the windows of Breidablik, Balder's palace; and as long as that was dark, the gods cared little for the brilliance of their own dwellings.
Hermod, in the meantime, had journeyed across the rainbow bridge, and on and on toward the north until he reached the Giall river, which runs between the regions of Hela and the upper world. Well the guard of the bridge knew, when she heard on the bridge the noise of the horse's feet, that it was no shade who was crossing; but when Hermod told his errand, he was allowed to go on. And now his way led over trackless, slippery ice, on which scarce any other horse could have kept his footing; and surely no other horse could have leapt, as did Sleipnir, the gate to Hela's own realm. Once within, Hermod came rapidly into the presence of the queen, and on his knees before her implored her to allow Balder to return to the light and the upper air.
"'For Heaven was Balder born, the city of gods And heroes, where they live in light and joy. Thither restore him, for his place is there!'"
Hela remained unmoved by his pleadings; and what wonder? For she was Loki's daughter, and knew by whose act Balder had been sent below. Finally she said:
"Hermod, I shall try whether the protestations that all things lament Balder are indeed true. Return to Asgard; and if, through all the earth, all things, living and dead, weep for Balder, he shall return. But if one thing in all the world refuses to shed tears, here he shall stay."
Cheered by this promise, Hermod turned to depart, but before he left he talked with Balder and with Nanna, his wife. They told him that all honor which could be paid to any one in the realms of the dead was paid to them; that Balder was made the judge in disputes between the shades. But despite that, the days were weary, hopeless; no joy was there, nothing substantial--just days and nights of unvarying twilight, with never a gleam of real brightness. Nor would Balder admit that there was cause for rejoicing in the promise of Hela. "Well we know the family of Loki. Were there not some trick, Hela would never have spoken that word."
Nevertheless, it was with a heart lighter than at his coming that Hermod set out on his return journey. And when he reached Asgard there was rejoicing among the gods. For the first time since Balder's death, there were the sounds of cheerful hurryings to and fro and of gods calling each to each as they set out upon their tasks; for all the gods wanted a part in the work of bringing Balder back to life.
In twos and threes they rode throughout all the world, and soon "all that lived, and all without life, wept." Trees, stones, flowers, metals joined willingly in grief for Balder the beautiful; and most of the gods speedily returned in joy. But Hermod, as he rode, came to the mouth of a dark cave where sat an old hag named Thok. Years long she had sat there, and the gods knew her well, for she always cried out mockingly to all who passed by; but Hermod could not know that to-day Loki had changed forms with the old hag, and that it was really that enemy of the gods who sat before him. Dismounting, he besought the old woman to weep for Balder, as all things in heaven and earth had promised to do. But in a shrill voice she cried:
"With dry tears will Thok weep for Balder. Let Hela keep her prey."
And as she fled, with harsh laughter, to the cave's depth, Hermod knew that it was Loki who had this second time stolen life from Balder.
Sadly he rode back to Asgard, and in silent grief the gods heard his tale; for they knew that brightness was gone forever from the abode of the gods--that Balder the beautiful should return no more.
This story of Balder is one of those myths which were invented to explain natural happenings. The ancient peoples, knowing nothing about science, could not account for such things as the rising and setting of the sun and the change from summer to winter; and they made up explanations which in time grew into interesting stories.
Some students believe that in this story the death of Balder (the sun) by the hand of Hoder (darkness) represents the going down of the sun at each day's close.
Another explanation, and a more probable one, is that the death of Balder represents the close of the short northern summer and the coming on of the long winter. That is, the dreary winter, with its darkness, is represented by Hoder, who had strength, but could not make use of it to aid men or gods; who could, however, with his blind strength, slay Balder, who stood for the blessed, life-giving qualities of the summer sun.
Loki represented fire. He had in him elements of good, but because of the fact that he had used his power often to harm, as does fire, instead of to bless, he was feared and hated and avoided; and thus he became jealous of Balder.
For a myth which the Greeks and Romans invented about the sun, see the story of Phaethon, in this volume.
THE PUNISHMENT OF LOKI
Adapted by Anna McCaleb
After Balder's death the gods felt that they had little to make them happy. Their thoughts dwelt always on their loss, or on their desire to punish Loki; and in neither of these thoughts was there any joy, for to the pure minds of the gods, the thought of violence could bring nothing but pain.
One day the sea-god Aegir sent to the dwellers in Asgard an invitation to a banquet in his sea caverns, and all accepted except Thor, who had business that called him elsewhere. On the appointed morning they appeared at Aegir's palace, and while at first they forced themselves to smile and appear cheerful, in compliment to their host, they soon found themselves, because of the novelty of all about them, becoming genuinely interested. The palace was of coral, pink and white--rough on the outside, but smooth and polished within; and the floors were strewn with sand so fine and white that it looked like marble. Draperies of bright- colored seaweed hung everywhere, and the gay sea flowers met their eyes at every turn, while the dishes and cups in which the feast was served were the most delicate pearl-tinted shells. Strange opal lights filtered through the water and into the banqueting hall, and great whales and sea snakes looked in through the windows on the gods as they sat at table.
All was cheerfulness and merriment, but suddenly the gods felt a chill come over them, as if a wind from Hela's ice-bound realm had rushed past. Turning, they saw Loki on the threshold. With a muttered excuse for his lateness he slipped into his seat; and then, since none except his host greeted him, and since the merry talk was not resumed, he glanced about the table and said:
"Pretty manners are these! Does no one pledge me in wine? Does no one have a word for me?"
Painfully the gods forced themselves to take up their conversation, though all avoided talking directly to Loki, whose expression became more lowering every moment. At length Odin turned to his host.
"This servant, Funfeng, is deft and skilful. Even in my palace I have not his superior."
Aegir bowed. "Since the king of the gods is pleased with Funfeng, Funfeng is no longer my servant, but the servant of Odin. He shall wait upon the heroes in Valhalla."
With a cry of jealous rage Loki sprang to his feet. "Never!" he cried, and he struck Funfeng so violently that he fell dead.
All the gods leaped up, and they drove Loki from the palace, commanding him never to appear in their presence again; but scarcely had they seated themselves to resume their interrupted feast, when the crafty god again entered the room. Not waiting for them to speak, he began to revile them. His words came in a rapid stream; he stopped not to draw breath. Beginning with Odin, he attacked the gods in turn, mocking their physical peculiarities, recounting every deed which they had done that was not to their credit, shaming them because he had always been able to elude them easily, and because only he could help them out of their difficulties. Finally he came to Sif, Thor's golden-haired wife, whom long before he had robbed of her tresses.
"As for Sif," he began, "I could tell a tale of her that--"
But he went no further, for a peal of thunder drowned his words, and a blinding flash of lightning made him cover his eyes with his hands. The gods sighed in relief, for Thor stood among them, his eyes shooting fire.
"Already," he cried, "has Aegir's palace been stained with blood to-day. I will not, therefore, kill you here. But if ever you appear before my eyes again, I shall smite you; and if ever you dare to speak Sif's name, I shall hear it though I am in the uttermost parts of the earth, and I shall have vengeance."
"Well spoken, son Thor," said Odin. "But I too have something to say to Loki. We shall permit you to go unharmed to-day, but if you care for your life, hide yourself. We shall seek you; and the gods have keen eyes. And if we find you out, you shall die."
Sullen, frightened, Loki withdrew. He wandered about long in the most barren, desolate parts of the earth, cursing the gods and hating himself. At length he found a spot which he felt sure would be hidden even from Odin's eyes. It was in a steep, rocky valley, where nothing grew, and where no sound ever came except the weird noise of the wind as it swept through the narrow passes, and the chatter of a mountain stream as it leapt down the rocks.
Here, in this solitary place, Loki built himself a hut of piled-up rocks. Four walls had the hut, and in each wall was a door, for Loki wished to be able to see the gods, from whatever direction they approached, and to make his escape. He had always been a famous fisherman, and now the fish which he took from the stream formed his only food.
Sometimes he changed himself into a salmon and floated about in the quieter places of the stream. He never talked with the other fish who lived in the stream, but somehow he felt less lonely with those living things about him than he did in his solitary hut on the mountain side.
One day (for Loki was a very clever workman) he began to fashion something, the like of which there had not been in the world before. This was a net for fishing; and so interested did Loki become in twisting and knotting the cords, that he almost forgot to keep watch for his enemies, the gods. The net was almost finished, when one afternoon Loki raised his head and saw through one of his doors three gods approaching--Odin, Thor and Heimdal, wisest of the gods. With a curse he tossed his net upon the fire--"THEY shall never have it!"--and slipped from his hut. Splash! And there was a huge salmon deep down in the stream, while Loki was nowhere to be seen.
