นิทานภาษาอังกฤษ

“NEAR the shores of the great Belt, which is one of the
straits that connect the Cattegat with the Baltic, stands an
old mansion with thick red walls. I know every stone of it,”
says the Wind. “I saw it when it was part of the castle of
Marck Stig on the promontory. But the castle was obliged to be
pulled down, and the stone was used again for the walls of a
new mansion on another spot- the baronial residence of
Borreby, which still stands near the coast. I knew them well,
those noble lords and ladies, the successive generations that
dwelt there; and now I’m going to tell you of Waldemar Daa and
his daughters. How proud was his bearing, for he was of royal
blood, and could boast of more noble deeds than merely hunting
the stag and emptying the wine-cup. His rule was despotic: ‘It
shall be,’ he was accustomed to say. His wife, in garments
embroidered with gold, stepped proudly over the polished
marble floors. The tapestries were gorgeous, and the furniture
of costly and artistic taste. She had brought gold and plate
with her into the house. The cellars were full of wine. Black,
fiery horses, neighed in the stables. There was a look of
wealth about the house of Borreby at that time. They had three
children, daughters, fair and delicate maidens- Ida, Joanna,
and Anna Dorothea; I have never forgotten their names. They
were a rich, noble family, born in affluence and nurtured in
luxury.

    “Whir-r-r, whir-r-r!” roared the Wind, and went on, “I did
not see in this house, as in other great houses, the high-born
lady sitting among her women, turning the spinning-wheel. She
could sweep the sounding chords of the guitar, and sing to the
music, not always Danish melodies, but the songs of a strange
land. It was ‘Live and let live,’ here. Stranger guests came
from far and near, music sounded, goblets clashed, and I,”
said the Wind, “was not able to drown the noise. Ostentation,
pride, splendor, and display ruled, but not the fear of the
Lord.

    “It was on the evening of the first day of May,” the Wind
continued, “I came from the west, and had seen the ships
overpowered with the waves, when all on board persisted or
were cast shipwrecked on the coast of Jutland. I had hurried
across the heath and over Jutland’s wood-girt eastern coast,
and over the island of Funen, and then I drove across the
great belt, sighing and moaning. At length I lay down to rest
on the shores of Zeeland, near to the great house of Borreby,
where the splendid forest of oaks still flourished. The young
men of the neighborhood were collecting branches and brushwood
under the oak-trees. The largest and dryest they could find
they carried into the village, and piled them up in a heap and
set them on fire. Then the men and maidens danced, and sung in
a circle round the blazing pile. I lay quite quiet,” said the
Wind, “but I silently touched a branch which had been brought
by one of the handsomest of the young men, and the wood blazed
up brightly, blazed brighter than all the rest. Then he was
chosen as the chief, and received the name of the Shepherd;
and might choose his lamb from among the maidens. There was
greater mirth and rejoicing than I had ever heard in the halls
of the rich baronial house. Then the noble lady drove by
towards the baron’s mansion with her three daughters, in a
gilded carriage drawn by six horses. The daughters were young
and beautiful- three charming blossoms- a rose, a lily, and a
white hyacinth. The mother was a proud tulip, and never
acknowledged the salutations of any of the men or maidens who
paused in their sport to do her honor. The gracious lady
seemed like a flower that was rather stiff in the stalk. Rose,
lily, and hyacinth- yes, I saw them all three. Whose little
lambs will they one day become? thought I; their shepherd will
be a gallant knight, perhaps a prince. The carriage rolled on,
and the peasants resumed their dancing. They drove about the
summer through all the villages near. But one night, when I
rose again, the high-born lady lay down to rise again no more;
that thing came to her which comes to us all, in which there
is nothing new. Waldemar Daa remained for a time silent and
thoughtful. ‘The loftiest tree may be bowed without being
broken,’ said a voice within him. His daughters wept; all the
people in the mansion wiped their eyes, but Lady Daa had
driven away, and I drove away too,” said the Wind. “Whir-r-r,
whir-r-r-!

    “I returned again; I often returned and passed over the
island of Funen and the shores of the Belt. Then I rested by
Borreby, near the glorious wood, where the heron made his
nest, the haunt of the wood-pigeons, the blue-birds, and the
black stork. It was yet spring, some were sitting on their
eggs, others had already hatched their young broods; but how
they fluttered about and cried out when the axe sounded
through the forest, blow upon blow! The trees of the forest
were doomed. Waldemar Daa wanted to build a noble ship, a
man-of-war, a three-decker, which the king would be sure to
buy; and these, the trees of the wood, the landmark of the
seamen, the refuge of the birds, must be felled. The hawk
started up and flew away, for its nest was destroyed; the
heron and all the birds of the forest became homeless, and
flew about in fear and anger. I could well understand how they
felt. Crows and ravens croaked, as if in scorn, while the
trees were cracking and falling around them. Far in the
interior of the wood, where a noisy swarm of laborers were
working, stood Waldemar Daa and his three daughters, and all
were laughing at the wild cries of the birds, excepting one,
the youngest, Anna Dorothea, who felt grieved to the heart;
and when they made preparations to fell a tree that was almost
dead, and on whose naked branches the black stork had built
her nest, she saw the poor little things stretching out their
necks, and she begged for mercy for them, with the tears in
her eyes. So the tree with the black stork’s nest was left
standing; the tree itself, however, was not worth much to
speak of. Then there was a great deal of hewing and sawing,
and at last the three-decker was built. The builder was a man
of low origin, but possessing great pride; his eyes and
forehead spoke of large intellect, and Waldemar Daa was fond
of listening to him, and so was Waldemar’s daughter Ida, the
eldest, now about fifteen years old; and while he was building
the ship for the father, he was building for himself a castle
in the air, in which he and Ida were to live when they were
married. This might have happened, indeed, if there had been a
real castle, with stone walls, ramparts, and a moat. But in
spite of his clever head, the builder was still but a poor,
inferior bird; and how can a sparrow expect to be admitted
into the society of peacocks?

    “I passed on in my course,” said the Wind, “and he passed
away also. He was not allowed to remain, and little Ida got
over it, because she was obliged to do so. Proud, black
horses, worth looking at, were neighing in the stable. And
they were locked up; for the admiral, who had been sent by the
king to inspect the new ship, and make arrangements for its
purchase, was loud in admiration of these beautiful horses. I
heard it all,” said the Wind, “for I accompanied the gentlemen
through the open door of the stable, and strewed stalks of
straw, like bars of gold, at their feet. Waldemar Daa wanted
gold, and the admiral wished for the proud black horses;
therefore he praised them so much. But the hint was not taken,
and consequently the ship was not bought. It remained on the
shore covered with boards,- a Noah’s ark that never got to the
water- Whir-r-r-r- and that was a pity.

    “In the winter, when the fields were covered with snow,
and the water filled with large blocks of ice which I had
blown up to the coast,” continued the Wind, “great flocks of
crows and ravens, dark and black as they usually are, came and
alighted on the lonely, deserted ship. Then they croaked in
harsh accents of the forest that now existed no more, of the
many pretty birds’ nests destroyed and the little ones left
without a home; and all for the sake of that great bit of
lumber, that proud ship, that never sailed forth. I made the
snowflakes whirl till the snow lay like a great lake round the
ship, and drifted over it. I let it hear my voice, that it
might know what the storm has to say. Certainly I did my part
towards teaching it seamanship.

    “That winter passed away, and another winter and summer
both passed, as they are still passing away, even as I pass
away. The snow drifts onwards, the apple-blossoms are
scattered, the leaves fall,- everything passes away, and men
are passing away too. But the great man’s daughters are still
young, and little Ida is a rose as fair to look upon as on the
day when the shipbuilder first saw her. I often tumbled her
long, brown hair, while she stood in the garden by the
apple-tree, musing, and not heeding how I strewed the blossoms
on her hair, and dishevelled it; or sometimes, while she stood
gazing at the red sun and the golden sky through the opening
branches of the dark, thick foliage of the garden trees. Her
sister Joanna was bright and slender as a lily; she had a tall
and lofty carriage and figure, though, like her mother, rather
stiff in back. She was very fond of walking through the great
hall, where hung the portraits of her ancestors. The women
were represented in dresses of velvet and silk, with tiny
little hats, embroidered with pearls, on their braided hair.
They were all handsome women. The gentlemen appeared clad in
steel, or in rich cloaks lined with squirrel’s fur; they wore
little ruffs, and swords at their sides. Where would Joanna’s
place be on that wall some day? and how would he look,- her
noble lord and husband? This is what she thought of, and often
spoke of in a low voice to herself. I heard it as I swept into
the long hall, and turned round to come out again. Anna
Dorothea, the pale hyacinth, a child of fourteen, was quiet
and thoughtful; her large, deep, blue eyes had a dreamy look,
but a childlike smile still played round her mouth. I was not
able to blow it away, neither did I wish to do so. We have met
in the garden, in the hollow lane, in the field and meadow,
where she gathered herbs and flowers which she knew would be
useful to her father in preparing the drugs and mixtures he
was always concocting. Waldemar Daa was arrogant and proud,
but he was also a learned man, and knew a great deal. It was
no secret, and many opinions were expressed on what he did. In
his fireplace there was a fire, even in summer time. He would
lock himself in his room, and for days the fire would be kept
burning; but he did not talk much of what he was doing. The
secret powers of nature are generally discovered in solitude,
and did he not soon expect to find out the art of making the
greatest of all good things- the art of making gold? So he
fondly hoped; therefore the chimney smoked and the fire
crackled so constantly. Yes, I was there too,” said the Wind.
“‘Leave it alone,’ I sang down the chimney; ‘leave it alone,
it will all end in smoke, air, coals, and ashes, and you will
burn your fingers.’ But Waldemar Daa did not leave it alone,
and all he possessed vanished like smoke blown by me. The
splendid black horses, where are they? What became of the cows
in the field, the old gold and silver vessels in cupboards and
chests, and even the house and home itself? It was easy to
melt all these away in the gold-making crucible, and yet
obtain no gold. And so it was. Empty are the barns and
store-rooms, the cellars and cupboards; the servants decreased
in number, and the mice multiplied. First one window became
broken, and then another, so that I could get in at other
places besides the door. ‘Where the chimney smokes, the meal
is being cooked,’ says the proverb; but here a chimney smoked
that devoured all the meals for the sake of gold. I blew round
the courtyard,” said the Wind, “like a watchman blowing his
home, but no watchman was there. I twirled the weather-cock
round on the summit of the tower, and it creaked like the
snoring of a warder, but no warder was there; nothing but mice
and rats. Poverty laid the table-cloth; poverty sat in the
wardrobe and in the larder. The door fell off its hinges,
cracks and fissures made their appearance everywhere; so that
I could go in and out at pleasure, and that is how I know all
about it. Amid smoke and ashes, sorrow, and sleepless nights,
the hair and beard of the master of the house turned gray, and
deep furrows showed themselves around his temples; his skin
turned pale and yellow, while his eyes still looked eagerly
for gold, the longed-for gold, and the result of his labor was
debt instead of gain. I blew the smoke and ashes into his face
and beard; I moaned through the broken window-panes, and the
yawning clefts in the walls; I blew into the chests and
drawers belonging to his daughters, wherein lay the clothes
that had become faded and threadbare, from being worn over and
over again. Such a song had not been sung, at the children’s
cradle as I sung now. The lordly life had changed to a life of
penury. I was the only one who rejoiced aloud in that castle,”
said the Wind. “At last I snowed them up, and they say snow
keeps people warm. It was good for them, for they had no wood,
and the forest, from which they might have obtained it, had
been cut down. The frost was very bitter, and I rushed through
loop-holes and passages, over gables and roofs with keen and
cutting swiftness. The three high-born daughters were lying in
bed because of the cold, and their father crouching beneath
his leather coverlet. Nothing to eat, nothing to burn, no fire
on the hearth! Here was a life for high-born people! ‘Give it
up, give it up!’ But my Lord Daa would not do that. ‘After
winter, spring will come,’ he said, ‘after want, good times.
We must not lose patience, we must learn to wait. Now my
horses and lands are all mortgaged, it is indeed high time;
but gold will come at last- at Easter.’

    “I heard him as he thus spoke; he was looking at a
spider’s web, and he continued, ‘Thou cunning little weaver,
thou dost teach me perseverance. Let any one tear thy web, and
thou wilt begin again and repair it. Let it be entirely
destroyed, thou wilt resolutely begin to make another till it
is completed. So ought we to do, if we wish to succeed at
last.’

    “It was the morning of Easter-day. The bells sounded from
the neighboring church, and the sun seemed to rejoice in the
sky. The master of the castle had watched through the night,
in feverish excitement, and had been melting and cooling,
distilling and mixing. I heard him sighing like a soul in
despair; I heard him praying, and I noticed how he held his
breath. The lamp burnt out, but he did not observe it. I blew
up the fire in the coals on the hearth, and it threw a red
glow on his ghastly white face, lighting it up with a glare,
while his sunken eyes looked out wildly from their cavernous
depths, and appeared to grow larger and more prominent, as if
they would burst from their sockets. ‘Look at the alchymic
glass,’ he cried; ’something glows in the crucible, pure and
heavy.’ He lifted it with a trembling hand, and exclaimed in a
voice of agitation, ‘Gold! gold!’ He was quite giddy, I could
have blown him down,” said the Wind; “but I only fanned the
glowing coals, and accompanied him through the door to the
room where his daughter sat shivering. His coat was powdered
with ashes, and there were ashes in his beard and in his
tangled hair. He stood erect, and held high in the air the
brittle glass that contained his costly treasure. ‘Found!
found! Gold! gold!’ he shouted, again holding the glass aloft,
that it might flash in the sunshine; but his hand trembled,
and the alchymic glass fell from it, clattering to the ground,
and brake in a thousand pieces. The last bubble of his
happiness had burst, with a whiz and a whir, and I rushed away
from the gold-maker’s house.