The gods were greatly disappointed when they entered the hut; they had been so sure that at last they had found the hiding place of the wicked one, and it seemed they had missed him again. However, they knew his power of disguising himself, and they were not utterly discouraged.
"He has not been gone long," said Heimdal, "for look--the fire still burns. And what is this upon the fire?" And he drew out the partly burned fish net.
"What can it be?" asked Odin. "It is too coarse for any sort of covering for the body, and not strong enough to use in entangling an enemy."
"Wait!" said Heimdal. "I have it--I have it! It's a net for fishing-- Loki was always a fisherman. See," he exclaimed excitedly, "you take it SO," thrusting one end into Thor's hand, "and you drag it through the water SO. The water runs through and the fish are held. O, clever Loki!"
"But why," asked Thor, "should he burn it up, when he has spent so much work upon it?"
"I don't know," said Heimdal musingly, "unless--unless. Where could he hide except in that stream, and how could he conceal himself there without changing himself to a fish? Mark my words. Loki is there, and he feared we might catch him with his own net."
"That," said Odin, "would be a form of justice for which one would scarcely dare hope. I fear the net is too badly burned for use."
"Not so," replied Heimdal. "Here is more flax, and we can easily repair the damage the fire has done."
So the three gods sat upon the floor of the hut and mended the burned net, keeping an eye always on the stream, that Loki might not make his escape. And when the net was ready they went forth, and with it dragged the stream. Not a fish did they catch, for Loki had frightened the real fish away, and he himself was hiding between two big stones, so that the net passed over him.
"The thing is too light," said Thor. "It does not touch the bottom."
"That we can soon change," replied Heimdal, and he set about fastening stones to the lower edge of the net.
Again they began to drag the river, and this time Loki feared that he could not escape. But just as the net almost touched him, he gave a mighty leap and sprang clear of the net. The silvery flash, the sudden splash, startled the gods, so that they almost dropped the net; but it told them what they wanted to know--Loki WAS in the stream. Turning, they dragged the net down the stream, driving Loki nearer and nearer to the sheer drop of the waterfall, down which he dared not plunge. Desperate, he made another leap, and again he almost escaped; but Thor's quick eyes saw him, Thor's strong, iron-gloved hand gripped him. The great salmon struggled, but Thor held it fast by the tail, and finally flung it out upon the bank.
Loki, within the fish, vowed to himself that he would not return to his own shape; but the fish's body could not live long out of the water, and soon he found himself growing weak and faint. At length, therefore, he was obliged to assume his own form, and there he stood, handsome, but evil-looking, before the waiting gods.
"It hurts us," said Odin, "that we should be forced to treat one of our own kind in this way. Perhaps even now--tell us that you do regret your past wickedness, that you are sorry for the trouble you have caused the gods, that you grieve sometimes for Balder's death."
"I grieve," said Loki, "only that I have caused so little trouble among the gods; I regret only that the days for pitting my cleverness against your stupidity are at an end--for I ask for no mercy. As for Balder's death, it has been my chief cause for rejoicing as I have dwelt here in this solitary place."
Shocked by his hardness, the gods led him away to the punishment which they had planned for him. The other gods met them by the way, and troops of dwarfs and elves and human beings and animals sprang up on every side, and followed them. And in the hearts of all these followers there was joy, for Loki had never done them anything but harm; and besides, had he not slain Balder, the beautiful, the beloved?
But in the hearts of the gods there was pain, for Loki was of their own number, and far back in the beginnings of time, before he had become wicked, he had been their great pride, by reason of his cleverness.
They passed, a noisy procession, to a dark, underground cavern, a damp, slimy place, where snakes looked out from their holes, and toads sat upon the stones. Here were three sharp-pointed rocks, which Thor pierced with holes; and to these rocks they bound the wretched Loki with chains of adamant.
"Here he shall stay," said Odin, "until the last great day shall come for gods and men."
A giantess, whose son Loki had killed, came with a great serpent, which she fastened directly over Loki's head; and from the serpent's mouth dripped poison, which fell, drop by drop, upon Loki's upturned face. His wife, Sigyn, could not bear to see her husband in such agony, so she took her stand beside him, cup in hand, and caught the poison as it fell. There through the ages on ages she stood, relieving Loki's pain, and trying to cheer him, for whom there was no cheer. When the cup was filled and she had to go to the cavern's mouth to empty it, then the venom fell on Loki's face, and in his terrible pain he struggled and writhed until the earth shook. And all the people, startled at their work or from their sleep, cried, "Loki's earthquake!"
SEVEN TIMES ONE
By Jean Ingelow
There's no dew left on the daisies and clover, There's no rain left in heaven; I've said my "seven times" over and over-- Seven times one are seven.
I am so old, so old I can write a letter; My birthday lessons are done; The lambs play always, they know no better; They are only one times one.
O moon! in the night I have seen you sailing And shining so round and low; You were bright! ah, bright! but your light is failing-- You are nothing now but a bow.
You moon, have you done something wrong in heaven, That God has hidden your face? I hope if you have you will soon be forgiven, And shine again in your place.
O velvet bee, you're a dusty fellow, You've powdered your legs with gold! O brave marsh marybuds, rich and yellow, Give me your money to hold!
O columbine, open your folded wrapper, Where two twin turtledoves dwell! O cuckoopint, toll me the purple clapper That hangs in your clear green bell!
And show me your nest with the young ones in it; I will not steal them away; I am old! you may trust me, linnet, linnet-- I am seven times one to-day.
SHUFFLE-SHOON AND AMBER-LOCKS [Footnote: From 'Love Songs of Childhood'. Copyright, 1894, by Eugene Field, published by Charles Scribner's Sons.]
By Eugene Field
Shuffle-Shoon and Amber-Locks Sit together, building blocks; Shuffle-Shoon is old and gray, Amber-Locks a little child.
But together at their play Age and Youth are reconciled, And with sympathetic glee Build their castles fair to see.
"When I grow to be a man," (So the wee one's prattle ran), "I shall build a castle so-- With a gateway broad and grand; Here a pretty vine shall grow, There a soldier guard shall stand; And the tower shall be so high, Folks will wonder, by and by!"
Shuffle-Shoon quoth: "Yes, I know; Thus I builded long ago! Here a gate and there a wall, Here a window, there a door; Here a steeple wondrous tall Riseth ever more and more! But the years have leveled low What I builded long ago!"
So they gossip at their play, Heedless of the fleeting day; One speaks of the Long Ago Where his dead hopes buried lie; One with chubby cheeks aglow Prattleth of the By-and-By; Side by side, they build their blocks-- Shuffle-Shoon and Amber-Locks.
AFTERWHILE [Footnote: From the poem to Afterwhiles by James Whitcomb Riley. Used by special permission of the publishers--The Bobbs-Merrill Company.]
By James Whitcomb Riley
Afterwhile we have in view The old home to journey to: Where the Mother is, and where Her sweet welcome waits us there. How we'll click the latch that locks In the pinks and hollyhocks, And leap up the path once more Where she waits us at the door; How we'll greet the dear old smile And the warm tears--afterwhile.
WINDY NIGHTS
By ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON
Whenever the moon and stars are set, Whenever the wind is high, All night long in the dark and wet, A man goes riding by. Late in the night when the fires are out, Why does he gallop and gallop about? Whenever the trees are crying aloud, And ships are tossed at sea, By, on the highway, low and loud, By at the gallop goes he. By at the gallop he goes, and then By he comes back at the gallop again.
THE SNOW QUEEN
By Hans Christian Andersen
THE FIRST STORY
WHICH TREATS OF THE MIRROR AND FRAGMENTS
Look you, now we're going to begin. When we are at the end of the story we shall know more than we do now, for he was a bad goblin. He was one of the very worst, for he was a demon. One day he was in very good spirits, for he had made a mirror which had this peculiarity, that everything good and beautiful that was reflected in it shrank together into almost nothing, but that whatever was worthless and looked ugly became prominent and looked worse than ever. The most lovely landscapes seen in this mirror looked like boiled spinach, and the best people became hideous, or stood on their heads and had no bodies; their faces were so distorted as to be unrecognizable, and a single freckle was shown spread out over nose and mouth. That was very amusing, the demon said. When good, pious thoughts passed through any person's mind these were again shown in the mirror, so that the demon chuckled at his artistic invention.
Those who visited the goblin school--for he kept a goblin school-- declared everywhere that a wonder had been wrought. For now, they asserted, one could see, for the first time, how the world and the people in it really looked. Now they wanted to fly up to heaven, to sneer and scoff at the angels themselves. The higher they flew with the mirror, the more it grinned; they could scarcely hold it fast. They flew higher and higher, and then the mirror trembled so terribly amid its grinning that it fell down out of their hands to the earth, where it was shattered into a hundred million million and more fragments.
And now this mirror occasioned much more unhappiness than before; for some of the fragments were scarcely as large as a barleycorn, and these flew about in the world, and whenever they flew into any one's eye they stuck there, and that person saw everything wrongly, or had only eyes for the bad side of a thing, for every little fragment of the mirror had retained the power which the whole glass possessed. A few persons even got a fragment of the mirror into their hearts, and that was terrible indeed, for such a heart became a block of ice. A few fragments of the mirror were so large that they were used as window panes, but it was a bad thing to look at one's friends through these panes: other pieces were made into spectacles, and then it went badly when people put on these spectacles to see rightly, and to be just; and then the demon laughed till his paunch shook, for it tickled him so. But without, some little fragments of glass still floated about in the air--and now we shall hear
THE SECOND STORY
A LITTLE BOY AND A LITTLE GIRL
In the great town, where there are many houses, and so many people that there is not room enough for every one to have a little garden, and where consequently most persons are compelled to be content with flowers in pots, were two poor children who possessed a garden somewhat larger than a flowerpot. They were not brother and sister, but they loved each other quite as much as if they had been. Their parents lived just opposite each other in two garrets, there where the roof of one neighbor's house joined that of another. And where the water pipe ran between the two houses was a little window; one had only to step across the pipe to get from one window to the other.
The parents of each child had a great box, in which grew kitchen herbs that they used, and a little rosebush; there was one in each box, and they grew famously. Now, it occurred to the parents to place the boxes across the pipe, so that they reached from one window to another, and looked quite like two embankments of flowers. Pea plants hung down over the boxes, and the rosebushes shot forth long twigs, which clustered round the windows and bent down toward each other; it was almost like a triumphal arch of flowers and leaves. As the boxes were very high, and the children knew that they might not creep upon them, they often obtained permission to step out upon the roof behind the boxes, and to sit upon their little stools under the roses, and there they could play capitally.
In the winter time there was an end of this amusement. The windows were sometimes quite frozen over. But then they warmed copper shillings on the stove, and held the warm coins against the frozen pane; and this made a capital peep-hole, so round! so round! and behind it gleamed a pretty mild eye at each window; and these eyes belonged to the little boy and the little girl. His name was Kay and the little girl's was Gerda.
In the summer they could get to one another at one bound; but in the winter they had to go down and up the long staircase, while the snow was pelting without.
"Those are the white bees swarming," said the old grandmother.
"Have they a queen bee?" asked the little boy. For he knew that there is one among the real bees.
"Yes, they have one," replied grandmamma. "She always flies where they swarm thickest. She is the largest of them all, and never remains quiet upon the earth; she flies up again into the black cloud. Many a midnight she is flying through the streets of the town, and looks in at the windows, and then they freeze in such a strange way, and look like flowers."
"Yes, I've seen that!" cried both the children; and now they knew that it was true.
"Can the Snow Queen come in here?" asked the little girl.
"Only let her come," cried the boy; "I'll set her upon the warm stove, and then she'll melt."
But grandmother smoothed his hair, and told some other tales. In the evening, when little Kay was at home and half undressed, he clambered upon the chair by the window, and looked through the little hole. A few flakes of snow were falling outside, and one of them, the largest of them all, remained lying on the edge of one of the flower boxes.
The snowflake grew larger and larger, and at last became a maiden clothed in the finest white gauze, put together of millions of starry flakes. She was beautiful and delicate, but of ice--of shining, glittering ice. Yet she was alive; her eyes flashed like two clear stars, but there was no peace or rest in them. She nodded toward the window, and beckoned with her hand. The little boy was frightened, and sprang down from the chair; then it seemed as if a great bird flew by outside, in front of the window.
Next day there was a clear frost, and then the spring came; the sun shone, the green sprouted forth, the swallows built nests, the windows were opened, and the little children again sat in their garden high up in the roof, over all the floors.
How splendidly the roses bloomed this summer! The little girl had learned a psalm, in which mention was made of roses; and, in speaking of roses, she thought of her own; and she sang it to the little boy, and he sang, too:
"The roses will fade and pass away, But we the Christ-child shall see one day."
And the little ones held each other by the hand, kissed the roses, looked at God's bright sunshine, and spoke to it, as if the Christ-child were there. What splendid summer days those were! How beautiful it was without, among the fresh rosebushes!
Kay and Gerda sat and looked at the picture book of beasts and birds. Then it was, while the clock was just striking twelve on the church tower, that Kay said:
"Oh! something struck my heart and pricked me in the eye." The little girl fell upon his neck; he blinked his eyes. No, there was nothing at all to be seen.
"I think it is gone," said he; but it was not gone. It was just one of those glass fragments which sprang from the mirror--the magic mirror that we remember well, the ugly glass that made every great and good thing which was mirrored in it to seem small and mean, but in which the mean and the wicked things were brought out in relief, and every fault was noticeable at once. Poor little Kay had also received a splinter just in his heart, and that will now soon become like a lump of ice. It did not hurt him now, but the splinter was still there.
"Why do you cry?" he asked. "You look ugly like that. There's nothing the matter with me. Oh, fie!" he suddenly exclaimed, "that rose is worm- eaten, and this one is quite crooked. After all, they're ugly roses. They're like the box in they stand."
And then he kicked the box with his foot, and tore both the roses off.
"Kay, what are you about?" cried the little girl.
And when he noticed her fright he tore off another rose, and then sprang in at his own window, away from pretty little Gerda.
When she afterward came with her picture book, he said it was only fit for babies in arms; and when his grandmother told stories he always came in with a BUT; and when he could manage it, he would get behind her, put on a pair of spectacles, and talk just as she did; he could do that very cleverly, and the people laughed at him. Soon he could mimic the speech and the gait of everybody in the street. Everything that was peculiar or ugly about people, Kay would imitate; and every one said, "That boy must certainly have a remarkable genius." But it was the glass that struck deep in his heart; so it happened that he even teased little Gerda, who loved him with all her heart.
His games now became quite different from what they were before; they became quite sensible. One winter's day when it snowed he came out with a great burning glass, held up the blue tail of his coat, and let the snowflakes fall upon it.
"Now look at the glass, Gerda," said he.
And every flake of snow was magnified, and looked like a splendid flower, or a star with ten points--it was beautiful to behold.
"See how clever that is," said Kay. "That's much more interesting than real flowers; and there's not a single fault in it--they're quite regular until they begin to melt."
Soon after, Kay came in thick gloves, and with his sledge upon his back. He called up to Gerda. "I've got leave to go into the great square, where the other boys play;" and he was gone.
In the great square the boldest among the boys often tied their sledges to the country people's carts, and thus rode with them a good way. They went capitally. When they were in the midst of their playing there came a great sledge. It was painted quite white, and in it sat somebody wrapped in a rough, white fur, with a white, rough cap on his head. The sledge drove twice round the square, and Kay bound his little sledge to it, and so he drove on with it. It went faster and faster, straight into the next street. The man who drove turned round and nodded in a familiar way to Kay; it was as if they knew one another. Each time when Kay wanted to cast loose his little sledge, the stranger nodded again, and then Kay remained where he was, and thus they drove out at the town gate. Then the snow began to fall so rapidly that the boy could not see a hand's breadth before him; but still he drove on. Now he hastily dropped the cord, so as to get loose from the great sledge; but that was no use, for his sledge was fast bound to the other, and they went on like the wind. Then he called out quite loudly, but nobody heard him; and the snow beat down, and the sledge flew onward. Every now and then it gave a jump, and they seemed to be flying over hedges and ditches. The boy was quite frightened. He wanted to say his prayer, but could remember nothing but the multiplication table.
The snowflakes became larger and larger; at last they looked like white fowls. All at once they sprang aside, the great sledge stopped, and the person who had driven it rose up. The fur and the cap were made altogether of ice. It was A LADY, tall and slender, and brilliantly white: it was the Snow Queen!
"We have driven well!" said she. "But why do you tremble with cold? Creep into my fur."
And she seated him beside her in her own sledge, and wrapped the fur round him, and he felt as if he sank into a snowdrift.
"Are you still cold?" asked she, and then she kissed him on the forehead.
Oh, that was colder than ice; it went quite through to his heart, half of which was already a lump of ice. He felt as if he were going to die, but only for a moment; for then he seemed quite well, and he did not notice the cold all about him.
"My sledge! Don't forget my sledge."
That was the first thing he thought of; and it was bound fast to one of the white chickens, and this chicken flew behind him with the sledge upon its back. The Snow Queen kissed Kay again, and then he had forgotten little Gerda, his grandmother, and all at home.