    “Late in the autumn, when the days were short, and the
mist sprinkled cold drops on the berries and the leafless
branches, I came back in fresh spirits, rushed through the
air, swept the sky clear, and snapped off the dry twigs, which
is certainly no great labor to do, yet it must be done. There
was another kind of sweeping taking place at Waldemar Daa’s,
in the castle of Borreby. His enemy, Owe Ramel, of Basnas, was
there, with the mortgage of the house and everything it
contained, in his pocket. I rattled the broken windows, beat
against the old rotten doors, and whistled through cracks and
crevices, so that Mr. Owe Ramel did not much like to remain
there. Ida and Anna Dorothea wept bitterly, Joanna stood, pale
and proud, biting her lips till the blood came; but what could
that avail? Owe Ramel offered Waldemar Daa permission to
remain in the house till the end of his life. No one thanked
him for the offer, and I saw the ruined old gentleman lift his
head, and throw it back more proudly than ever. Then I rushed
against the house and the old lime-trees with such force, that
one of the thickest branches, a decayed one, was broken off,
and the branch fell at the entrance, and remained there. It
might have been used as a broom, if any one had wanted to
sweep the place out, and a grand sweeping-out there really
was; I thought it would be so. It was hard for any one to
preserve composure on such a day; but these people had strong
wills, as unbending as their hard fortune. There was nothing
they could call their own, excepting the clothes they wore.
Yes, there was one thing more, an alchymist’s glass, a new
one, which had been lately bought, and filled with what could
be gathered from the ground of the treasure which had promised
so much but failed in keeping its promise. Waldemar Daa hid
the glass in his bosom, and, taking his stick in his hand, the
once rich gentleman passed with his daughters out of the house
of Borreby. I blew coldly upon his flustered cheeks, I stroked
his gray beard and his long white hair, and I sang as well as
I was able, ‘Whir-r-r, whir-r-r. Gone away! Gone away!’ Ida
walked on one side of the old man, and Anna Dorothea on the
other; Joanna turned round, as they left the entrance. Why?
Fortune would not turn because she turned. She looked at the
stone in the walls which had once formed part of the castle of
Marck Stig, and perhaps she thought of his daughters and of
the old song,-

           “The eldest and youngest, hand-in-hand,
            Went forth alone to a distant land.”

These were only two; here there were three, and their father
with them also. They walked along the high-road, where once
they had driven in their splendid carriage; they went forth
with their father as beggars. They wandered across an open
field to a mud hut, which they rented for a dollar and a half
a year, a new home, with bare walls and empty cupboards. Crows
and magpies fluttered about them, and cried, as if in
contempt, ‘Caw, caw, turned out of our nest- caw, caw,’ as
they had done in the wood at Borreby, when the trees were
felled. Daa and his daughters could not help hearing it, so I
blew about their ears to drown the noise; what use was it that
they should listen? So they went to live in the mud hut in the
open field, and I wandered away, over moor and meadow, through
bare bushes and leafless forests, to the open sea, to the
broad shores in other lands, ‘Whir-r-r, whir-r-r! Away, away!’
year after year.”

    And what became of Waldemar Daa and his daughters? Listen;
the Wind will tell us:

    “The last I saw of them was the pale hyacinth, Anna
Dorothea. She was old and bent then; for fifty years had
passed and she had outlived them all. She could relate the
history. Yonder, on the heath, near the town of Wiborg, in
Jutland, stood the fine new house of the canon. It was built
of red brick, with projecting gables. It was inhabited, for
the smoke curled up thickly from the chimneys. The canon’s
gentle lady and her beautiful daughters sat in the bay-window,
and looked over the hawthorn hedge of the garden towards the
brown heath. What were they looking at? Their glances fell
upon a stork’s nest, which was built upon an old tumbledown
hut. The roof, as far as one existed at all, was covered with
moss and lichen. The stork’s nest covered the greater part of
it, and that alone was in a good condition; for it was kept in
order by the stork himself. That is a house to be looked at,
and not to be touched,” said the Wind. “For the sake of the
stork’s nest it had been allowed to remain, although it is a
blot on the landscape. They did not like to drive the stork
away; therefore the old shed was left standing, and the poor
woman who dwelt in it allowed to stay. She had the Egyptian
bird to thank for that; or was it perchance her reward for
having once interceded for the preservation of the nest of its
black brother in the forest of Borreby? At that time she, the
poor woman, was a young child, a white hyacinth in a rich
garden. She remembered that time well; for it was Anna
Dorothea.

    “‘O-h, o-h,’ she sighed; for people can sigh like the
moaning of the wind among the reeds and rushes. ‘O-h, o-h,’
she would say, ‘no bell sounded at thy burial, Waldemar Daa.
The poor school-boys did not even sing a psalm when the former
lord of Borreby was laid in the earth to rest. O-h, everything
has an end, even misery. Sister Ida became the wife of a
peasant; that was the hardest trial which befell our father,
that the husband of his own daughter should be a miserable
serf, whom his owner could place for punishment on the wooden
horse. I suppose he is under the ground now; and Ida- alas!
alas! it is not ended yet; miserable that I am! Kind Heaven,
grant me that I may die.’

    “That was Anna Dorothea’s prayer in the wretched hut that
was left standing for the sake of the stork. I took pity on
the proudest of the sisters,” said the Wind. “Her courage was
like that of a man; and in man’s clothes she served as a
sailor on board ship. She was of few words, and of a dark
countenance; but she did not know how to climb, so I blew her
overboard before any one found out that she was a woman; and,
in my opinion, that was well done,” said the Wind.

    On such another Easter morning as that on which Waldemar
Daa imagined he had discovered the art of making gold, I heard
the tones of a psalm under the stork’s nest, and within the
crumbling walls. It was Anna Dorothea’s last song. There was
no window in the hut, only a hole in the wall; and the sun
rose like a globe of burnished gold, and looked through. With
what splendor he filled that dismal dwelling! Her eyes were
glazing, and her heart breaking; but so it would have been,
even had the sun not shone that morning on Anna Dorothea. The
stork’s nest had secured her a home till her death. I sung
over her grave; I sung at her father’s grave. I know where it
lies, and where her grave is too, but nobody else knows it.

    “New times now; all is changed. The old high-road is lost
amid cultivated fields; the new one now winds along over
covered graves; and soon the railway will come, with its train
of carriages, and rush over graves where lie those whose very
names are forgoten. All passed away, passed away!

    “This is the story of Waldemar Daa and his daughters. Tell
it better, any of you, if you know how,” said the Wind; and he
rushed away, and was gone.

                            THE END

IN the old days, when grandpapa was quite a little boy,
and ran about in little red breeches and a red coat, and a
feather in his cap- for that’s the costume the little boys
wore in his time when they were dressed in their best- many
things were very different from what they are now. There was
often a good deal of show in the streets- show that we don’t
see nowadays, because it has been abolished as too
old-fashioned. Still, it is very interesting to hear
grandfather tell about it.

    It must really have been a gorgeous sight to behold, in
those days, when the shoemaker brought over the shield, when
the court-house was changed. The silken flag waved to and fro,
on the shield itself a double eagle was displayed, and a big
boot; the youngest lads carried the “welcome,” and the chest
of the workmen’s guild, and their shirt-sleeves were adorned
with red and white ribbons; the elder ones carried drawn
swords, each with a lemon stuck on its point. There was a full
band of music, and the most splendid of all the instruments
was the “bird,” as grandfather called the big stick with the
crescent on the top, and all manner of dingle-dangles hanging
to it- a perfect Turkish clatter of music. The stick was
lifted high in the air, and swung up and down till it jingled
again, and quite dazzled one’s eyes when the sun shone on all
its glory of gold, and silver, and brass.

    In front of the procession ran the Harlequin, dressed in
clothes made of all kinds of colored patches artfully sewn
together, with a black face, and bells on his head like a
sledge horse. He beat the people with his bat, which made a
great clattering without hurting them, and the people would
crowd together and fall back, only to advance again the next
moment. Little boys and girls fell over their own toes into
the gutter, old women dispensed digs with their elbows, and
looked sour, and took snuff. One laughed, another chatted; the
people thronged the windows and door-steps, and even all the
roofs. The sun shone; and although they had a little rain too,
that was good for the farmer; and when they got wetted
thoroughly, they only thought what a blessing it was for the
country.

    And what stories grandpapa could tell! As a little boy he
had seen all these fine doings in their greatest pomp. The
oldest of the policemen used to make a speech from the
platform on which the shield was hung up, and the speech was
in verse, as if it had been made by a poet, as, indeed it had;
for three people had concocted it together, and they had first
drunk a good bowl of punch, so that the speech might turn out
well.

    And the people gave a cheer for the speech, but they
shouted much louder for the Harlequin, when he appeared in
front of the platform, and made a grimace at them.

    The fools played the fool most admirably, and drank mead
out of spirit-glasses, which they then flung among the crowd,
by whom they were caught up. Grandfather was the possessor of
one of these glasses, which had been given him by a working
mason, who had managed to catch it. Such a scene was really
very pleasant; and the shield on the new court-house was hung
with flowers and green wreaths.

    “One never forgets a feast like that, however old one may
grow,” said grandfather. Nor did he forget it, though he saw
many other grand spectacles in his time, and could tell about
them too; but it was most pleasant of all to hear him tell
about the shield that was brought in the town from the old to
the new court-house.

    Once, when he was a little boy, grandpapa had gone with
his parents to see this festivity. He had never yet been in
the metropolis of the country. There were so many people in
the streets, that he thought that the shield was being
carried. There were many shields to be seen; a hundred rooms
might have been filled with pictures, if they had been hung up
inside and outside. At the tailor’s were pictures of all kinds
of clothing, to show that he could stitch up people from the
coarsest to the finest; at the tobacco manufacturer’s were
pictures of the most charming little boys, smoking cigars,
just as they do in reality; there were signs with painted
butter, and herring, clerical collars, and coffins, and
inscriptions and announcements into the bargain. A person
could walk up and down for a whole day through the streets,
and tire himself out with looking at the pictures; and then he
would know all about what people lived in the houses, for they
had hung out their shields or signs; and, as grandfather said,
it was a very instructive thing, in a great town, to know at
once who the inhabitants were.

    And this is what happened with these shields, when
grandpapa came to the town. He told it me himself, and he
hadn’t “a rogue on his back,” as mother used to tell me he had
when he wanted to make me believe something outrageous, for
now he looked quite trustworthy.

    The first night after he came to the town had been
signalized by the most terrible gale ever recorded in the
newspapers- a gale such as none of the inhabitants had ever
before experienced. The air was dark with flying tiles; old
wood-work crashed and fell; and a wheelbarrow ran up the
streets all alone, only to get out of the way. There was a
groaning in the air, and a howling and a shrieking, and
altogether it was a terrible storm. The water in the canal
rose over the banks, for it did not know where to run. The
storm swept over the town, carrying plenty of chimneys with
it, and more than one proud weathercock on a church tower had
to bow, and has never got over it from that time.

    There was a kind of sentry-house, where dwelt the
venerable old superintendent of the fire brigade, who always
arrived with the last engine. The storm would not leave this
little sentry-house alone, but must needs tear it from its
fastenings, and roll it down the street; and, wonderfully
enough, it stopped opposite to the door of the dirty
journeyman plasterer, who had saved three lives at the last
fire, but the sentry-house thought nothing of that.

    The barber’s shield, the great brazen dish, was carried
away, and hurled straight into the embrasure of the councillor
of justice; and the whole neighborhood said this looked almost
like malice, inasmuch as they, and nearly all the friends of
the councillor’s wife, used to call that lady “the Razor” for
she was so sharp that she knew more about other people’s
business than they knew about it themselves.

    A shield with a dried salt fish painted on it flew exactly
in front of the door of a house where dwelt a man who wrote a
newspaper. That was a very poor joke perpetrated by the gale,
which seemed to have forgotten that a man who writes in a
paper is not the kind of person to understand any liberty
taken with him; for he is a king in his own newspaper, and
likewise in his own opinion.

    The weathercock flew to the opposite house, where he
perched, looking the picture of malice- so the neighbors said.

    The cooper’s tub stuck itself up under the head of
“ladies’ costumes.”

    The eating-house keeper’s bill of fare, which had hung at
his door in a heavy frame, was posted by the storm over the
entrance to the theatre, where nobody went. “It was a
ridiculous list- horse-radish, soup, and stuffed cabbage.” And
now people came in plenty.

    The fox’s skin, the honorable sign of the furrier, was
found fastened to the bell-pull of a young man who always went
to early lecture, and looked like a furled umbrella. He said
he was striving after truth, and was considered by his aunt “a
model and an example.”

    The inscription “Institution for Superior Education” was
found near the billiard club, which place of resort was
further adorned with the words, “Children brought up by hand.”
Now, this was not at all witty; but, you see, the storm had
done it, and no one has any control over that.

    It was a terrible night, and in the morning- only think!-
nearly all the shields had changed places. In some places the
inscriptions were so malicious, that grandfather would not
speak of them at all; but I saw that he was chuckling
secretly, and there may have been some inaccuracy in his
description, after all.

    The poor people in the town, and still more the strangers,
were continually making mistakes in the people they wanted to
see; nor was this to be avoided, when they went according to
the shields that were hung up. Thus, for instance, some who
wanted to go to a very grave assembly of elderly men, where
important affairs were to be discussed, found themselves in a
noisy boys’ school, where all the company were leaping over
the chairs and tables.

    There were also people who made a mistake between the
church and the theatre, and that was terrible indeed!

    Such a storm we have never witnessed in our day; for that
only happened in grandpapa’s time, when he was quite a little
boy. Perhaps we shall never experience a storm of the kind,
but our grandchildren may; and we can only hope and pray that
all may stay at home while the storm is moving the shields.