"Now you shall have no more kisses," said she, "for if you did I should kiss you to death."
Kay looked at her. She was so beautiful, he could not imagine a more sensible or lovely face; she did not appear to him to be made of ice now, as she did when she sat at the window and beckoned to him. In his eyes she was perfect; he did not feel at all afraid. He told her that he could do mental arithmetic as far as fractions; that he knew the number of square miles and the number of inhabitants in the country. And she always smiled, and then it seemed to him that what he knew was not enough. And he looked up into the wide sky, and she flew with him high up upon the black cloud, and the storm blew and whistled; it seemed as though the wind sang old songs. They flew over woods and lakes, over sea and land; below them the cold wind roared, the wolves howled, the snow crackled; over them flew the black, screaming crows; but above all the moon shone bright and clear, and Kay looked at the long, long winter night; by day he slept at the feet of the Queen.
THE THIRD STORY
THE FLOWER GARDEN OF THE WOMAN WHO COULD CONJURE
But how did it fare with little Gerda when Kay did not return? What could have become of him? No one knew, no one could give information. The boys only told that they had seen him bind his sledge to another very large one, which had driven along the street and out at the town gate. Nobody knew what had become of him; many tears were shed, and little Gerda especially wept long and bitterly. Then she said he was dead--he had been drowned in the river which flowed close by their school. Oh, those were very dark, long winter days! But now spring came, with warmer sunshine.
"Kay is dead and gone," said little Gerda.
"I don't believe it," said the Sunshine.
"He is dead and gone," said she to the Sparrows. "We don't believe it," they replied; and at last little Gerda did not believe it herself.
"I will put on my new red shoes," she said one morning--"those that Kay has never seen; and then I will go down to the river, and ask for him."
It was still very early; she kissed the old grandmother, who was still asleep, put on her red shoes, and went quite alone out of the town gate toward the river.
"Is it true that you have taken my little playmate from me? I will give you my red shoes if you will give him back to me."
And it seemed to her as if the waves nodded quite strangely; and then she took her red shoes, which she liked best of anything she possessed, and threw them both into the river; but they fell close to the shore, and the little wavelets carried them back to her, to the land. It seemed as if the river would not take from her the dearest things she possessed because he had not her little Kay. But she thought she had not thrown the shoes far enough out, so she crept into a boat that lay among the reeds, went to the other end of the boat, and threw the shoes from thence into the water; but the boat was not bound fast, and at the movement she made it glided away from the shore. She noticed it, and hurried to get back; but before she reached the other end, the boat was a yard from the bank, and it drifted away faster than before.
Then little Gerda was very much frightened, and began to cry; but no one heard her except the Sparrows, and they could not carry her to land; but they flew along the shore, and sang, as if to console her, "Here we are! here we are!" The boat drove on with the stream, and little Gerda sat quite still, with only her stockings on her feet; her little red shoes floated along behind her, but they could not come up to the boat, for that made more way.
It was very pretty on both shores. There were beautiful flowers, old trees, and slopes with sheep and cows; but not ONE person was to be seen.
"Perhaps the river will carry me to little Kay," thought Gerda.
And then she became more cheerful, and rose up, and for many hours she watched the charming green banks; then she came to a great cherry orchard, in which stood a little house with remarkable blue and red windows; it had a thatched roof, and without stood two wooden soldiers, who presented arms to those who sailed past.
Gerda called to them, for she thought they were alive, but of course they did not answer. She came quite close to them. The river carried the boat toward the shore.
Gerda called still louder, and then there came out of the house an old woman leaning on a crutch; she had on a great velvet hat, painted over with the finest flowers.
"You poor little child!" said the old woman. "How did you manage to come on the great rolling river, and to float thus far out into the world?"
And then the old woman went quite into the water, seized the boat with her crutch stick, drew it to land, and lifted little Gerda out. And Gerda was glad to be on dry land again, though she felt a little afraid of the strange old woman.
"Come and tell me who you are, and how you came here," said the old lady. And Gerda told her everything; and the old woman shook her head, and said, "Hem! hem!" And when Gerda had told everything, and asked if she had not seen little Kay, the woman said that he had not yet come by, but that he probably would soon come. Gerda was not to be sorrowful, but to look at the flowers and taste the cherries, for they were better than any picture book, for each one of them could tell a story. Then she took Gerda by the hand and led her into the little house, and locked the door.
The windows were very high, and the panes were red, blue and yellow; the daylight shone in a remarkable way, with different colors. On the table stood the finest cherries, and Gerda ate as many of them as she liked, for she had leave to do so. While she was eating them, the old lady combed Gerda's hair with a golden comb, and the yellow hair hung softly round the friendly little face, which looked as blooming as a rose.
"I have long wished for such a dear little girl as you," said the old lady. "Now you shall see how well we shall live with one another."
And as the ancient dame combed her hair, Gerda forgot her adopted brother Kay more and more; for this old woman could conjure, but she was not a wicked witch. She only practiced a little magic for her own amusement, and wanted to keep little Gerda. Therefore she went into the garden, stretched out her crutch toward all the rosebushes, and, beautiful as they were, they all sank into the earth, and one could not tell where they had stood. The old woman was afraid that, if the little girl saw roses, she would think of her own, and remember little Kay, and run away.
Now Gerda was led out into the flower garden. What fragrance was there, and what loveliness! Every conceivable flower was there in full bloom; there were some for every season; no picture book could be gayer and prettier. Gerda jumped high for joy, and played till the sun went down behind the high cherry trees; then she was put into a lovely bed, with red silk pillows stuffed with blue violets, and she slept there, and dreamed as gloriously as a queen on her wedding day.
Next day she played again with the flowers in the warm sunshine; and thus many days went by. Gerda knew every flower; but, many as there were of them, it still seemed to her as if one were wanting, but which one she did not know. One day she sat looking at the old lady's hat with the painted flowers, and the prettiest of them all was a rose. The old lady had forgotten to efface it from her hat when she caused the others to disappear. But so it always is when one does not keep one's wits about one.
"What, are there no roses here?" cried Gerda.
And she went among the beds, and searched and searched, but there was not one to be found. Then she sat down and wept; her tears fell just upon a spot where a rosebush lay buried, and when the warm tears moistened the earth, the tree at once sprouted up as blooming as when it had sunk; and Gerda embraced it, kissed the roses, and thought of the beautiful roses at home, and also of little Kay.
"Oh, how I have been detained!" said the little girl. "I wanted to seek for little Kay! Do you not know where he is?" she asked the roses. "Do you think he is dead?"
"He is not dead," the roses answered. "We have been in the ground. All the dead people are there, but Kay is not there."
"Thank you," said little Gerda, and she went to the other flowers, looked into their cups, and asked, "Do you know where little Kay is?"
But every flower stood in the sun thinking only of her own story, or fancy tale. Gerda heard many, many, of them; but not one knew anything of Kay.
And what did the Tiger Lily say?
"Do you hear the drum, 'Rub-dub'? There are only two notes, always 'rub- dub'! Hear the mourning song of the women; hear the call of the priests. The Hindoo widow stands in her long red mantle on the funeral pile; the flames rise up around her and her dead husband; but the Hindoo woman is thinking of the living one here in the circle, of him whose eyes burn hotter than flames, whose fiery glances have burned into her soul more ardently than the flames themselves, which are soon to burn her body to ashes. Can the flame of the heart die in the flame of the funeral pile?"
"I don't understand that at all!" said little Gerda.
"That's my story," said the Lily.
What says the Convolvulus?
"Over the narrow road looms an old knightly castle; thickly the ivy grows over the crumbling red walls, leaf by leaf up to the balcony, where stands a beautiful girl; she bends over the balustrade and glances up the road. No rose on its branch is fresher than she; no apple blossom wafted onward by the wind floats more lightly along. How her costly silks rustle! 'Comes he not yet?'"
"Is it Kay whom you mean?" asked little Gerda.
"I'm only speaking of a story--my dream," replied the Convolvulus.
What said the little Snowdrop?
"Between the trees a long board hangs by ropes; that is a swing. Two pretty little girls, with clothes white as snow and long green silk ribbons on their hats, are sitting upon it, swinging. Their brother, who is greater than they, stands in the swing, and has slung his arm round the rope to hold himself, for in one hand he has a little saucer, and in the other a clay pipe. He is blowing bubbles. The swing flies, and the bubbles rise with beautiful, changing colors; the last still hangs from the pipe bowl, swaying in the wind. The swing flies on; the little black dog, light as the bubbles, stands up on his hind legs, and wants to be taken into the swing: it flies on, and the dog falls, barks, and grows angry, for he is teased, and the bubble bursts. A swinging board and a bursting bubble--that is my song."
"It may be very pretty, what you're telling, but you speak it so mournfully, and you don't mention little Kay at all."
What do the Hyacinths say?
"There were three beautiful sisters, transparent and delicate. The dress of one was red, that of the second blue, and that of the third quite white; hand in hand they danced by the calm lake in the bright moonlight. They were not elves; they were human beings. It was so sweet and fragrant there! The girls disappeared in the forest, and the sweet fragrance became stronger: three coffins, with three beautiful maidens lying in them, glided from the wood-thicket across the lake; the glowworms flew gleaming about them like little hovering lights. Are the dancing girls sleeping, or are they dead? The flower scent says they are dead, and the evening bell tolls their knell."
"You make me quite sorrowful," said little Gerda. "You scent so strongly, I cannot help thinking of the dead maidens. Ah! is little Kay really dead? The Roses have been down in the earth, and they say he is not."
"Kling! klang!" tolled the Hyacinth bells. "We are not tolling for little Kay--we don't know him; we only sing our song, the only one we know."
And Gerda went to the Buttercup, gleaming forth from the green leaves.
"You are a little bright sun," said Gerda. "Tell me, if you know, where I may find my companion."
And the Buttercup shone so gaily, and looked back at Gerda. What song might the Buttercup sing? It was not about Kay.
"In a little courtyard the clear sun shone warm on the first day of spring. The sunbeams glided down the white wall of the neighboring house; close by grew the first yellow flower, glancing like gold in the bright sun's ray. The old grandmother sat out of doors in her chair; her granddaughter, a poor, handsome maid-servant, was coming home for a short visit. She kissed her grandmother. There was gold, heart's gold, in that blessed kiss--gold in the mouth, gold in the south, gold in the morning hour. See, that's my little story," said the Buttercup.
"My poor old grandmother!" sighed Gerda. "Yes, she is surely longing for me and grieving for me, just as she did for little Kay. But I shall soon go home and take Kay with me. There is no use of my asking the flowers; they know only their own song, and give me no information." And then she tied her little frock round her, that she might run the faster; but the Jonquil struck against her leg as she sprang over it, and she stopped to look at the tall yellow flower, and asked, "Do you, perhaps, know anything of little Kay?"
And she bent quite down to the flower, and what did it say?
"I can see myself! I can see myself!" said the Jonquil. "Oh! oh! how I smell! Up in the little room in the gable stands a little dancing girl. She stands sometimes on one foot, sometimes on both; she seems to tread on all the world. She's nothing but an ocular delusion: she pours water out of a teapot on a bit of stuff--it is her bodice. 'Cleanliness is a fine thing,' she says; her white frock hangs on a hook; it has been washed in the teapot too, and dried on the roof. She puts it on and ties her saffron handkerchief round her neck, and the dress looks all the whiter. Point your toes! look how she seems to stand on a stalk. I can see myself! I can see myself!"
"I don't care at all about that," said Gerda. "You need not tell me that."
And then she ran to the end of the garden. The door was locked, but she pressed against the rusty lock, and it broke off, the door sprang open, and little Gerda ran with naked feet out into the wide world. She looked back three times, but no one was there to pursue her. At last she could run no longer, and seated herself on a great stone; and when she looked round the summer was over--it was late in autumn. One could not notice that in the beautiful garden, where there was always sunshine, and where the flowers of every season always bloomed.
"Alas! how I have loitered!" said little Gerda. "Autumn has come. I may not rest again."
And she rose up to go on. Oh! how sore and tired her little feet were. All around it looked cold and bleak; the long willow leaves were quite yellow, and the dew fell down like water; one leaf after another dropped; only the sloe-thorn still bore fruit, but the sloes were sour, and set the teeth on edge. Oh! how gray and gloomy it looked--the wide world!
THE FOURTH STORY
THE PRINCE WHO MIGHT HAVE BEEN KAY
Gerda was compelled to rest again; then there came hopping across the snow, just opposite the spot where she was sitting, a great Crow. This Crow stopped a long time to look at her, nodding its head, and then it said, "Krah! krah! Good day! good day!" It could not pronounce better, but it felt friendly toward the little girl, and asked where she was going all alone in the wide world. The word "alone" Gerda understood very well, and felt how much it expressed; and she told the Crow the story of her whole life and fortunes, and asked if it had not seen Kay.
And the Crow nodded very gravely, and said:
"That may be! that may be!"
"What? do you think so?" cried the little girl, and nearly pressed the Crow to death, she kissed it so.
"Gently, gently!" said the Crow. "I think I know. I believe it may be little Kay; but he has certainly forgotten you, with the princess."
"Does he live with a princess?" asked Gerda.
"Yes; listen," said the Crow. "But it's so difficult for me to speak your language. If you know the Crow's language, I can tell it much better."
"No, I never learned it," said Gerda; "but my grandmother understood it, and could speak the language, too. I only wish I had learned it."
"That doesn't matter," said the Crow. "But it will go badly."
And then the Crow told what it knew.
"In the country in which we now are lives a princess who is quite wonderfully clever; but then she has read all the newspapers in the world, and has forgotten them again, she is so clever. Lately she was sitting on the throne--and that's not so pleasant as is generally supposed--and she began to sing a song, and it was just this: 'Why should I not marry now?' You see, there was something in that," said the Crow. "And so she wanted to marry, but she wished for a husband who could answer when he was spoken to, not one who only stood and looked handsome, for that was wearisome. And so she had all her maids of honor summoned, and when they heard her intention they were very glad. 'I like that,' said they; 'I thought the very same thing the other day.' You may be sure that every word I am telling you is true," added the Crow. "I have a tame sweetheart who goes about freely in the castle, and she told me everything."
Of course the sweetheart was a crow, for one crow always finds out another, and birds of a feather flock together.
"Newspapers were published directly, with a border of hearts and the princess's initials. One could read in them that every young man who was good-looking might come to the castle and speak with the princess, and him who spoke so that one could hear he was at home there, and who spoke best, the princess, would choose for her husband. Yes, yes," said the Crow, "you may believe me. It's as true as that I sit here. Young men came flocking in; there was a great crowding and much running to and fro, but no one succeeded the first or second day. They could all speak well when they were out in the streets, but when they entered at the palace gates, and saw the guards standing in their silver lace, and went up the staircase, and saw the lackeys in their golden liveries, and the great lighted halls, they became confused. And when they stood before the throne itself, on which the princess sat, they could do nothing but repeat the last word she had spoken, and she did not care to hear her own words again. It was just as if the people in there had taken some narcotic and fallen asleep till they got into the street again, for not till then were they able to speak. There stood a whole row of them, from the town gate to the palace gate. I went out myself to see it," said the Crow. "They were hungry and thirsty, but in the palace they did not receive so much as a glass of lukewarm water. A few of the wisest had brought bread and butter with them, but they would not share with their neighbors, for they thought, 'Let him look hungry, and the princess won't have him.'"
"But Kay, little Kay?" asked Gerda. "When did he come? Was he among the crowd?"
"Wait! wait! We're just coming to him. It was on the third day that there came a little personage, without horse or carriage, walking quite merrily up to the castle. His eyes sparkled like yours; he had fine long hair, but his clothes were shabby."
"That was Kay!" cried Gerda, rejoicing. "Oh, then, I have found him!" And she clapped her hands.
"He had a little knapsack on his back," observed the Crow.
"No, that must certainly have been his sledge," said Gerda, "for he went away with a sledge."
"That may well be," said the Crow, "for I did not look at it very closely. But this much I know from my tame sweetheart, that when he passed under the palace gate and saw the life guards in silver, and mounted the staircase and saw the lackeys in gold, he was not in the least embarrassed. He nodded, and said to them, 'It must be tedious work standing on the stairs--I'd rather go in.' The halls shone full of light; privy councilors and Excellencies walked about with bare feet, and carried golden vessels; any one might have become solemn; and his boots creaked most noisily, but he was not embarrassed."
"That is certainly Kay!" cried Gerda. "He had new boots on; I've heard them creak in grandmother's room."
"Yes, certainly they creaked," resumed the Crow. "And he went boldly in to the princess herself, who sat on a pearl that was as big as a spinning wheel, and all the maids of honor with their attendants, and all the cavaliers with their followers, and the followers of their followers, who themselves kept a page apiece, were standing round; and the nearer they stood to the door, the prouder they looked. The followers' followers' pages could hardly be looked at, so proudly did they stand in the doorway!"
"That must be terrible!" faltered little Gerda. "And yet Kay won the princess?"