                            THE END

“WE had such an excellent dinner yesterday,” said an old
mouse of the female sex to another who had not been present at
the feast. “I sat number twenty-one below the mouse-king,
which was not a bad place. Shall I tell you what we had?
Everything was first rate. Mouldy bread, tallow candle, and
sausage. And then, when we had finished that course, the same
came on all over again; it was as good as two feasts. We were
very sociable, and there was as much joking and fun as if we
had been all of one family circle. Nothing was left but the
sausage skewers, and this formed a subject of conversation,
till at last it turned to the proverb, ‘Soup from sausage
skins;’ or, as the people in the neighboring country call it,
‘Soup from a sausage skewer.’ Every one had heard the proverb,
but no one had ever tasted the soup, much less prepared it. A
capital toast was drunk to the inventor of the soup, and some
one said he ought to be made a relieving officer to the poor.
Was not that witty? Then the old mouse-king rose and promised
that the young lady-mouse who should learn how best to prepare
this much-admired and savory soup should be his queen, and a
year and a day should be allowed for the purpose.”

    “That was not at all a bad proposal,” said the other
mouse; “but how is the soup made?”

    “Ah, that is more than I can tell you. All the young lady
mice were asking the same question. They wished very much to
be queen, but they did not want to take the trouble of going
out into the world to learn how to make soup, which was
absolutely necessary to be done first. But it is not every one
who would care to leave her family, or her happy corner by the
fire-side at home, even to be made queen. It is not always
easy to find bacon and cheese-rind in foreign lands every day,
and it is not pleasant to have to endure hunger, and be
perhaps, after all, eaten up alive by the cat.”

    “Most probably some such thoughts as these discouraged the
majority from going out into the world to collect the required
information. Only four mice gave notice that they were ready
to set out on the journey. They were young and lively, but
poor. Each of them wished to visit one of the four divisions
of the world, so that it might be seen which was the most
favored by fortune. Every one took a sausage skewer as a
traveller’s staff, and to remind them of the object of their
journey. They left home early in May, and none of them
returned till the first of May in the following year, and then
only three of them. Nothing was seen or heard of the fourth,
although the day of decision was close at hand. “Ah, yes,
there is always some trouble mixed up with the greatest
pleasure,” said the mouse-king; but he gave orders that all
the mice within a circle of many miles should be invited at
once. They were to assemble in the kitchen, and the three
travelled mice were to stand in a row before them, while a
sausage skewer, covered with crape, was to be stuck up instead
of the missing mouse. No one dared to express an opinion until
the king spoke, and desired one of them to go on with her
story. And now we shall hear what she said.

                WHAT THE FIRST LITTLE MOUSE
                SAW AND HEARD ON HER TRAVELS

    “When I first went out into the world,” said the little
mouse, “I fancied, as so many of my age do, that I already
knew everything, but it was not so. It takes years to acquire
great knowledge. I went at once to sea in a ship bound for the
north. I had been told that the ship’s cook must know how to
prepare every dish at sea, and it is easy enough to do that
with plenty of sides of bacon, and large tubs of salt meat and
mouldy flour. There I found plenty of delicate food, but no
opportunity for learning how to make soup from a sausage
skewer. We sailed on for many days and nights; the ship rocked
fearfully, and we did not escape without a wetting. As soon as
we arrived at the port to which the ship was bound, I left it,
and went on shore at a place far towards the north. It is a
wonderful thing to leave your own little corner at home, to
hide yourself in a ship where there are sure to be some nice
snug corners for shelter, then suddenly to find yourself
thousands of miles away in a foreign land. I saw large
pathless forests of pine and birch trees, which smelt so
strong that I sneezed and thought of sausage. There were great
lakes also which looked as black as ink at a distance, but
were quite clear when I came close to them. Large swans were
floating upon them, and I thought at first they were only
foam, they lay so still; but when I saw them walk and fly, I
knew what they were directly. They belong to the goose
species, one can see that by their walk. No one can attempt to
disguise family descent. I kept with my own kind, and
associated with the forest and field mice, who, however, knew
very little, especially about what I wanted to know, and which
had actually made me travel abroad. The idea that soup could
be made from a sausage skewer was to them such an
out-of-the-way, unlikely thought, that it was repeated from
one to another through the whole forest. They declared that
the problem would never be solved, that the thing was an
impossibility. How little I thought that in this place, on the
very first night, I should be initiated into the manner of its
preparation.

    “It was the height of summer, which the mice told me was
the reason that the forest smelt so strong, and that the herbs
were so fragrant, and the lakes with the white swimming swans
so dark, and yet so clear. On the margin of the wood, near to
three or four houses, a pole, as large as the mainmast of a
ship, had been erected, and from the summit hung wreaths of
flowers and fluttering ribbons; it was the Maypole. Lads and
lasses danced round the pole, and tried to outdo the violins
of the musicians with their singing. They were as merry as
ever at sunset and in the moonlight, but I took no part in the
merry-making. What has a little mouse to do with a Maypole
dance? I sat in the soft moss, and held my sausage skewer
tight. The moon threw its beams particularly on one spot where
stood a tree covered with exceedingly fine moss. I may almost
venture to say that it was as fine and soft as the fur of the
mouse-king, but it was green, which is a color very agreeable
to the eye. All at once I saw the most charming little people
marching towards me. They did not reach higher than my knee;
they looked like human beings, but were better proportioned,
and they called themselves elves. Their clothes were very
delicate and fine, for they were made of the leaves of
flowers, trimmed with the wings of flies and gnats, which had
not a bad effect. By their manner, it appeared as if they were
seeking for something. I knew not what, till at last one of
them espied me and came towards me, and the foremost pointed
to my sausage skewer, and said, ‘There, that is just what we
want; see, it is pointed at the top; is it not capital?’ and
the longer he looked at my pilgrim’s staff, the more delighted
he became. ‘I will lend it to you,’ said I, ‘but not to keep.’

    “‘Oh no, we won’t keep it!’ they all cried; and then they
seized the skewer, which I gave up to them, and danced with it
to the spot where the delicate moss grew, and set it up in the
middle of the green. They wanted a maypole, and the one they
now had seemed cut out on purpose for them. Then they
decorated it so beautifully that it was quite dazzling to look
at. Little spiders spun golden threads around it, and then it
was hung with fluttering veils and flags so delicately white
that they glittered like snow in the moonshine. After that
they took colors from the butterfly’s wing, and sprinkled them
over the white drapery “which gleamed as if covered with
flowers and diamonds, so that I could not recognize my sausage
skewer at all. Such a maypole had never been seen in all the
world as this. Then came a great company of real elves.
Nothing could be finer than their clothes, and they invited me
to be present at the feast; but I was to keep at a certain
distance, because I was too large for them. Then commenced
such music that it sounded like a thousand glass bells, and
was so full and strong that I thought it must be the song of
the swans. I fancied also that I heard the voices of the
cuckoo and the black-bird, and it seemed at last as if the
whole forest sent forth glorious melodies- the voices of
children, the tinkling of bells, and the songs of the birds;
and all this wonderful melody came from the elfin maypole. My
sausage peg was a complete peal of bells. I could scarcely
believe that so much could have been produced from it, till I
remembered into what hands it had fallen. I was so much
affected that I wept tears such as a little mouse can weep,
but they were tears of joy. The night was far too short for
me; there are no long nights there in summer, as we often have
in this part of the world. When the morning dawned, and the
gentle breeze rippled the glassy mirror of the forest lake,
all the delicate veils and flags fluttered away into thin air;
the waving garlands of the spider’s web, the hanging bridges
and galleries, or whatever else they may be called, vanished
away as if they had never been. Six elves brought me back my
sausage skewer, and at the same time asked me to make any
request, which they would grant if in their power; so I begged
them, if they could, to tell me how to make soup from a
sausage skewer.

    “‘How do we make it?’ said the chief of the elves with a
smile. ‘Why you have just seen it; you scarcely knew your
sausage skewer again, I am sure.’

    “They think themselves very wise, thought I to myself.
Then I told them all about it, and why I had travelled so far,
and also what promise had been made at home to the one who
should discover the method of preparing this soup. ‘What use
will it be,’ I asked, ‘to the mouse-king or to our whole
mighty kingdom that I have seen all these beautiful things? I
cannot shake the sausage peg and say, Look, here is the
skewer, and now the soup will come. That would only produce a
dish to be served when people were keeping a fast.’

    “Then the elf dipped his finger into the cup of a violet,
and said to me, ‘Look here, I will anoint your pilgrim’s
staff, so that when you return to your own home and enter the
king’s castle, you have only to touch the king with your
staff, and violets will spring forth and cover the whole of
it, even in the coldest winter time; so I think I have given
you really something to carry home, and a little more than
something.’”

    But before the little mouse explained what this something
more was, she stretched her staff out to the king, and as it
touched him the most beautiful bunch of violets sprang forth
and filled the place with perfume. The smell was so powerful
that the mouse-king ordered the mice who stood nearest the
chimney to thrust their tails into the fire, that there might
be a smell of burning, for the perfume of the violets was
overpowering, and not the sort of scent that every one liked.

    “But what was the something more of which you spoke just
now?” asked the mouse-king.

    “Why,” answered the little mouse, “I think it is what they
call ‘effect;’” and thereupon she turned the staff round, and
behold not a single flower was to be seen upon it! She now
only held the naked skewer, and lifted it up as a conductor
lifts his baton at a concert. “Violets, the elf told me,”
continued the mouse, “are for the sight, the smell, and the
touch; so we have only now to produce the effect of hearing
and tasting;” and then, as the little mouse beat time with her
staff, there came sounds of music, not such music as was heard
in the forest, at the elfin feast, but such as is often heard
in the kitchen- the sounds of boiling and roasting. It came
quite suddenly, like wind rushing through the chimneys, and
seemed as if every pot and kettle were boiling over. The
fire-shovel clattered down on the brass fender; and then,
quite as suddenly, all was still,- nothing could be heard but
the light, vapory song of the tea-kettle, which was quite
wonderful to hear, for no one could rightly distinguish
whether the kettle was just beginning to boil or going to
stop. And the little pot steamed, and the great pot simmered,
but without any regard for each; indeed there seemed no sense
in the pots at all. And as the little mouse waved her baton
still more wildly, the pots foamed and threw up bubbles, and
boiled over; while again the wind roared and whistled through
the chimney, and at last there was such a terrible hubbub,
that the little mouse let her stick fall.

    “That is a strange sort of soup,” said the mouse-king;
“shall we not now hear about the preparation?”

    “That is all,” answered the little mouse, with a bow.

    “That all!” said the mouse-king; “then we shall be glad to
hear what information the next may have to give us.”

             WHAT THE SECOND MOUSE HAD TO TELL

    “I was born in the library, at a castle,” said the second
mouse. “Very few members of our family ever had the good
fortune to get into the dining-room, much less the store-room.
On my journey, and here to-day, are the only times I have ever
seen a kitchen. We were often obliged to suffer hunger in the
library, but then we gained a great deal of knowledge. The
rumor reached us of the royal prize offered to those who
should be able to make soup from a sausage skewer. Then my old
grandmother sought out a manuscript which, however, she could
not read, but had heard it read, and in it was written, ‘Those
who are poets can make soup of sausage skewers.’ She then
asked me if I was a poet. I felt myself quite innocent of any
such pretensions. Then she said I must go out and make myself
a poet. I asked again what I should be required to do, for it
seemed to me quite as difficult as to find out how to make
soup of a sausage skewer. My grandmother had heard a great
deal of reading in her day, and she told me three principal
qualifications were necessary- understanding, imagination, and
feeling. ‘If you can manage to acquire these three, you will
be a poet, and the sausage-skewer soup will be quite easy to
you.’

    “So I went forth into the world, and turned my steps
towards the west, that I might become a poet. Understanding is
the most important matter in everything. I knew that, for the
two other qualifications are not thought much of; so I went
first to seek for understanding. Where was I to find it? ‘Go
to the ant and learn wisdom,’ said the great Jewish king. I
knew that from living in a library. So I went straight on till
I came to the first great ant-hill, and then I set myself to
watch, that I might become wise. The ants are a very
respectable people, they are wisdom itself. All they do is
like the working of a sum in arithmetic, which comes right.
‘To work and to lay eggs,’ say they, and to provide for
posterity, is to live out your time properly;’ and that they
truly do. They are divided into the clean and the dirty ants,
their rank is pointed out by a number, and the ant-queen is
number ONE; and her opinion is the only correct one on
everything; she seems to have the whole wisdom of the world in
her, which was just the important matter I wished to acquire.
She said a great deal which was no doubt very clever; yet to
me it sounded like nonsense. She said the ant-hill was the
loftiest thing in the world, and yet close to the mound stood
a tall tree, which no one could deny was loftier, much
loftier, but no mention was made of the tree. One evening an
ant lost herself on this tree; she had crept up the stem, not
nearly to the top, but higher than any ant had ever ventured;
and when at last she returned home she said that she had found
something in her travels much higher than the ant-hill. The
rest of the ants considered this an insult to the whole
community; so she was condemned to wear a muzzle and to live
in perpetual solitude. A short time afterwards another ant got
on the tree, and made the same journey and the same discovery,
but she spoke of it cautiously and indefinitely, and as she
was one of the superior ants and very much respected, they
believed her, and when she died they erected an eggshell as a
monument to her memory, for they cultivated a great respect
for science. I saw,” said the little mouse, “that the ants
were always running to and fro with her burdens on their
backs. Once I saw one of them drop her load; she gave herself
a great deal of trouble in trying to raise it again, but she
could not succeed. Then two others came up and tried with all
their strength to help her, till they nearly dropped their own
burdens in doing so; then they were obliged to stop for a
moment in their help, for every one must think of himself
first. And the ant-queen remarked that their conduct that day
showed that they possessed kind hearts and good understanding.
‘These two qualities,’ she continued, ‘place us ants in the
highest degree above all other reasonable beings.
Understanding must therefore be seen among us in the most
prominent manner, and my wisdom is greater than all.’ And so
saying she raised herself on her two hind legs, that no one
else might be mistaken for her. I could not therefore make an
error, so I ate her up. We are to go to the ants to learn
wisdom, and I had got the queen.

    “I now turned and went nearer to the lofty tree already
mentioned, which was an oak. It had a tall trunk with a
wide-spreading top, and was very old. I knew that a living
being dwelt here, a dryad as she is called, who is born with
the tree and dies with it. I had heard this in the library,
and here was just such a tree, and in it an oak-maiden. She
uttered a terrible scream when she caught sight of me so near
to her; like many women, she was very much afraid of mice. And
she had more real cause for fear than they have, for I might
have gnawed through the tree on which her life depended. I
spoke to her in a kind and friendly manner, and begged her to
take courage. At last she took me up in her delicate hand, and
then I told her what had brought me out into the world, and
she promised me that perhaps on that very evening she should
be able to obtain for me one of the two treasures for which I
was seeking. She told me that Phantaesus was her very dear
friend, that he was as beautiful as the god of love, that he
remained often for many hours with her under the leafy boughs
of the tree which then rustled and waved more than ever over
them both. He called her his dryad, she said, and the tree his
tree; for the grand old oak, with its gnarled trunk, was just
to his taste. The root, spreading deep into the earth, the top
rising high in the fresh air, knew the value of the drifted
snow, the keen wind, and the warm sunshine, as it ought to be
known. ‘Yes,’ continued the dryad, ‘the birds sing up above in
the branches, and talk to each other about the beautiful
fields they have visited in foreign lands; and on one of the
withered boughs a stork has built his nest,- it is beautifully
arranged, and besides it is pleasant to hear a little about
the land of the pyramids. All this pleases Phantaesus, but it
is not enough for him; I am obliged to relate to him of my
life in the woods; and to go back to my childhood, when I was
little, and the tree so small and delicate that a
stinging-nettle could overshadow it, and I have to tell
everything that has happened since then till now that the tree
is so large and strong. Sit you down now under the green
bindwood and pay attention, when Phantaesus comes I will find
an opportunity to lay hold of his wing and to pull out one of
the little feathers. That feather you shall have; a better was
never given to any poet, it will be quite enough for you.’

    “And when Phantaesus came the feather was plucked, and,”
said the little mouse, “I seized and put it in water, and kept
it there till it was quite soft. It was very heavy and
indigestible, but I managed to nibble it up at last. It is not
so easy to nibble one’s self into a poet, there are so many
things to get through. Now, however, I had two of them,
understanding and imagination; and through these I knew that
the third was to be found in the library. A great man has said
and written that there are novels whose sole and only use
appeared to be that they might relieve mankind of overflowing
tears- a kind of sponge, in fact, for sucking up feelings and
emotions. I remembered a few of these books, they had always
appeared tempting to the appetite; they had been much read,
and were so greasy, that they must have absorbed no end of
emotions in themselves. I retraced my steps to the library,
and literally devoured a whole novel, that is, properly
speaking, the interior or soft part of it; the crust, or
binding, I left. When I had digested not only this, but a
second, I felt a stirring within me; then I ate a small piece
of a third romance, and felt myself a poet. I said it to
myself, and told others the same. I had head-ache and
back-ache, and I cannot tell what aches besides. I thought
over all the stories that may be said to be connected with
sausage pegs, and all that has ever been written about
skewers, and sticks, and staves, and splinters came to my
thoughts; the ant-queen must have had a wonderfully clear
understanding. I remembered the man who placed a white stick
in his mouth by which he could make himself and the stick
invisible. I thought of sticks as hobby-horses, staves of
music or rhyme, of breaking a stick over a man’s back, and
heaven knows how many more phrases of the same sort relating
to sticks, staves, and skewers. All my thoughts rein on
skewers, sticks of wood, and staves; and as I am, at last, a
poet, and I have worked terribly hard to make myself one, I
can of course make poetry on anything. I shall therefore be
able to wait upon you every day in the week with a poetical
history of a skewer. And that is my soup.”

    “In that case,” said the mouse-king, “we will hear what
the third mouse has to say.”

    “Squeak, squeak,” cried a little mouse at the kitchen
door; it was the fourth, and not the third, of the four who
were contending for the prize, one whom the rest supposed to
be dead. She shot in like an arrow, and overturned the sausage
peg that had been covered with crape. She had been running day
and night. She had watched an opportunity to get into a goods
train, and had travelled by the railway; and yet she had
arrived almost too late. She pressed forward, looking very
much ruffled. She had lost her sausage skewer, but not her
voice; for she began to speak at once as if they only waited
for her, and would hear her only, and as if nothing else in
the world was of the least consequence. She spoke out so
clearly and plainly, and she had come in so suddenly, that no
one had time to stop her or to say a word while she was
speaking. And now let us hear what she said.

             WHAT THE FOURTH MOUSE, WHO SPOKE
               BEFORE THE THIRD, HAD TO TELL

    “I started off at once to the largest town,” said she,
“but the name of it has escaped me. I have a very bad memory
for names. I was carried from the railway, with some forfeited
goods, to the jail, and on arriving I made my escape, and ran
into the house of the turnkey. The turnkey was speaking of his
prisoners, especially of one who had uttered thoughtless
words. These words had given rise to other words, and at
length they were written down and registered: ‘The whole
affair is like making soup of sausage skewers,’ said he, ‘but
the soup may cost him his neck.’

    “Now this raised in me an interest for the prisoner,”
continued the little mouse, “and I watched my opportunity, and
slipped into his apartment, for there is a mouse-hole to be
found behind every closed door. The prisoner looked pale; he
had a great beard and large, sparkling eyes. There was a lamp
burning, but the walls were so black that they only looked the
blacker for it. The prisoner scratched pictures and verses
with white chalk on the black walls, but I did not read the
verses. I think he found his confinement wearisome, so that I
was a welcome guest. He enticed me with bread-crumbs, with
whistling, and with gentle words, and seemed so friendly
towards me, that by degrees I gained confidence in him, and we
became friends; he divided his bread and water with me, gave
me cheese and sausage, and I really began to love him.
Altogether, I must own that it was a very pleasant intimacy.
He let me run about on his hand, and on his arm, and into his
sleeve; and I even crept into his beard, and he called me his
little friend. I forgot what I had come out into the world
for; forgot my sausage skewer which I had laid in a crack in
the floor- it is lying there still. I wished to stay with him
always where I was, for I knew that if I went away the poor
prisoner would have no one to be his friend, which is a sad
thing. I stayed, but he did not. He spoke to me so mournfully
for the last time, gave me double as much bread and cheese as
usual, and kissed his hand to me. Then he went away, and never
came back. I know nothing more of his history.

    “The jailer took possession of me now. He said something
about soup from a sausage skewer, but I could not trust him.
He took me in his hand certainly, but it was to place me in a
cage like a tread-mill. Oh how dreadful it was! I had to run
round and round without getting any farther in advance, and
only to make everybody laugh. The jailer’s grand-daughter was
a charming little thing. She had curly hair like the brightest
gold, merry eyes, and such a smiling mouth.

    “‘You poor little mouse,’ said she, one day as she peeped
into my cage, ‘I will set you free.’ She then drew forth the
iron fastening, and I sprang out on the window-sill, and from
thence to the roof. Free! free! that was all I could think of;
not of the object of my journey. It grew dark, and as night
was coming on I found a lodging in an old tower, where dwelt a
watchman and an owl. I had no confidence in either of them,
least of all in the owl, which is like a cat, and has a great
failing, for she eats mice. One may however be mistaken
sometimes; and so was I, for this was a respectable and
well-educated old owl, who knew more than the watchman, and
even as much as I did myself. The young owls made a great fuss
about everything, but the only rough words she would say to
them were, ‘You had better go and make some soup from sausage
skewers.’ She was very indulgent and loving to her children.
Her conduct gave me such confidence in her, that from the
crack where I sat I called out ’squeak.’ This confidence of
mine pleased her so much that she assured me she would take me
under her own protection, and that not a creature should do me
harm. The fact was, she wickedly meant to keep me in reserve
for her own eating in winter, when food would be scarce. Yet
she was a very clever lady-owl; she explained to me that the
watchman could only hoot with the horn that hung loose at his
side; and then she said he is so terribly proud of it, that he
imagines himself an owl in the tower;- wants to do great
things, but only succeeds in small; all soup on a sausage
skewer. Then I begged the owl to give me the recipe for this
soup. ‘Soup from a sausage skewer,’ said she, ‘is only a
proverb amongst mankind, and may be understood in many ways.
Each believes his own way the best, and after all, the proverb
signifies nothing.’ ‘Nothing!’ I exclaimed. I was quite
struck. Truth is not always agreeable, but truth is above
everything else, as the old owl said. I thought over all this,
and saw quite plainly that if truth was really so far above
everything else, it must be much more valuable than soup from
a sausage skewer. So I hastened to get away, that I might be
home in time, and bring what was highest and best, and above
everything- namely, the truth. The mice are an enlightened
people, and the mouse-king is above them all. He is therefore
capable of making me queen for the sake of truth.”

    “Your truth is a falsehood,” said the mouse who had not
yet spoken; “I can prepare the soup, and I mean to do so.”

                  HOW IT WAS PREPARED

    “I did not travel,” said the third mouse; “I stayed in
this country: that was the right way. One gains nothing by
travelling- everything can be acquired here quite as easily;
so I stayed at home. I have not obtained what I know from
supernatural beings. I have neither swallowed it, nor learnt
it from conversing with owls. I have got it all from my
reflections and thoughts. Will you now set the kettle on the
fire- so? Now pour the water in- quite full- up to the brim;
place it on the fire; make up a good blaze; keep it burning,
that the water may boil; it must boil over and over. There,
now I throw in the skewer. Will the mouse-king be pleased now
to dip his tail into the boiling water, and stir it round with
the tail. The longer the king stirs it, the stronger the soup
will become. Nothing more is necessary, only to stir it.”

    “Can no one else do this?” asked the king.

    “No,” said the mouse; “only in the tail of the mouse-king
is this power contained.”

    And the water boiled and bubbled, as the mouse-king stood
close beside the kettle. It seemed rather a dangerous
performance; but he turned round, and put out his tail, as
mice do in a dairy, when they wish to skim the cream from a
pan of milk with their tails and afterwards lick it off. But
the mouse-king’s tail had only just touched the hot steam,
when he sprang away from the chimney in a great hurry,
exclaiming, “Oh, certainly, by all means, you must be my
queen; and we will let the soup question rest till our golden
wedding, fifty years hence; so that the poor in my kingdom,
who are then to have plenty of food, will have something to
look forward to for a long time, with great joy.”

    And very soon the wedding took place. But many of the
mice, as they were returning home, said that the soup could
not be properly called “soup from a sausage skewer,” but “soup
from a mouse’s tail.” They acknowledged also that some of the
stories were very well told; but that the whole could have
been managed differently. “I should have told it so- and so-
and so.” These were the critics who are always so clever
afterwards.

    When this story was circulated all over the world, the
opinions upon it were divided; but the story remained the
same. And, after all, the best way in everything you
undertake, great as well as small, is to expect no thanks for
anything you may do, even when it refers to “soup from a
sausage skewer.”

                            THE END

IT was winter-time; the air was cold, the wind was sharp,
but within the closed doors it was warm and comfortable, and
within the closed door lay the flower; it lay in the bulb
under the snow-covered earth.

    One day rain fell. The drops penetrated through the snowy
covering down into the earth, and touched the flower-bulb, and
talked of the bright world above. Soon the Sunbeam pierced its
way through the snow to the root, and within the root there
was a stirring.

    “Come in,” said the flower.

    “I cannot,” said the Sunbeam. “I am not strong enough to
unlock the door! When the summer comes I shall be strong!”

    “When will it be summer?” asked the Flower, and she
repeated this question each time a new sunbeam made its way
down to her. But the summer was yet far distant. The snow
still lay upon the ground, and there was a coat of ice on the
water every night.

    “What a long time it takes! what a long time it takes!”
said the Flower. “I feel a stirring and striving within me; I
must stretch myself, I must unlock the door, I must get out,
and must nod a good morning to the summer, and what a happy
time that will be!”

    And the Flower stirred and stretched itself within the
thin rind which the water had softened from without, and the
snow and the earth had warmed, and the Sunbeam had knocked at;
and it shot forth under the snow with a greenish-white blossom
on a green stalk, with narrow thick leaves, which seemed to
want to protect it. The snow was cold, but was pierced by the
Sunbeam, therefore it was easy to get through it, and now the
Sunbeam came with greater strength than before.

    “Welcome, welcome!” sang and sounded every ray, and the
Flower lifted itself up over the snow into the brighter world.
The Sunbeams caressed and kissed it, so that it opened
altogether, white as snow, and ornamented with green stripes.
It bent its head in joy and humility.

    “Beautiful Flower!” said the Sunbeams, “how graceful and
delicate you are! You are the first, you are the only one! You
are our love! You are the bell that rings out for summer,
beautiful summer, over country and town. All the snow will
melt; the cold winds will be driven away; we shall rule; all
will become green, and then you will have companions,
syringas, laburnums, and roses; but you are the first, so
graceful, so delicate!”

    That was a great pleasure. It seemed as if the air were
singing and sounding, as if rays of light were piercing
through the leaves and the stalks of the Flower. There it
stood, so delicate and so easily broken, and yet so strong in
its young beauty; it stood there in its white dress with the
green stripes, and made a summer. But there was a long time
yet to the summer-time. Clouds hid the sun, and bleak winds
were blowing.

    “You have come too early,” said Wind and Weather. “We have
still the power, and you shall feel it, and give it up to us.
You should have stayed quietly at home and not have run out to
make a display of yourself. Your time is not come yet!”