"If I had not been a crow, I would have married her myself, notwithstanding that I am engaged. They say he spoke as well as I can when I speak the crows' language; I heard that from my tame sweetheart. He was merry and agreeable; he had not come to marry, only to hear the wisdom of the princess; and he approved of her, and she of him."
"Yes, certainly that was Kay!" said Gerda. "He was so clever; he could do mental arithmetic up to fractions. Oh! won't you lead me to the castle, too?"
"That's easily said," replied the Crow. "But how are we to manage it? I'll talk it over with my tame sweetheart: she can probably advise us; for this I must tell you--a little girl like yourself will never get leave to go completely in."
"Yes, I shall get leave," said Gerda. "When Kay hears that I'm there he'll come out directly, and bring me in."
"Wait for me yonder at the grating," said the Crow; and it wagged its head and flew away.
It was late in the evening when the Crow came back.
"Rax! rax!" it said. "I'm to greet you kindly from my sweetheart, and here's a little loaf for you. She took it from the kitchen. There's plenty of bread there, and you must be hungry. You can't possibly get into the palace, for you are barefooted, and the guards in silver and the lackeys in gold would not allow it. But don't cry; you shall go up. My sweetheart knows a little back staircase that leads up to the bedroom, and she knows where she can get the key."
And they went into the garden, into the great avenue, where one leaf was falling down after another; and when the lights were extinguished in the palace, one after the other, the Crow led Gerda to a back door, which stood ajar.
Oh, how Gerda's heart beat with fear and longing! It was just as if she had been going to do something wicked; and yet she only wanted to know whether it was little Kay. Yes, it must be he. She thought so deeply of his clear eyes and his long hair; she could fancy she saw how he smiled, as he had smiled at home when they sat among the roses. He would certainly be glad to see her; to hear what a long distance she had come for his sake; to know how sorry they had all been at home when he did not come back. Oh, what a fear and what a joy that was!
Now they were on the staircase. A little lamp was burning upon a cupboard, and in the middle of the floor stood the tame Crow, turning her head on every side and looking at Gerda, who courtesied as her grandmother had taught her to do.
"My betrothed has spoken to me very favorably of you, my little lady," said the tame Crow. "Your history, as it may be called, is very moving. Will you take the lamp? then I will precede you. We will go the straight way, and then we shall meet nobody."
"I feel as if some one were coming after us," said Gerda, as something rushed by her. It seemed like a shadow on the wall; horses with flying manes and thin legs, hunters, and ladies and gentlemen on horseback.
"These are only dreams," said the Crow; "they are coming to carry the high masters' thoughts out hunting. That's all the better, for you may look at them the more closely, in bed. But I hope, when you are taken into favor and get promotion, you will show a grateful heart."
"Of that we may be sure!" observed the Crow from the wood.
Now they came into the first hall; it was hung with rose-colored satin, and artificial flowers were worked on the walls. And here the dreams again came flitting by them, but they moved so quickly that Gerda could not see the high-born lords and ladies. Each hall was more splendid than the last; yes, one could almost become bewildered! Now they were in the bedchamber. Here the ceiling was like a great palm tree with leaves of glass, of costly glass, and in the middle of the floor two beds hung on a thick stalk of gold, and each of them looked like a lily. One of them was white, and in that lay the princess; the other was red, and in that Gerda was to seek little Kay. She bent one of the red leaves aside, and then she saw a little brown neck. Oh, that was Kay! She called out his name quite loud, and held the lamp toward him. The dreams rushed into the room again on horseback--he awoke, turned his head, and--it was not little Kay!
The prince was only like him in the neck, but he was young and good- looking; and the princess looked up, blinking, from the white lily, and asked who was there. Then little Gerda wept, and told her history, and all that the Crows had done for her.
"You poor child!" said the prince and princess.
And they praised the Crows, and said that they were not angry with them at all, but the Crows were not to do it again. However, they should be rewarded.
"Will you fly out free," asked the princess, "or will you have fixed positions as court Crows, with the right to everything that is left in the kitchen?"
And the two Crows bowed, and begged for fixed positions, for they thought of their old age, and said, "It is so good to have some provisions for one's old days," as they called them.
And the prince got up out of his bed, and let Gerda sleep in it, and he could not do more than that. She folded her little hands and thought, "How good men and animals are!" and then she shut her eyes and went quietly to sleep. All the dreams came flying in again, looking like angels, and they drew a little sledge, on which Kay sat nodding; but all this was only a dream, and therefore it was gone again as soon as she awoke.
The next day she was clothed from head to foot in velvet; and an offer was made to her that she should stay in the castle and enjoy pleasant times, but she only begged for a little carriage, with a horse to draw it, and a pair of little boots; then she would drive out into the world and seek for Kay.
And she received not only boots, but a muff likewise, and was neatly dressed; and when she was ready to depart, a coach, made of pure gold, stopped before the door. Upon it shone like a star the coat of arms of the prince and princess; coachmen, footmen, and outriders--for there were outriders, too--sat on horseback, with gold crowns on their heads. The prince and princess themselves helped her into the carriage, and wished her all good fortune. The forest Crow, who was now married, accompanied her the first three miles; he sat by Gerda's side, for he could not bear riding backward; the other Crow stood in the doorway, flapping her wings; she did not go with them, for she suffered from headache that had come on since she had obtained a fixed position and was allowed to eat too much. The coach was lined with sugar biscuits, and in the seat there were gingerbread, nuts, and fruit.
"Farewell, farewell!" cried the prince and princess; and little Gerda wept, and the Crow wept.
So they went on for the first three miles, and then the Crow said good- bye, and that was the heaviest parting of all. The Crow flew up on a tree, and beat his black wings as long as he could see the coach, which glittered like the bright sunshine.
THE FIFTH STORY
THE LITTLE ROBBER GIRL
They drove on through the thick forest, but the coach gleamed like a torch. It dazzled the robbers' eyes, and they could not bear it.
"That is gold! that is gold!" cried they; and they rushed forward, seized the horses, killed the postilions, the coachmen, and the footmen, and then pulled little Gerda out of the carriage.
"She is fat--she is pretty--she is fed with nut kernels!" said the old robber woman, who had a very long matted beard and shaggy eyebrows that hung down over her eyes. "She's as good as a little pet lamb; how I shall relish her!"
And she drew out her shining knife, that gleamed in a horrible way.
"Oh!" screamed the old woman at the same moment: for her own daughter, who hung at her back, bit her ear in a very naughty and spiteful manner. "You ugly brat!" screamed the old woman; and she had not time to kill Gerda.
"She shall play with me!" said the little robber girl. "She shall give me her muff and her pretty dress, and sleep with me in my bed!"
And then the girl gave another bite, so that the woman jumped high up, and turned right round, and all the robbers laughed, and said:
"Look how she dances with her calf."
"I want to go into the carriage," said the little robber girl,
And she would have her own way, for she was spoiled and very obstinate; and she and Gerda sat in the carriage, and drove over stock and stone deep into the forest. The little robber girl was as big as Gerda, but stronger and more broad-shouldered, and she had a brown skin; her eyes were quite black, and they looked almost mournful. She clasped little Gerda round the waist, and said:
"They shall not kill you as long as I am not angry with you. I suppose you are a princess?"
"No," replied Gerda. And she told all that had happened to her, and how fond she was of little Kay.
The robber girl looked at her seriously, nodded slightly, and said:
"They shall not kill you, even if I do get angry with you, for then I will do it myself."
And then she dried Gerda's eyes, and put her two hands into the beautiful muff that was so soft and warm.
Now the coach stopped, and they were in the courtyard of a robber castle. It had burst from the top to the ground; ravens and crows flew out of the great holes, and big bulldogs--each of which looked as if he could devour a man--jumped high up, but did not bark, for that was forbidden.
In the great, old, smoky hall, a bright fire burned upon the stone floor; the smoke passed along under the ceiling, and had to seek an exit for itself. A great cauldron of soup was boiling and hares and rabbits were roasting on the spit.
"You shall sleep to-night with me and all my little animals," said the robber girl.
They had something to eat and drink, and then went to a corner, where straw and carpets were spread out. Above these sat on laths and perches more than a hundred pigeons, and all seemed asleep, but they turned a little when the two little girls came.
"All these belong to me," said the little robber girl; and she quickly seized one of the nearest, held it by the feet, and shook it so that it flapped its wings. "Kiss it!" she cried, and beat it in Gerda's face. "There sit the wood rascals," she continued, pointing to a number of laths that had been nailed in front of a hole in the wall, "Those are wood rascals, those two; they fly away directly if one does not keep them well locked up. And here's my old sweetheart 'Ba.'" Arid she pulled out by the horn a Reindeer, that was tied up, and had a polished copper ring round its neck. "We're obliged to keep him tight, too, or he'd run away from us. Every evening I tickle his neck with a sharp knife, and he's badly frightened at that."