    It was a cutting cold! The days which now come brought not
a single sunbeam. It was weather that might break such a
little Flower in two with cold. But the Flower had more
strength than she herself knew of. She was strong in joy and
in faith in the summer, which would be sure to come, which had
been announced by her deep longing and confirmed by the warm
sunlight; and so she remained standing in confidence in the
snow in her white garment, bending her head even while the
snow-flakes fell thick and heavy, and the icy winds swept over
her.

    “You’ll break!” they said, “and fade, and fade! What did
you want out here? Why did you let yourself be tempted? The
Sunbeam only made game of you. Now you have what you deserve,
you summer gauk.”    “Summer gauk!” she repeated in the cold
morning hour.

    “O summer gauk!” cried some children rejoicingly; “yonder
stands one- how beautiful, how beautiful! The first one, the
only one!”

    These words did the Flower so much good, they seemed to
her like warm sunbeams. In her joy the Flower did not even
feel when it was broken off. It lay in a child’s hand, and was
kissed by a child’s mouth, and carried into a warm room, and
looked on by gentle eyes, and put into water. How
strengthening, how invigorating! The Flower thought she had
suddenly come upon the summer.

    The daughter of the house, a beautiful little girl, was
confirmed, and she had a friend who was confirmed, too. He was
studying for an examination for an appointment. “He shall be
my summer gauk,” she said; and she took the delicate Flower
and laid it in a piece of scented paper, on which verses were
written, beginning with summer gauk and ending with summer
gauk. “My friend, be a winter gauk.” She had twitted him with
the summer. Yes, all this was in the verses, and the paper was
folded up like a letter, and the Flower was folded in the
letter, too. It was dark around her, dark as in those days
when she lay hidden in the bulb. The Flower went forth on her
journey, and lay in the post-bag, and was pressed and crushed,
which was not at all pleasant; but that soon came to an end.

    The journey was over; the letter was opened, and read by
the dear friend. How pleased he was! He kissed the letter, and
it was laid, with its enclosure of verses, in a box, in which
there were many beautiful verses, but all of them without
flowers; she was the first, the only one, as the Sunbeams had
called her; and it was a pleasant thing to think of that.

    She had time enough, moreover, to think about it; she
thought of it while the summer passed away, and the long
winter went by, and the summer came again, before she appeared
once more. But now the young man was not pleased at all. He
took hold of the letter very roughly, and threw the verses
away, so that the Flower fell on the ground. Flat and faded
she certainly was, but why should she be thrown on the ground?
Still, it was better to be here than in the fire, where the
verses and the paper were being burnt to ashes. What had
happened? What happens so often:- the Flower had made a gauk
of him, that was a jest; the girl had made a fool of him, that
was no jest, she had, during the summer, chosen another
friend.

    Next morning the sun shone in upon the little flattened
Snowdrop, that looked as if it had been painted upon the
floor. The servant girl, who was sweeping out the room, picked
it up, and laid it in one of the books which were upon the
table, in the belief that it must have fallen out while the
room was being arranged. Again the flower lay among verses-
printed verses- and they are better than written ones- at
least, more money has been spent upon them.

    And after this years went by. The book stood upon the
book-shelf, and then it was taken up and somebody read out of
it. It was a good book; verses and songs by the old Danish
poet, Ambrosius Stub, which are well worth reading. The man
who was now reading the book turned over a page.

    “Why, there’s a flower!” he said; “a snowdrop, a summer
gauk, a poet gauk! That flower must have been put in there
with a meaning! Poor Ambrosius Stub! he was a summer fool too,
a poet fool; he came too early, before his time, and therefore
he had to taste the sharp winds, and wander about as a guest
from one noble landed proprietor to another, like a flower in
a glass of water, a flower in rhymed verses! Summer fool,
winter fool, fun and folly- but the first, the only, the fresh
young Danish poet of those days. Yes, thou shalt remain as a
token in the book, thou little snowdrop: thou hast been put
there with a meaning.”

    And so the Snowdrop was put back into the book, and felt
equally honored and pleased to know that it was a token in the
glorious book of songs, and that he who was the first to sing
and to write had been also a snowdrop, had been a summer gauk,
and had been looked upon in the winter-time as a fool. The
Flower understood this, in her way, as we interpret everything
in our way.

    That is the story of the Snowdrop.

                            THE END

“IT is so delightfully cold,” said the Snow Man, “that it
makes my whole body crackle. This is just the kind of wind to
blow life into one. How that great red thing up there is
staring at me!” He meant the sun, who was just setting. “It
shall not make me wink. I shall manage to keep the pieces.”

    He had two triangular pieces of tile in his head, instead
of eyes; his mouth was made of an old broken rake, and was, of
course, furnished with teeth. He had been brought into
existence amidst the joyous shouts of boys, the jingling of
sleigh-bells, and the slashing of whips. The sun went down,
and the full moon rose, large, round, and clear, shining in
the deep blue.

    “There it comes again, from the other side,” said the Snow
Man, who supposed the sun was showing himself once more. “Ah,
I have cured him of staring, though; now he may hang up there,
and shine, that I may see myself. If I only knew how to manage
to move away from this place,- I should so like to move. If I
could, I would slide along yonder on the ice, as I have seen
the boys do; but I don’t understand how; I don’t even know how
to run.”

    “Away, away,” barked the old yard-dog. He was quite
hoarse, and could not pronounce “Bow wow” properly. He had
once been an indoor dog, and lay by the fire, and he had been
hoarse ever since. “The sun will make you run some day. I saw
him, last winter, make your predecessor run, and his
predecessor before him. Away, away, they all have to go.”

    “I don’t understand you, comrade,” said the Snow Man. “Is
that thing up yonder to teach me to run? I saw it running
itself a little while ago, and now it has come creeping up
from the other side.

    “You know nothing at all,” replied the yard-dog; “but
then, you’ve only lately been patched up. What you see yonder
is the moon, and the one before it was the sun. It will come
again to-morrow, and most likely teach you to run down into
the ditch by the well; for I think the weather is going to
change. I can feel such pricks and stabs in my left leg; I am
sure there is going to be a change.”

    “I don’t understand him,” said the Snow Man to himself;
“but I have a feeling that he is talking of something very
disagreeable. The one who stared so just now, and whom he
calls the sun, is not my friend; I can feel that too.”

    “Away, away,” barked the yard-dog, and then he turned
round three times, and crept into his kennel to sleep.

    There was really a change in the weather. Towards morning,
a thick fog covered the whole country round, and a keen wind
arose, so that the cold seemed to freeze one’s bones; but when
the sun rose, the sight was splendid. Trees and bushes were
covered with hoar frost, and looked like a forest of white
coral; while on every twig glittered frozen dew-drops. The
many delicate forms concealed in summer by luxuriant foliage,
were now clearly defined, and looked like glittering
lace-work. From every twig glistened a white radiance. The
birch, waving in the wind, looked full of life, like trees in
summer; and its appearance was wondrously beautiful. And where
the sun shone, how everything glittered and sparkled, as if
diamond dust had been strewn about; while the snowy carpet of
the earth appeared as if covered with diamonds, from which
countless lights gleamed, whiter than even the snow itself.

    “This is really beautiful,” said a young girl, who had
come into the garden with a young man; and they both stood
still near the Snow Man, and contemplated the glittering
scene. “Summer cannot show a more beautiful sight,” she
exclaimed, while her eyes sparkled.

    “And we can’t have such a fellow as this in the summer
time,” replied the young man, pointing to the Snow Man; “he is
capital.”

    The girl laughed, and nodded at the Snow Man, and then
tripped away over the snow with her friend. The snow creaked
and crackled beneath her feet, as if she had been treading on
starch.

    “Who are these two?” asked the Snow Man of the yard-dog.
“You have been here longer than I have; do you know them?”

    “Of course I know them,” replied the yard-dog; “she has
stroked my back many times, and he has given me a bone of
meat. I never bite those two.”

    “But what are they?” asked the Snow Man.

    “They are lovers,” he replied; “they will go and live in
the same kennel by-and-by, and gnaw at the same bone. Away,
away!”

    “Are they the same kind of beings as you and I?” asked the
Snow Man.

    “Well, they belong to the same master,” retorted the
yard-dog. “Certainly people who were only born yesterday know
very little. I can see that in you. I have age and experience.
I know every one here in the house, and I know there was once
a time when I did not lie out here in the cold, fastened to a
chain. Away, away!”

    “The cold is delightful,” said the Snow Man; “but do tell
me tell me; only you must not clank your chain so; for it jars
all through me when you do that.”

    “Away, away!” barked the yard-dog; “I’ll tell you; they
said I was a pretty little fellow once; then I used to lie in
a velvet-covered chair, up at the master’s house, and sit in
the mistress’s lap. They used to kiss my nose, and wipe my
paws with an embroidered handkerchief, and I was called ‘Ami,
dear Ami, sweet Ami.’ But after a while I grew too big for
them, and they sent me away to the housekeeper’s room; so I
came to live on the lower story. You can look into the room
from where you stand, and see where I was master once; for I
was indeed master to the housekeeper. It was certainly a
smaller room than those up stairs; but I was more comfortable;
for I was not being continually taken hold of and pulled about
by the children as I had been. I received quite as good food,
or even better. I had my own cushion, and there was a stove-
it is the finest thing in the world at this season of the
year. I used to go under the stove, and lie down quite beneath
it. Ah, I still dream of that stove. Away, away!”

    “Does a stove look beautiful?” asked the Snow Man, “is it
at all like me?”

    “It is just the reverse of you,’ said the dog; “it’s as
black as a crow, and has a long neck and a brass knob; it eats
firewood, so that fire spurts out of its mouth. We should keep
on one side, or under it, to be comfortable. You can see it
through the window, from where you stand.”

    Then the Snow Man looked, and saw a bright polished thing
with a brazen knob, and fire gleaming from the lower part of
it. The Snow Man felt quite a strange sensation come over him;
it was very odd, he knew not what it meant, and he could not
account for it. But there are people who are not men of snow,
who understand what it is. “‘And why did you leave her?” asked
the Snow Man, for it seemed to him that the stove must be of
the female sex. “How could you give up such a comfortable
place?”

    “I was obliged,” replied the yard-dog. “They turned me out
of doors, and chained me up here. I had bitten the youngest of
my master’s sons in the leg, because he kicked away the bone I
was gnawing. ‘Bone for bone,’ I thought; but they were so
angry, and from that time I have been fastened with a chain,
and lost my bone. Don’t you hear how hoarse I am. Away, away!
I can’t talk any more like other dogs. Away, away, that is the
end of it all.”

    But the Snow Man was no longer listening. He was looking
into the housekeeper’s room on the lower storey; where the
stove stood on its four iron legs, looking about the same size
as the Snow Man himself. “What a strange crackling I feel
within me,” he said. “Shall I ever get in there? It is an
innocent wish, and innocent wishes are sure to be fulfilled. I
must go in there and lean against her, even if I have to break
the window.”

    “You must never go in there,” said the yard-dog, “for if
you approach the stove, you’ll melt away, away.”

    “I might as well go,” said the Snow Man, “for I think I am
breaking up as it is.”

    During the whole day the Snow Man stood looking in through
the window, and in the twilight hour the room became still
more inviting, for from the stove came a gentle glow, not like
the sun or the moon; no, only the bright light which gleams
from a stove when it has been well fed. When the door of the
stove was opened, the flames darted out of its mouth; this is
customary with all stoves. The light of the flames fell
directly on the face and breast of the Snow Man with a ruddy
gleam. “I can endure it no longer,” said he; “how beautiful it
looks when it stretches out its tongue?”

    The night was long, but did not appear so to the Snow Man,
who stood there enjoying his own reflections, and crackling
with the cold. In the morning, the window-panes of the
housekeeper’s room were covered with ice. They were the most
beautiful ice-flowers any Snow Man could desire, but they
concealed the stove. These window-panes would not thaw, and he
could see nothing of the stove, which he pictured to himself,
as if it had been a lovely human being. The snow crackled and
the wind whistled around him; it was just the kind of frosty
weather a Snow Man might thoroughly enjoy. But he did not
enjoy it; how, indeed, could he enjoy anything when he was
“stove sick?”

    “That is terrible disease for a Snow Man,” said the
yard-dog; “I have suffered from it myself, but I got over it.
Away, away,” he barked and then he added, “the weather is
going to change.” And the weather did change; it began to
thaw. As the warmth increased, the Snow Man decreased. He said
nothing and made no complaint, which is a sure sign. One
morning he broke, and sunk down altogether; and, behold, where
he had stood, something like a broomstick remained sticking up
in the ground. It was the pole round which the boys had built
him up. “Ah, now I understand why he had such a great longing
for the stove,” said the yard-dog. “Why, there’s the shovel
that is used for cleaning out the stove, fastened to the
pole.” The Snow Man had a stove scraper in his body; that was
what moved him so. “But it’s all over now. Away, away.” And
soon the winter passed. “Away, away,” barked the hoarse
yard-dog. But the girls in the house sang,

            “Come from your fragrant home, green thyme;
              Stretch your soft branches, willow-tree;
            The months are bringing the sweet spring-time,
              When the lark in the sky sings joyfully.
            Come gentle sun, while the cuckoo sings,
            And I’ll mock his note in my wanderings.”

    And nobody thought any more of the Snow Man.

                            THE END

THERE was once a shilling, which came forth from the mint
springing and shouting, “Hurrah! now I am going out into the
wide world.” And truly it did go out into the wide world. The
children held it with warm hands, the miser with a cold and
convulsive grasp, and the old people turned it about, goodness
knows how many times, while the young people soon allowed it
to roll away from them. The shilling was made of silver, it
contained very little copper, and considered itself quite out
in the world when it had been circulated for a year in the
country in which it had been coined. One day, it really did go
out into the world, for it belonged to a gentleman who was
about to travel in foreign lands. This gentleman was not aware
that the shilling lay at the bottom of his purse when he
started, till he one day found it between his fingers. “Why,”
cried he, “here is a shilling from home; well, it must go on
its travels with me now!” and the shilling jumped and rattled
for joy, when it was put back again into the purse.