And the little girl drew a long knife from a cleft in the wall, and let it glide over the Reindeer's neck; the poor creature kicked out its legs, and the little robber girl laughed, and drew Gerda into bed with her.
"Do you keep the knife while you're asleep?" asked Gerda, and looked at it in a frightened way.
"I always sleep with my knife," replied the robber girl. "One does not know what may happen. But now tell me again what you told me just now about little Kay, and why you came out into the wide world."
And Gerda told it again from the beginning; and the Wood Pigeons cooed above them in their cage, and the other pigeons slept. The little robber girl put her arm round Gerda's neck, held her knife in the other hand, and slept so that one could hear her; but Gerda could not close her eyes at all--she did not know whether she was to live or die.
The robbers sat round the fire, sang and drank, and the old robber woman tumbled about. It was quite terrible for a little girl to behold. Then the Wood Pigeons said: "Coo! coo! we have seen little Kay. A white owl was carrying his sledge; he sat in the Snow Queen's carriage, which drove close by the forest as we lay in our nests. She blew upon us young pigeons, and all died except us two. Coo! coo!"
"What are you saying there?" asked Gerda. "Whither was the Snow Queen traveling? Do you know anything about it?"
"She was probably journeying to Lapland, for there they have always ice and snow. Ask the Reindeer that is tied to the cord."
"There is ice and snow yonder, and it is glorious and fine," said the Reindeer. "There one may run about free in great glittering plains. There the Snow Queen has her summer tent; but her strong castle is up toward the North Pole, on the island that's called Spitzbergen."
"O Kay, little Kay!" cried Gerda.
"You must lie still," exclaimed the robber girl, "or I shall thrust my knife into your body."
In the morning Gerda told her all that the Wood Pigeons had said, and the robber girl looked quite serious, and nodded her head and said, "That's all the same, that's all the same!"
"Do you know where Lapland is?" she asked the Reindeer.
"Who should know better than I?" the creature replied, and its eyes sparkled in its head. "I was born and bred there; I ran about there in the snow fields."
"Listen!" said the robber girl to Gerda. "You see all our men have gone away. Only mother is here still, and she'll stay; but toward noon she drinks out of the big bottle, and then she sleeps for a little while; then I'll do something for you."
Then she sprang out of bed, and clasped her mother round the neck and pulled her beard, crying:
"Good morning, my own old nanny goat." And her mother filliped her nose till it was red and blue; and it was all done for pure love.
When the mother had drunk out of her bottle and had gone to sleep upon it, the robber girl went to the Reindeer, and said:
"I should like very much to tickle you a few times more with the knife, for you are very funny then; but it's all the same. I'll loosen your cord and help you out, so that you may run to Lapland; but you must use your legs well, and carry this little girl to the palace of the Snow Queen, where her playfellow is. You've heard what she told me, for she spoke loud enough, and you were listening."
The Reindeer sprang up high for joy. The robber girl lifted little Gerda on its back, and had the forethought to tie her fast, and even to give her her own little cushion as a saddle.
"There are your fur boots for you," she said, "for it's growing cold; but I shall keep the muff, for that's so very pretty. Still, you shall not be cold, for all that; here's my mother's big muffles--they'll just reach up to your elbows. Now you look just like my ugly mother."
And Gerda wept for joy.
"I can't bear to see you whimper," said the little robber girl. "No, you just ought to look very glad. And here are two loaves and a ham for you; now you won't be hungry."
These were tied on the Reindeer's back. The little robber girl opened the door, coaxed in all the big dogs, and then cut the rope with her sharp knife, and said to the Reindeer:
"Now run, but take good care of the little girl."
And Gerda stretched out her hands with the big muffles toward the little robber girl, and said, "Farewell."
And the Reindeer ran over stock and stone, away through the great forest, over marshes and steppes, as fast as it could go. The wolves howled, and the ravens croaked. "Hiss! hiss!" sounded through the air. It seemed as if the sky were flashing fire.
"Those are my old Northern Lights," said the Reindeer. "Look how they glow!" And then it ran on faster than ever, day and night.
THE SIXTH STORY
THE LAPLAND WOMAN AND THE FINLAND WOMAN
At a little hut they stopped. It was very humble; the roof sloped down almost to the ground, and the door was so low that the family had to creep on their stomachs when they wanted to go in or out. No one was in the house but an old Lapland woman, cooking fish by the light of a train-oil lamp; and the Reindeer told Gerda's whole history, but it related its own first, for this seemed to the Reindeer the more important of the two. Gerda was so exhausted by the cold that she could not speak.
"Oh, you poor things," said the Lapland woman; "you've a long way to run yet! You must go more than a hundred miles into Finmark, for the Snow Queen is there, staying in the country, and burning Bengal Lights every evening. I'll write a few words on a dried cod, for I have no paper, and I'll give you that as a letter to the Finland woman; she can give you better information than I."
And when Gerda had been warmed and refreshed with food and drink, the Lapland woman wrote a few words on a dried codfish, and telling Gerda to take care of these, tied her again on the Reindeer, and the Reindeer sprang away. Flash! flash! The whole night long the most beautiful blue Northern Lights were burning.
And then they got to Finmark, and knocked at the chimney of the Finland woman; for she had not even a hut.
There was such a heat in the chimney that the woman herself went about almost naked. She at once loosened little Gerda's dress and took off the child's muffles and boots; otherwise it would have been too hot for her to bear. Then she laid a piece of ice on the Reindeer's head, and read what was written on the codfish; she read it three times, and when she knew it by heart, she popped the fish into the soup-cauldron, for it was eatable, and she never wasted anything.
Now the Reindeer first told his own story, and then little Gerda's; and the Finland woman blinked with her clever eyes, but said nothing.
"You are very clever," said the Reindeer. "I know you can tie all the winds of the world together with a bit of twine; if the seaman unties one knot, he has a good wind; if he loosens the second, it blows hard; but if he unties the third and fourth, there comes such a tempest that the forests are thrown down. Won't you give the little girl a draught, so that she may get twelve men's power, and overcome the Snow Queen?"
"Twelve men's power!" repeated the Finland woman. "Great use that would be!"
And she went to a bed and brought out a great rolled-up fur, and unrolled it; wonderful characters were written upon it, and the Finland woman read until the perspiration ran down her forehead.
But the Reindeer again begged so hard for little Gerda, and Gerda looked at the Finland woman with such beseeching eyes, full of tears, that she began to blink again with her own, and drew the Reindeer into a corner, and whispered to him, while she laid fresh ice upon his head.
"Little Kay is certainly at the Snow Queen's, and finds everything there to his taste and thinks it is the best place in the world; but that is because he has a splinter of glass in his eye, and a little fragment in his heart; but these must be got out, or he will never be a human being again, and the Snow Queen will keep her power over him."
"But cannot you give something to little Gerda, so as to give her power over all this?"
"I can give her no greater power than she possesses already; don't you see how great that is? Don't you see how men and animals are obliged to serve her, and how she gets on so well in the world, with her naked feet? She cannot receive her power from us; it consists in this--that she is a dear, innocent child. If she herself cannot penetrate to the Snow Queen and get the glass out of little Kay, we can be of no use! Two miles from here the Snow Queen's garden begins; you can carry the little girl thither; set her down by the great bush that stands with its red berries in the snow. Don't stand gossiping, but make haste, and get back here!"
And then the Finland woman lifted little Gerda on the Reindeer, which ran as fast as it could.
"Oh, I haven't my boots! I haven't my muffles!" cried Gerda.
She soon noticed that in the cutting cold; but the Reindeer dared not stop. It ran till it came to the bush with the red berries; there it set Gerda down, and kissed her on the mouth, and great big tears ran down the creature's cheeks; and then it ran back, as fast as it could. There stood poor Gerda without shoes, without gloves, in the midst of the terrible, cold Finmark.
She ran forward as fast as possible; then came a whole regiment of snowflakes; but they did not fall down from the sky, for that was quite bright, and shone with the Northern Lights: the snowflakes ran along the ground, and the nearer they came, the larger they grew. Gerda still remembered how large and beautiful the snowflakes had appeared when she had looked at them through the burning glass. But here they were certainly far larger and much more terrible--they were alive. They were advance posts of the Snow Queen, and had the strangest shapes. A few looked like ugly great porcupines; others like knots formed of snakes, which stretched forth their heads; and others like little fat bears, whose hair stood up on end; all were brilliantly white, all were living snowflakes.