    Here it lay among a number of foreign companions, who were
always coming and going, one taking the place of another, but
the shilling from home was always put back, and had to remain
in the purse, which was certainly a mark of distinction. Many
weeks passed, during which the shilling had travelled a long
distance in the purse, without in the least knowing where he
was. He had found out that the other coins were French and
Italian; and one coin said they were in this town, and another
said they were in that, but the shilling was unable to make
out or imagine what they meant. A man certainly cannot see
much of the world if he is tied up in a bag, and this was
really the shilling’s fate. But one day, as he was lying in
the purse, he noticed that it was not quite closed, and so he
slipped near to the opening to have a little peep into
society. He certainly had not the least idea of what would
follow, but he was curious, and curiosity often brings its own
punishment. In his eagerness, he came so near the edge of the
purse that he slipped out into the pocket of the trousers; and
when, in the evening, the purse was taken out, the shilling
was left behind in the corner to which it had fallen. As the
clothes were being carried into the hall, the shilling fell
out on the floor, unheard and unnoticed by any one. The next
morning the clothes were taken back to the room, the gentleman
put them on, and started on his journey again; but the
shilling remained behind on the floor. After a time it was
found, and being considered a good coin, was placed with three
other coins. “Ah,” thought the shilling, “this is pleasant; I
shall now see the world, become acquainted with other people,
and learn other customs.”

    “Do you call that a shilling?” said some one the next
moment. “That is not a genuine coin of the country,- it is
false; it is good for nothing.”

    Now begins the story as it was afterwards related by the
shilling himself.

    “‘False! good for nothing!’ said he. That remark went
through and through me like a dagger. I knew that I had a true
ring, and that mine was a genuine stamp. These people must at
all events be wrong, or they could not mean me. But yes, I was
the one they called ‘false, and good for nothing.’

    “‘Then I must pay it away in the dark,’ said the man who
had received me. So I was to be got rid of in the darkness,
and be again insulted in broad daylight.

    “‘False! good for nothing!’ Oh, I must contrive to get
lost, thought I. And I trembled between the fingers of the
people every time they tried to pass me off slyly as a coin of
the country. Ah! unhappy shilling that I was! Of what use were
my silver, my stamp, and my real value here, where all these
qualities were worthless. In the eyes of the world, a man is
valued just according to the opinion formed of him. It must be
a shocking thing to have a guilty conscience, and to be
sneaking about on account of wicked deeds. As for me, innocent
as I was, I could not help shuddering before their eyes
whenever they brought me out, for I knew I should be thrown
back again up the table as a false pretender. At length I was
paid away to a poor old woman, who received me as wages for a
hard day’s work. But she could not again get rid of me; no one
would take me. I was to the woman a most unlucky shilling. ‘I
am positively obliged to pass this shilling to somebody,’ said
she; ‘I cannot, with the best intentions, lay by a bad
shilling. The rich baker shall have it,- he can bear the loss
better than I can. But, after all, it is not a right thing to
do.’

    “‘Ah!’ sighed I to myself, ‘am I also to be a burden on
the conscience of this poor woman? Am I then in my old days so
completely changed?’ The woman offered me to the rich baker,
but he knew the current money too well, and as soon as he
received me he threw me almost in the woman’s face. She could
get no bread for me, and I felt quite grieved to the heart
that I should be cause of so much trouble to another, and be
treated as a cast-off coin. I who, in my young days, felt so
joyful in the certainty of my own value, and knew so well that
I bore a genuine stamp. I was as sorrowful now as a poor
shilling can be when nobody will have him. The woman took me
home again with her, and looking at me very earnestly, she
said, ‘No, I will not try to deceive any one with thee again.
I will bore a hole through thee, that everyone may know that
thou art a false and worthless thing; and yet, why should I do
that? Very likely thou art a lucky shilling. A thought has
just struck me that it is so, and I believe it. Yes, I will
make a hole in the shilling,’ said she, ‘and run a string
through it, and then give it to my neighbor’s little one to
hang round her neck, as a lucky shilling.’ So she drilled a
hole through me.

    “It is really not at all pleasant to have a hole bored
through one, but we can submit to a great deal when it is done
with a good intention. A string was drawn through the hole,
and I became a kind of medal. They hung me round the neck of a
little child, and the child laughed at me and kissed me, and I
rested for one whole night on the warm, innocent breast of a
child.

    “In the morning the child’s mother took me between her
fingers, and had certain thoughts about me, which I very soon
found out. First, she looked for a pair of scissors, and cut
the string.

    “‘Lucky shilling!’ said she, ‘certainly this is what I
mean to try.’ Then she laid me in vinegar till I became quite
green, and after that she filled up the hole with cement,
rubbed me a little to brighten me up, and went out in the
twilight hour to the lottery collector, to buy herself a
ticket, with a shilling that should bring luck. How everything
seemed to cause me trouble. The lottery collector pressed me
so hard that I thought I should crack. I had been called
false, I had been thrown away,- that I knew; and there were
many shillings and coins with inscriptions and stamps of all
kinds lying about. I well knew how proud they were, so I
avoided them from very shame. With the collector were several
men who seemed to have a great deal to do, so I fell unnoticed
into a chest, among several other coins.

    “Whether the lottery ticket gained a prize, I know not;
but this I know, that in a very few days after, I was
recognized as a bad shilling, and laid aside. Everything that
happened seemed always to add to my sorrow. Even if a man has
a good character, it is of no use for him to deny what is said
of him, for he is not considered an impartial judge of
himself.

    “A year passed, and in this way I had been changed from
hand to hand; always abused, always looked at with
displeasure, and trusted by no one; but I trusted in myself,
and had no confidence in the world. Yes, that was a very dark
time.

    “At length one day I was passed to a traveller, a
foreigner, the very same who had brought me away from home;
and he was simple and true-hearted enough to take me for
current coin. But would he also attempt to pass me? and should
I again hear the outcry, ‘False! good-for-nothing!’ The
traveller examined me attentively, ‘I took thee for good
coin,’ said he; then suddenly a smile spread all over his
face. I have never seen such a smile on any other face as on
his. ‘Now this is singular,’ said he, ‘it is a coin from my
own country; a good, true, shilling from home. Some one has
bored a hole through it, and people have no doubt called it
false. How curious that it should come into my hands. I will
take it home with me to my own house.’

    ‘Joy thrilled through me when I heard this. I had been
once more called a good, honest shilling, and I was to go back
to my own home, where each and all would recognize me, and
know that I was made of good silver, and bore a true, genuine
stamp. I should have been glad in my joy to throw out sparks
of fire, but it has never at any time been my nature to
sparkle. Steel can do so, but not silver. I was wrapped up in
fine, white paper, that I might not mix with the other coins
and be lost; and on special occasions, when people from my own
country happened to be present, I was brought forward and
spoken of very kindly. They said I was very interesting, and
it was really quite worth while to notice that those who are
interesting have often not a single word to say for
themselves.

    “At length I reached home. All my cares were at an end.
Joy again overwhelmed me; for was I not good silver, and had I
not a genuine stamp? I had no more insults or disappointments
to endure; although, indeed, there was a hole through me, as
if I were false; but suspicions are nothing when a man is
really true, and every one should persevere in acting
honestly, for an will be made right in time. That is my firm
belief,” said the shilling.

                            THE END

HAVE you ever seen an old wooden cupboard quite black with
age, and ornamented with carved foliage and curious figures?
Well, just such a cupboard stood in a parlor, and had been
left to the family as a legacy by the great-grandmother. It
was covered from top to bottom with carved roses and tulips;
the most curious scrolls were drawn upon it, and out of them
peeped little stags’ heads, with antlers. In the middle of the
cupboard door was the carved figure of a man most ridiculous
to look at. He grinned at you, for no one could call it
laughing. He had goat’s legs, little horns on his head, and a
long beard; the children in the room always called him, “Major
general-field-sergeant-commander Billy-goat’s-legs.” It was
certainly a very difficult name to pronounce, and there are
very few who ever receive such a title, but then it seemed
wonderful how he came to be carved at all; yet there he was,
always looking at the table under the looking-glass, where
stood a very pretty little shepherdess made of china. Her
shoes were gilt, and her dress had a red rose or an ornament.
She wore a hat, and carried a crook, that were both gilded,
and looked very bright and pretty. Close by her side stood a
little chimney-sweep, as black as coal, and also made of
china. He was, however, quite as clean and neat as any other
china figure; he only represented a black chimney-sweep, and
the china workers might just as well have made him a prince,
had they felt inclined to do so. He stood holding his ladder
quite handily, and his face was as fair and rosy as a girl’s;
indeed, that was rather a mistake, it should have had some
black marks on it. He and the shepherdess had been placed
close together, side by side; and, being so placed, they
became engaged to each other, for they were very well suited,
being both made of the same sort of china, and being equally
fragile. Close to them stood another figure, three times as
large as they were, and also made of china. He was an old
Chinaman, who could nod his head, and used to pretend that he
was the grandfather of the shepherdess, although he could not
prove it. He however assumed authority over her, and therefore
when “Major-general-field-sergeant-commander
Billy-goat’s-legs” asked for the little shepherdess to be his
wife, he nodded his head to show that he consented. “You will
have a husband,” said the old Chinaman to her, “who I really
believe is made of mahogany. He will make you a lady of
Major-general-field-sergeant-commander Billy-goat’s-legs. He
has the whole cupboard full of silver plate, which he keeps
locked up in secret drawers.”

    “I won’t go into the dark cupboard,” said the little
shepherdess. “I have heard that he has eleven china wives
there already.”

    “Then you shall be the twelfth,” said the old Chinaman.
“To-night as soon as you hear a rattling in the old cupboard,
you shall be married, as true as I am a Chinaman;” and then he
nodded his head and fell asleep.

    Then the little shepherdess cried, and looked at her
sweetheart, the china chimney-sweep. “I must entreat you,”
said she, “to go out with me into the wide world, for we
cannot stay here.”

    “I will do whatever you wish,” said the little
chimney-sweep; “let us go immediately: I think I shall be able
to maintain you with my profession.”

    “If we were but safely down from the table!” said she; “I
shall not be happy till we are really out in the world.”

    Then he comforted her, and showed her how to place her
little foot on the carved edge and gilt-leaf ornaments of the
table. He brought his little ladder to help her, and so they
contrived to reach the floor. But when they looked at the old
cupboard, they saw it was all in an uproar. The carved stags
pushed out their heads, raised their antlers, and twisted
their necks. The major-general sprung up in the air; and cried
out to the old Chinaman, “They are running away! they are
running away!” The two were rather frightened at this, so they
jumped into the drawer of the window-seat. Here were three or
four packs of cards not quite complete, and a doll’s theatre,
which had been built up very neatly. A comedy was being
performed in it, and all the queens of diamonds, clubs, and
hearts,, and spades, sat in the first row fanning themselves
with tulips, and behind them stood all the knaves, showing
that they had heads above and below as playing cards generally
have. The play was about two lovers, who were not allowed to
marry, and the shepherdess wept because it was so like her own
story. “I cannot bear it,” said she, “I must get out of the
drawer;” but when they reached the floor, and cast their eyes
on the table, there was the old Chinaman awake and shaking his
whole body, till all at once down he came on the floor,
“plump.” “The old Chinaman is coming,” cried the little
shepherdess in a fright, and down she fell on one knee.

    “I have thought of something,” said the chimney-sweep;
“let us get into the great pot-pourri jar which stands in the
corner; there we can lie on rose-leaves and lavender, and
throw salt in his eyes if he comes near us.”

    “No, that will never do,” said she, “because I know that
the Chinaman and the pot-pourri jar were lovers once, and
there always remains behind a feeling of good-will between
those who have been so intimate as that. No, there is nothing
left for us but to go out into the wide world.”

    “Have you really courage enough to go out into the wide
world with me?” said the chimney-sweep; “have you thought how
large it is, and that we can never come back here again?”

    “Yes, I have,” she replied.

    When the chimney-sweep saw that she was quite firm, he
said, “My way is through the stove and up the chimney. Have
you courage to creep with me through the fire-box, and the
iron pipe? When we get to the chimney I shall know how to
manage very well. We shall soon climb too high for any one to
reach us, and we shall come through a hole in the top out into
the wide world.” So he led her to the door of the stove.

    “It looks very dark,” said she; still she went in with him
through the stove and through the pipe, where it was as dark
as pitch.

    “Now we are in the chimney,” said he; “and look, there is
a beautiful star shining above it.” It was a real star shining
down upon them as if it would show them the way. So they
clambered, and crept on, and a frightful steep place it was;
but the chimney-sweep helped her and supported her, till they
got higher and higher. He showed her the best places on which
to set her little china foot, so at last they reached the top
of the chimney, and sat themselves down, for they were very
tired, as may be supposed. The sky, with all its stars, was
over their heads, and below were the roofs of the town. They
could see for a very long distance out into the wide world,
and the poor little shepherdess leaned her head on her
chimney-sweep’s shoulder, and wept till she washed the gilt
off her sash; the world was so different to what she expected.
“This is too much,” she said; “I cannot bear it, the world is
too large. Oh, I wish I were safe back on the table. again,
under the looking glass; I shall never be happy till I am safe
back again. Now I have followed you out into the wide world,
you will take me back, if you love me.”

    Then the chimney-sweep tried to reason with her, and spoke
of the old Chinaman, and of the
Major-general-field-sergeant-commander Billy-goat’s legs; but
she sobbed so bitterly, and kissed her little chimney-sweep
till he was obliged to do all she asked, foolish as it was.
And so, with a great deal of trouble, they climbed down the
chimney, and then crept through the pipe and stove, which were
certainly not very pleasant places. Then they stood in the
dark fire-box, and listened behind the door, to hear what was
going on in the room. As it was all quiet, they peeped out.
Alas! there lay the old Chinaman on the floor; he had fallen
down from the table as he attempted to run after them, and was
broken into three pieces; his back had separated entirely, and
his head had rolled into a corner of the room. The
major-general stood in his old place, and appeared lost in
thought.