Then little Gerda said her prayer; and the cold was so great that she could see her own breath, which went forth out of her mouth like smoke. The breath became thicker and thicker, and formed itself into little angels, who grew and grew whenever they touched the earth; and all had helmets on their heads, and shields and spears in their hands. Their number increased, and when Gerda had finished her prayer a whole legion stood round about her, and struck with their spears at the terrible snowflakes, so that these were shattered into a thousand pieces; and little Gerda could go forward afresh, with good courage. The angels stroked her hands and feet, and then she felt less how cold it was, and hastened on to the Snow Queen's palace.
But now we must see what Kay was doing. He was not thinking of little Gerda, and least of all that she was standing in front of the palace.
THE SEVENTH STORY
OF THE SNOW QUEEN'S CASTLE, AND WHAT HAPPENED THERE AT LAST
The walls of the palace were formed of the drifting snow, and the windows and doors of the cutting winds. There were more than a hundred halls, all blown together by the snow; the greatest of these extended for several miles; the strong Northern Lights illuminated them all, and how great and empty, how icily cold and shining they all were! Never was merriment there--not even a little bear's ball, at which the storm could have played the music, while the bears walked about on their hind legs and showed off their pretty manners; never any little sport of mouth- slapping or bars-touch; never any little coffee gossip among the young lady white foxes. Empty, vast, and cold were the halls of the Snow Queen. The Northern Lights flamed so brightly that one could count them where they stood highest and lowest. In the midst of this immense empty snow hall was a frozen lake, which had burst into a thousand pieces; but each piece was like the rest, so that it was a perfect work of art; and in the middle of the lake sat the Snow Queen, when she was at home, and then she said that she sat in the Mirror of Reason, and that this was the only one, and the best in the world.
Little Kay was quite blue with cold--indeed, almost black! but he did not notice it, for she had kissed the cold shudderings away from him, and his heart was like a lump of ice. He dragged a few sharp, flat pieces of ice to and fro, joining them together in all kinds of ways, for he wanted to achieve something with them. It was just like when we have little tablets of wood, and lay them together to form figures--what we call the Chinese game. Kay also went and laid figures, and, indeed, very artistic ones. That was the icy game of Reason. In his eyes these figures were very remarkable and of the highest importance; that was because of the fragment of glass sticking in his eye. He laid out the figures so that they formed a word--but he could never manage to lay down the word as he wished to have it--the word eternity. The Snow Queen had said:
"If you can find out this figure, you shall be your own master, and I will give you the whole world and a pair of new skates."
But he could not.
"Now I'll hasten away to the warm lands," said the Snow Queen. "I will go and look into the black spots." These were the volcanoes, Etna and Vesuvius, as they are called. "I shall whiten them a little! That's necessary; that will do the grapes and lemons good."
And the Snow Queen flew away, and Kay sat quite alone in the great icy hall that was miles in extent, and looked at his pieces of ice, and thought so deeply that cracks were heard inside him; one would have thought that he was frozen.
Then it happened that little Gerda stepped through the great gate into the wide hall. Here reigned cutting winds, but she prayed a prayer, and the winds lay down as if they would have gone to sleep; and she stepped into the great, empty, cold halls, and beheld Kay; she knew him, and flew to him, and embraced him, and held him fast, and called out:
"Kay, dear little Kay! I have found you!"
But he sat quite still, stiff and cold. Then little Gerda wept hot tears, that fell upon his breast; they penetrated into his heart, they thawed the lump of ice, and consumed the little piece of glass in it. He looked at her, and she sang:
"The roses will fade and pass away, But we the Christ-child shall see one day."
Then Kay burst into tears; he wept so that the splinter of glass came out of his eye. Now he recognized her, and cried rejoicingly:
"Gerda, dear Gerda! where have you been all this time? And where have I been?" And he looked all around him. "How cold it is here! How large and void!"
And he clung to Gerda, and she laughed and wept for joy. It was so glorious that even the pieces of ice round about danced for joy; and when they were tired and lay down, they formed themselves into just the letters of which the Snow Queen had said that if he found them out he should be his own master, and she would give him the whole world and a new pair of skates.
And Gerda kissed his cheeks, and they became blooming; she kissed his eyes, and they shone like her own; she kissed his hands and feet, and he then became well and merry. The Snow Queen might now come home; his word of release stood written in shining characters of ice.
And they took one another by the hand, and wandered forth from the great palace of ice. They spoke of the grandmother and of the roses on the roof; and where they went the winds rested and the sun burst forth; and when they came to the bush with the red berries, the Reindeer was standing there waiting; it had brought another young Reindeer, which gave the children warm milk, and kissed them on the mouth. Then they carried Kay and Gerda, first to the Finnish woman, where they warmed themselves thoroughly in the hot room, and received instructions for their journey home; and then to the Lapland woman, who had made them new clothes and put their sledge in order.
The Reindeer and the young one sprang at their side, and followed them as far as the boundary of the country. There the first green sprouted forth, and there they took leave of the two Reindeer and the Lapland woman. "Farewell!" said all. And the first little birds began to twitter, the forest was decked with green buds, and out of it, on a beautiful horse (which Gerda knew, for it was the same that had drawn her golden coach) a young girl came riding, with a shining red cap on her head and a pair of pistols in the holsters. This was the little robber girl, who had grown tired of staying at home, and wished to go first to the north, and if that did not suit her, to some other region. She knew Gerda at once, and Gerda knew her too; and it was a right merry meeting.
"You are a fine fellow to gad about!" she said to little Kay. "I should like to know if you deserve that one should run to the end of the world after you?"
But Gerda patted her cheeks, and asked after the prince and princess.
"They've gone to foreign countries," said the robber girl.
"But the Crow?" said Gerda.
"The Crow is dead," answered the other. "The tame one has become a widow, and goes about with an end of black worsted thread round her leg. She complains most lamentably, but it's all talk. But now tell me how you have fared, and how you caught him."
And Gerda and Kay told their story.
"Snipp-snapp-snurre-purre-basellurre!" said the robber girl.
And she took them both by the hand, and promised that if she ever came through their town, she would come up and pay them a visit. And then she rode away into the wide world.
But Gerda and Kay went hand in hand, and as they went it became beautiful spring, with green and with flowers. The church bells sounded, and they recognized the high steeples and the great town; it was the one in which they lived, and they went to the grandmother's door, and up the stairs, and into the room, where everything remained in its usual place. The big clock was going "Tick! tack!" and the hands were turning; but as they went through the rooms they noticed that they had become grown-up people. The roses out on the roof-gutter were blooming in at the open window, and there stood the children's chairs, and Kay and Gerda sat upon the chairs, and held each other by the hand. They had forgotten the cold, empty splendor at the Snow Queen's like a heavy dream. The grandmother was sitting in God's bright sunshine, and read aloud out of the Bible, "Except ye become as little children, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of God."
And Kay and Gerda looked into each other's eyes, and all at once they understood the old song:
"The roses will fade and pass away, But we the Christ-child shall see one day."
There they both sat, grown up, and yet children--children in heart; and it was summer--warm, delightful summer.
HOW TO REMEMBER THE STORY
When we read a good long story like The Snow Queen, we enjoy it and think we should like to remember it. If it is really good we ought to remember it, not only because of its excellence, but, in the case of an old story, because we so often find allusions to it in our other reading. The best way to fix a story in mind is to make an outline of the incidents, or plot. Then we can see the whole thing almost at a glance, and so remembrance is made easy.
A good outline of The Snow Queen would appear something like this:
I. The Goblin's Mirror. (Enlarges evil; distorts and diminishes good.) 1. The Mirror is broken.
II. Kay and Gerda. 1. The little rose garden. 2. Pieces of the mirror find their way into Kay's eye and heart. 3. The Snow Queen. a. Finds Kay. b. Carries him away. c. Makes him forget Gerda. III. Gerda's Search for Kay. 1. Carried away by the river. 2. Rescued by the old witch. IV. In the Flower garden. 1. The rose reminds Gerda of Kay. 2. Gerda questions the flowers. a. The Tiger Lily. b. The Convolvulus. c. The Snowdrop. d. The Hyacinth. e. The Buttercup. f. The Jonquil. V. Gerda Continues Her Search in Autumn. 1. Gerda meets the Crow and follows him. a. The princess's castle, b. The prince is not Kay. c. Gerda in rich clothes continues her search in a carriage. VI. Gerda meets the Robbers. 1. The old woman claims Gerda. 2. The robber girl fancies Gerda. 3. The Wood Pigeons tell about Kay. 4. The Reindeer carries Gerda on her search. VII. Gerda's Journey on the Reindeer. 1. The Lapland woman, a. Cares for Gerda. b. Sends message on a codfish. 2. The Finland woman. a. Cares for Gerda. b. Tells what has happened to Kay.