    “This is terrible,” said the little shepherdess. “My poor
old grandfather is broken to pieces, and it is our fault. I
shall never live after this;” and she wrung her little hands.

    “He can be riveted,” said the chimney-sweep; “he can be
riveted. Do not be so hasty. If they cement his back, and put
a good rivet in it, he will be as good as new, and be able to
say as many disagreeable things to us as ever.”

    “Do you think so?” said she; and then they climbed up to
the table, and stood in their old places.

    “As we have done no good,” said the chimney-sweep, “we
might as well have remained here, instead of taking so much
trouble.”

    “I wish grandfather was riveted,” said the shepherdess.
“Will it cost much, I wonder?”

    And she had her wish. The family had the Chinaman’s back
mended, and a strong rivet put through his neck; he looked as
good as new, but he could no longer nod his head.

    “You have become proud since your fall broke you to
pieces,” said Major-general-field-sergeant-commander
Billy-goat’s-legs. “You have no reason to give yourself such
airs. Am I to have her or not?”

    The chimney-sweep and the little shepherdess looked
piteously at the old Chinaman, for they were afraid he might
nod; but he was not able: besides, it was so tiresome to be
always telling strangers he had a rivet in the back of his
neck.

    And so the little china people remained together, and were
glad of the grandfather’s rivet, and continued to love each
other till they were broken to pieces.

                            THE END

THE mayor stood at the open window. He looked smart, for
his shirt-frill, in which he had stuck a breast-pin, and his
ruffles, were very fine. He had shaved his chin uncommonly
smooth, although he had cut himself slightly, and had stuck a
piece of newspaper over the place. “Hark ‘ee, youngster!”
cried he.

    The boy to whom he spoke was no other than the son of a
poor washer-woman, who was just going past the house. He
stopped, and respectfully took off his cap. The peak of this
cap was broken in the middle, so that he could easily roll it
up and put it in his pocket. He stood before the mayor in his
poor but clean and well-mended clothes, with heavy wooden
shoes on his feet, looking as humble as if it had been the
king himself.

    “You are a good and civil boy,” said the mayor. “I suppose
your mother is busy washing the clothes down by the river, and
you are going to carry that thing to her that you have in your
pocket. It is very bad for your mother. How much have you got
in it?”

    “Only half a quartern,” stammered the boy in a frightened
voice.

    “And she has had just as much this morning already?”

    “No, it was yesterday,” replied the boy.

    “Two halves make a whole,” said the mayor. “She’s good for
nothing. What a sad thing it is with these people. Tell your
mother she ought to be ashamed of herself. Don’t you become a
drunkard, but I expect you will though. Poor child! there, go
now.”

    The boy went on his way with his cap in his hand, while
the wind fluttered his golden hair till the locks stood up
straight. He turned round the corner of the street into the
little lane that led to the river, where his mother stood in
the water by her washing bench, beating the linen with a heavy
wooden bar. The floodgates at the mill had been drawn up, and
as the water rolled rapidly on, the sheets were dragged along
by the stream, and nearly overturned the bench, so that the
washer-woman was obliged to lean against it to keep it steady.
“I have been very nearly carried away,” she said; “it is a
good thing that you are come, for I want something to
strengthen me. It is cold in the water, and I have stood here
six hours. Have you brought anything for me?”

    The boy drew the bottle from his pocket, and the mother
put it to her lips, and drank a little.

    “Ah, how much good that does, and how it warms me,” she
said; “it is as good as a hot meal, and not so dear. Drink a
little, my boy; you look quite pale; you are shivering in your
thin clothes, and autumn has really come. Oh, how cold the
water is! I hope I shall not be ill. But no, I must not be
afraid of that. Give me a little more, and you may have a sip
too, but only a sip; you must not get used to it, my poor,
dear child.” She stepped up to the bridge on which the boy
stood as she spoke, and came on shore. The water dripped from
the straw mat which she had bound round her body, and from her
gown. “I work hard and suffer pain with my poor hands,” said
she, “but I do it willingly, that I may be able to bring you
up honestly and truthfully, my dear boy.”

    At the same moment, a woman, rather older than herself,
came towards them. She was a miserable-looking object, lame of
one leg, and with a large false curl hanging down over one of
her eyes, which was blind. This curl was intended to conceal
the blind eye, but it made the defect only more visible. She
was a friend of the laundress, and was called, among the
neighbors, “Lame Martha, with the curl.” “Oh, you poor thing;
how you do work, standing there in the water!” she exclaimed.
“You really do need something to give you a little warmth, and
yet spiteful people cry out about the few drops you take.” And
then Martha repeated to the laundress, in a very few minutes,
all that the mayor had said to her boy, which she had
overheard; and she felt very angry that any man could speak,
as he had done, of a mother to her own child, about the few
drops she had taken; and she was still more angry because, on
that very day, the mayor was going to have a dinner-party, at
which there would be wine, strong, rich wine, drunk by the
bottle. “Many will take more than they ought, but they don’t
call that drinking! They are all right, you are good for
nothing indeed!” cried Martha indignantly.

    “And so he spoke to you in that way, did he, my child?”
said the washer-woman, and her lips trembled as she spoke. “He
says you have a mother who is good for nothing. Well, perhaps
he is right, but he should not have said it to my child. How
much has happened to me from that house!”

    “Yes,” said Martha; “I remember you were in service there,
and lived in the house when the mayor’s parents were alive;
how many years ago that is. Bushels of salt have been eaten
since then, and people may well be thirsty,” and Martha
smiled. “The mayor’s great dinner-party to-day ought to have
been put off, but the news came too late. The footman told me
the dinner was already cooked, when a letter came to say that
the mayor’s younger brother in Copenhagen is dead.”

    “Dead!” cried the laundress, turning pale as death.

    “Yes, certainly,” replied Martha; “but why do you take it
so much to heart? I suppose you knew him years ago, when you
were in service there?”

    “Is he dead?” she exclaimed. “Oh, he was such a kind,
good-hearted man, there are not many like him,” and the tears
rolled down her cheeks as she spoke. Then she cried, “Oh, dear
me; I feel quite ill: everything is going round me, I cannot
bear it. Is the bottle empty?” and she leaned against the
plank.

    “Dear me, you are ill indeed,” said the other woman.
“Come, cheer up; perhaps it will pass off. No, indeed, I see
you are really ill; the best thing for me to do is to lead you
home.”

    “But my washing yonder?”

    “I will take care of that. Come, give me your arm. The boy
can stay here and take care of the linen, and I’ll come back
and finish the washing; it is but a trifle.”

    The limbs of the laundress shook under her, and she said,
“I have stood too long in the cold water, and I have had
nothing to eat the whole day since the morning. O kind Heaven,
help me to get home; I am in a burning fever. Oh, my poor
child,” and she burst into tears. And he, poor boy, wept also,
as he sat alone by the river, near to and watching the damp
linen.

    The two women walked very slowly. The laundress slipped
and tottered through the lane, and round the corner, into the
street where the mayor lived; and just as she reached the
front of his house, she sank down upon the pavement. Many
persons came round her, and Lame Martha ran into the house for
help. The mayor and his guests came to the window.

    “Oh, it is the laundress,” said he; “she has had a little
drop too much. She is good for nothing. It is a sad thing for
her pretty little son. I like the boy very well; but the
mother is good for nothing.”

    After a while the laundress recovered herself, and they
led her to her poor dwelling, and put her to bed. Kind Martha
warmed a mug of beer for her, with butter and sugar- she
considered this the best medicine- and then hastened to the
river, washed and rinsed, badly enough, to be sure, but she
did her best. Then she drew the linen ashore, wet as it was,
and laid it in a basket. Before evening, she was sitting in
the poor little room with the laundress. The mayor’s cook had
given her some roasted potatoes and a beautiful piece of fat
for the sick woman. Martha and the boy enjoyed these good
things very much; but the sick woman could only say that the
smell was very nourishing, she thought. By-and-by the boy was
put to bed, in the same bed as the one in which his mother
lay; but he slept at her feet, covered with an old quilt made
of blue and white patchwork. The laundress felt a little
better by this time. The warm beer had strengthened her, and
the smell of the good food had been pleasant to her.

    “Many thanks, you good soul,” she said to Martha. “Now the
boy is asleep, I will tell you all. He is soon asleep. How
gentle and sweet he looks as he lies there with his eyes
closed! He does not know how his mother has suffered; and
Heaven grant he never may know it. I was in service at the
counsellor’s, the father of the mayor, and it happened that
the youngest of his sons, the student, came home. I was a
young wild girl then, but honest; that I can declare in the
sight of Heaven. The student was merry and gay, brave and
affectionate; every drop of blood in him was good and
honorable; a better man never lived on earth. He was the son
of the house, and I was only a maid; but he loved me truly and
honorably, and he told his mother of it. She was to him as an
angel upon earth; she was so wise and loving. He went to
travel, and before he started he placed a gold ring on my
finger; and as soon as he was out of the house, my mistress
sent for me. Gently and earnestly she drew me to her, and
spake as if an angel were speaking. She showed me clearly, in
spirit and in truth, the difference there was between him and
me. ‘He is pleased now,’ she said, ‘with your pretty face; but
good looks do not last long. You have not been educated like
he has. You are not equals in mind and rank, and therein lies
the misfortune. I esteem the poor,’ she added. ‘In the sight
of God, they may occupy a higher place than many of the rich;
but here upon earth we must beware of entering upon a false
track, lest we are overturned in our plans, like a carriage
that travels by a dangerous road. I know a worthy man, an
artisan, who wishes to marry you. I mean Eric, the glovemaker.
He is a widower, without children, and in a good position.
Will you think it over?’ Every word she said pierced my heart
like a knife; but I knew she was right, and the thought
pressed heavily upon me. I kissed her hand, and wept bitter
tears, and I wept still more when I went to my room, and threw
myself on the bed. I passed through a dreadful night; God
knows what I suffered, and how I struggled. The following
Sunday I went to the house of God to pray for light to direct
my path. It seemed like a providence that as I stepped out of
church Eric came towards me; and then there remained not a
doubt in my mind. We were suited to each other in rank and
circumstances. He was, even then, a man of good means. I went
up to him, and took his hand, and said, ‘Do you still feel the
same for me?’ ‘Yes; ever and always,’ said he. ‘Will you,
then, marry a maiden who honors and esteems you, although she
cannot offer you her love? but that may come.’ ‘Yes, it will
come,’ said he; and we joined our hands together, and I went
home to my mistress. The gold ring which her son had given me
I wore next to my heart. I could not place it on my finger
during the daytime, but only in the evening, when I went to
bed. I kissed the ring till my lips almost bled, and then I
gave it to my mistress, and told her that the banns were to be
put up for me and the glovemaker the following week. Then my
mistress threw her arms round me, and kissed me. She did not
say that I was ‘good for nothing;’ very likely I was better
then than I am now; but the misfortunes of this world, were
unknown to me then. At Michaelmas we were married, and for the
first year everything went well with us. We had a journeyman
and an apprentice, and you were our servant, Martha.”

    “Ah, yes, and you were a dear, good mistress,” said
Martha, “I shall never forget how kind you and your husband
were to me.”

    “Yes, those were happy years when you were with us,
although we had no children at first. The student I never met
again. Yet I saw him once, although he did not see me. He came
to his mother’s funeral. I saw him, looking pale as death, and
deeply troubled, standing at her grave; for she was his
mother. Sometime after, when his father died, he was in
foreign lands, and did not come home. I know that he never
married, I believe he became a lawyer. He had forgotten me,
and even had we met he would not have known me, for I have
lost all my good looks, and perhaps that is all for the best.”
And then she spoke of the dark days of trial, when misfortune
had fallen upon them.

    “We had five hundred dollars,” she said, “and there was a
house in the street to be sold for two hundred, so we thought
it would be worth our while to pull it down and build a new
one in its place; so it was bought. The builder and carpenter
made an estimate that the new house would cost ten hundred and
twenty dollars to build. Eric had credit, so he borrowed the
money in the chief town. But the captain, who was bringing it
to him, was shipwrecked, and the money lost. Just about this
time, my dear sweet boy, who lies sleeping there, was born,
and my husband was attacked with a severe lingering illness.
For three quarters of a year I was obliged to dress and
undress him. We were backward in our payments, we borrowed
more money, and all that we had was lost and sold, and then my
husband died. Since then I have worked, toiled, and striven
for the sake of the child. I have scrubbed and washed both
coarse and fine linen, but I have not been able to make myself
better off; and it was God’s will. In His own time He will
take me to Himself, but I know He will never forsake my boy.”
Then she fell asleep. In the morning she felt much refreshed,
and strong enough, as she thought, to go on with her work. But
as soon as she stepped into the cold water, a sudden faintness
seized her; she clutched at the air convulsively with her
hand, took one step forward, and fell. Her head rested on dry
land, but her feet were in the water; her wooden shoes, which
were only tied on by a wisp of straw, were carried away by the
stream, and thus she was found by Martha when she came to
bring her some coffee.

    In the meantime a messenger had been sent to her house by
the mayor, to say that she must come to him immediately, as he
had something to tell her. It was too late; a surgeon had been
sent for to open a vein in her arm, but the poor woman was
dead.

    “She has drunk herself to death,” said the cruel mayor. In
the letter, containing the news of his brother’s death, it was
stated that he had left in his will a legacy of six hundred
dollars to the glovemaker’s widow, who had been his mother’s
maid, to be paid with discretion, in large or small sums to
the widow or her child.

    “There was something between my brother and her, I
remember,” said the mayor; “it is a good thing that she is out
of the way, for now the boy will have the whole. I will place
him with honest people to bring him up, that he may become a
respectable working man.” And the blessing of God rested upon
these words. The mayor sent for the boy to come to him, and
promised to take care of him, but most cruelly added that it
was a good thing that his mother was dead, for “she was good
for nothing.” They carried her to the churchyard, the
churchyard in which the poor were buried. Martha strewed sand
on the grave and planted a rose-tree upon it, and the boy
stood by her side.

    “Oh, my poor mother!” he cried, while the tears rolled
down his cheeks. “Is it true what they say, that she was good
for nothing?”

    “No, indeed, it is not true,” replied the old servant,
raising her eyes to heaven; “she was worth a great deal; I
knew it years ago, and since the last night of her life I am
more certain of it than ever. I say she was a good and worthy
woman, and God, who is in heaven, knows I am speaking the
truth, though the world may say, even now she was good for
nothing.”

                            THE END

ONCE upon a time there was an old poet, one of those right
good old poets.

    One evening, as he was sitting at home, there was a
terrible storm going on outside; the rain was pouring down,
but the old poet sat comfortably in his chimney-corner, where
the fire was burning and the apples were roasting.

    “There will not be a dry thread left on the poor people
who are out in this weather,” he said.

    “Oh, open the door! I am so cold and wet through,” called
a little child outside. It was crying and knocking at the
door, whilst the rain was pouring down and the wind was
rattling all the windows.

    “Poor creature!” said the poet, and got up and opened the
door. Before him stood a little boy; he was naked, and the
water flowed from his long fair locks. He was shivering with
cold; if he had not been let in, he would certainly have
perished in the storm.

    “Poor little thing!” said the poet, and took him by the
hand. “Come to me; I will soon warm you. You shall have some
wine and an apple, for you are such a pretty boy.”

    And he was, too. His eyes sparkled like two bright stars,
and although the water flowed down from his fair locks, they
still curled quite beautifully.

    He looked like a little angel, but was pale with cold, and
trembling all over. In his hand he held a splendid bow, but it
had been entirely spoilt by the rain, and the colours of the
pretty arrows had run into one another by getting wet.

    The old man sat down by the fire, and taking the little
boy on his knee, wrung the water out of his locks and warmed
his hands in his own.

    He then made him some hot spiced wine, which quickly
revived him; so that with reddening cheeks, he sprang upon the
floor and danced around the old man.

    “You are a merry boy,” said the latter. “What is your
name?”

    “My name is Cupid,” he answered. “Don’t you know me? There
lies my bow. I shoot with that, you know. Look, the weather is
getting fine again- the moon is shining.”

    “But your bow is spoilt,” said the old poet.

    “That would be unfortunate,” said the little boy, taking
it up and looking at it. “Oh, it’s quite dry and isn’t damaged
at all. The string is quite tight; I’ll try it.” So, drawing
it back, he took an arrow, aimed, and shot the good old poet
right in the heart. “Do you see now that my bow was not
spoilt?” he said, and, loudly laughing, ran away. What a
naughty boy to shoot the old poet like that, who had taken him
into his warm room, had been so good to him, and had given him
the nicest wine and the best apple!

    The good old man lay upon the floor crying; he was really
shot in the heart. “Oh!” he cried, “what a naughty boy this
Cupid is! I shall tell all the good children about this, so
that they take care never to play with him, lest he hurt
them.”

    And all good children, both girls and boys, whom he told
about this, were on their guard against wicked Cupid; but he
deceives them all the same, for he is very deep. When the
students come out of class, he walks beside them with a book
under his arm, and wearing a black coat. They cannot recognize
him. And then, if they take him by the arm, believing him to
be a student too, he sticks an arrow into their chest. And
when the girls go to church to be confirmed, he is amongst
them too. In fact, he is always after people. He sits in the
large chandelier in the theatre and blazes away, so that
people think it is a lamp; but they soon find out their
mistake. He walks about in the castle garden and on the
promenades. Yes, once he shot your father and your mother in
the heart too. Just ask them, and you will hear what they say.
Oh! he is a bad boy, this Cupid, and you must never have
anything to do with him, for he is after every one. Just
think, he even shot an arrow at old grandmother; but that was
a long time ago. The wound has long been healed, but such
things are never forgotten.

    Now you know what a bad boy this wicked Cupid is.

                            THE END

ONCE upon a time there was little girl, pretty and dainty.
But in summer time she was obliged to go barefooted because
she was poor, and in winter she had to wear large wooden
shoes, so that her little instep grew quite red.

    In the middle of the village lived an old shoemaker’s
wife; she sat down and made, as well as she could, a pair of
little shoes out of some old pieces of red cloth. They were
clumsy, but she meant well, for they were intended for the
little girl, whose name was Karen.

    Karen received the shoes and wore them for the first time
on the day of her mother’s funeral. They were certainly not
suitable for mourning; but she had no others, and so she put
her bare feet into them and walked behind the humble coffin.

    Just then a large old carriage came by, and in it sat an
old lady; she looked at the little girl, and taking pity on
her, said to the clergyman, “Look here, if you will give me
the little girl, I will take care of her.”

    Karen believed that this was all on account of the red
shoes, but the old lady thought them hideous, and so they were
burnt. Karen herself was dressed very neatly and cleanly; she
was taught to read and to sew, and people said that she was
pretty. But the mirror told her, “You are more than pretty-
you are beautiful.”

    One day the Queen was travelling through that part of the
country, and had her little daughter, who was a princess, with
her. All the people, amongst them Karen too, streamed towards
the castle, where the little princess, in fine white clothes,
stood before the window and allowed herself to be stared at.
She wore neither a train nor a golden crown, but beautiful red
morocco shoes; they were indeed much finer than those which
the shoemaker’s wife had sewn for little Karen. There is
really nothing in the world that can be compared to red shoes!

    Karen was now old enough to be confirmed; she received
some new clothes, and she was also to have some new shoes. The
rich shoemaker in the town took the measure of her little foot
in his own room, in which there stood great glass cases full
of pretty shoes and white slippers. It all looked very lovely,
but the old lady could not see very well, and therefore did
not get much pleasure out of it. Amongst the shoes stood a
pair of red ones, like those which the princess had worn. How
beautiful they were! and the shoemaker said that they had been
made for a count’s daughter, but that they had not fitted her.

    “I suppose they are of shiny leather?” asked the old lady.
“They shine so.”

    “Yes, they do shine,” said Karen. They fitted her, and
were bought. But the old lady knew nothing of their being red,
for she would never have allowed Karen to be confirmed in red
shoes, as she was now to be.

    Everybody looked at her feet, and the whole of the way
from the church door to the choir it seemed to her as if even
the ancient figures on the monuments, in their stiff collars
and long black robes, had their eyes fixed on her red shoes.
It was only of these that she thought when the clergyman laid
his hand upon her head and spoke of the holy baptism, of the
covenant with God, and told her that she was now to be a
grown-up Christian. The organ pealed forth solemnly, and the
sweet children’s voices mingled with that of their old leader;
but Karen thought only of her red shoes. In the afternoon the
old lady heard from everybody that Karen had worn red shoes.
She said that it was a shocking thing to do, that it was very
improper, and that Karen was always to go to church in future
in black shoes, even if they were old.

    On the following Sunday there was Communion. Karen looked
first at the black shoes, then at the red ones- looked at the
red ones again, and put them on.

    The sun was shining gloriously, so Karen and the old lady
went along the footpath through the corn, where it was rather
dusty.

    At the church door stood an old crippled soldier leaning
on a crutch; he had a wonderfully long beard, more red than
white, and he bowed down to the ground and asked the old lady
whether he might wipe her shoes. Then Karen put out her little
foot too. “Dear me, what pretty dancing-shoes!” said the
soldier. “Sit fast, when you dance,” said he, addressing the
shoes, and slapping the soles with his hand.

    The old lady gave the soldier some money and then went
with Karen into the church.

    And all the people inside looked at Karen’s red shoes, and
all the figures gazed at them; when Karen knelt before the
altar and put the golden goblet to her mouth, she thought only
of the red shoes. It seemed to her as though they were
swimming about in the goblet, and she forgot to sing the
psalm, forgot to say the “Lord’s Prayer.”

    Now every one came out of church, and the old lady stepped
into her carriage. But just as Karen was lifting up her foot
to get in too, the old soldier said: “Dear me, what pretty
dancing shoes!” and Karen could not help it, she was obliged
to dance a few steps; and when she had once begun, her legs
continued to dance. It seemed as if the shoes had got power
over them. She danced round the church corner, for she could
not stop; the coachman had to run after her and seize her. He
lifted her into the carriage, but her feet continued to dance,
so that she kicked the good old lady violently. At last they
took off her shoes, and her legs were at rest.

    At home the shoes were put into the cupboard, but Karen
could not help looking at them.

    Now the old lady fell ill, and it was said that she would
not rise from her bed again. She had to be nursed and waited
upon, and this was no one’s duty more than Karen’s. But there
was a grand ball in the town, and Karen was invited. She
looked at the red shoes, saying to herself that there was no
sin in doing that; she put the red shoes on, thinking there
was no harm in that either; and then she went to the ball; and
commenced to dance.

    But when she wanted to go to the right, the shoes danced
to the left, and when she wanted to dance up the room, the
shoes danced down the room, down the stairs through the
street, and out through the gates of the town. She danced, and
was obliged to dance, far out into the dark wood. Suddenly
something shone up among the trees, and she believed it was
the moon, for it was a face. But it was the old soldier with
the red beard; he sat there nodding his head and said: “Dear
me, what pretty dancing shoes!”

    She was frightened, and wanted to throw the red shoes
away; but they stuck fast. She tore off her stockings, but the
shoes had grown fast to her feet. She danced and was obliged
to go on dancing over field and meadow, in rain and sunshine,
by night and by day- but by night it was most horrible.

    She danced out into the open churchyard; but the dead
there did not dance. They had something better to do than
that. She wanted to sit down on the pauper’s grave where the
bitter fern grows; but for her there was neither peace nor
rest. And as she danced past the open church door she saw an
angel there in long white robes, with wings reaching from his
shoulders down to the earth; his face was stern and grave, and
in his hand he held a broad shining sword.

    “Dance you shall,” said he, “dance in your red shoes till
you are pale and cold, till your skin shrivels up and you are
a skeleton! Dance you shall, from door to door, and where
proud and wicked children live you shall knock, so that they
may hear you and fear you! Dance you shall, dance- !”

    “Mercy!” cried Karen. But she did not hear what the angel
answered, for the shoes carried her through the gate into the
fields, along highways and byways, and unceasingly she had to
dance.

    One morning she danced past a door that she knew well;
they were singing a psalm inside, and a coffin was being
carried out covered with flowers. Then she knew that she was
forsaken by every one and damned by the angel of God.

    She danced, and was obliged to go on dancing through the
dark night. The shoes bore her away over thorns and stumps
till she was all torn and bleeding; she danced away over the
heath to a lonely little house. Here, she knew, lived the
executioner; and she tapped with her finger at the window and
said:

    “Come out, come out! I cannot come in, for I must dance.”

    And the executioner said: “I don’t suppose you know who I
am. I strike off the heads of the wicked, and I notice that my
axe is tingling to do so.”

    “Don’t cut off my head!” said Karen, “for then I could not
repent of my sin. But cut off my feet with the red shoes.”

    And then she confessed all her sin, and the executioner
struck off her feet with the red shoes; but the shoes danced
away with the little feet across the field into the deep
forest.

    And he carved her a pair of wooden feet and some crutches,
and taught her a psalm which is always sung by sinners; she
kissed the hand that guided the axe, and went away over the
heath.

    “Now, I have suffered enough for the red shoes,” she said;
“I will go to church, so that people can see me.” And she went
quickly up to the church-door; but when she came there, the
red shoes were dancing before her, and she was frightened, and
turned back.

    During the whole week she was sad and wept many bitter
tears, but when Sunday came again she said: “Now I have
suffered and striven enough. I believe I am quite as good as
many of those who sit in church and give themselves airs.” And
so she went boldly on; but she had not got farther than the
churchyard gate when she saw the red shoes dancing along
before her. Then she became terrified, and turned back and
repented right heartily of her sin.

    She went to the parsonage, and begged that she might be
taken into service there. She would be industrious, she said,
and do everything that she could; she did not mind about the
wages as long as she had a roof over her, and was with good
people. The pastor’s wife had pity on her, and took her into
service. And she was industrious and thoughtful. She sat quiet
and listened when the pastor read aloud from the Bible in the
evening. All the children liked her very much, but when they
spoke about dress and grandeur and beauty she would shake her
head.

    On the following Sunday they all went to church, and she
was asked whether she wished to go too; but, with tears in her
eyes, she looked sadly at her crutches. And then the others
went to hear God’s Word, but she went alone into her little
room; this was only large enough to hold the bed and a chair.
Here she sat down with her hymn-book, and as she was reading
it with a pious mind, the wind carried the notes of the organ
over to her from the church, and in tears she lifted up her
face and said: “O God! help me!”

    Then the sun shone so brightly, and right before her stood
an angel of God in white robes; it was the same one whom she
had seen that night at the church-door. He no longer carried
the sharp sword, but a beautiful green branch, full of roses;
with this he touched the ceiling, which rose up very high, and
where he had touched it there shone a golden star. He touched
the walls, which opened wide apart, and she saw the organ
which was pealing forth; she saw the pictures of the old
pastors and their wives, and the congregation sitting in the
polished chairs and singing from their hymn-books. The church
itself had come to the poor girl in her narrow room, or the
room had gone to the church. She sat in the pew with the rest
of the pastor’s household, and when they had finished the hymn
and looked up, they nodded and said, “It was right of you to
come, Karen.”

    “It was mercy,” said she.

    The organ played and the children’s voices in the choir
sounded soft and lovely. The bright warm sunshine streamed
through the window into the pew where Karen sat, and her heart
became so filled with it, so filled with peace and joy, that
it broke. Her soul flew on the sunbeams to Heaven, and no one
was there who asked after the Red Shoes.

                            THE END