Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen
by H. C. Andersen · English · Gutenberg #27200 · 2,015,478 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen
Author: H. C. Andersen
Release date: November 8, 2008 [eBook #27200]
Most recently updated: January 4, 2021
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/27200
Credits: Produced by Al Haines
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FAIRY TALES OF HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN ***
Produced by Al Haines
FAIRY TALES OF HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN
CONTENTS
A Story
By the Almshouse Window
The Angel
Anne Lisbeth
Beauty of Form and Beauty of Mind
The Beetle who went on his Travels
The Bell
The Bell-deep
The Bird of Popular Song
The Bishop of Borglum and his Warriors
The Bottle Neck
The Buckwheat
The Butterfly
A Cheerful Temper
The Child in the Grave
Children's Prattle
The Farm-yard Cock and the Weather-cock
The Daisy
The Darning-Needle
Delaying is not Forgetting
The Drop of Water
The Dryad
Jack the Dullard
The Dumb Cook
The Elf of the Rose
The Elfin Hill
The Emperor's New Suit
The Fir Tree
The Flax
The Flying Trunk
The Shepherd's Story of the Bond of Friendship
The Girl Who Trod on the Loaf
The Goblin and the Huckster
The Golden Treasure
The Goloshes of Fortune
She was Good for Nothing
Grandmother
A Great Grief
The Happy Family
A Leaf from Heaven
Holger Danske
Ib and Little Christina
The Ice Maiden
The Jewish Maiden
The Jumper
The Last Dream of the Old Oak
The Last Pearl
Little Claus and Big Claus
The Little Elder-tree Mother
Little Ida's Flowers
The Little Match-seller
The Little Mermaid
Little Tiny or Thumbelina
Little Tuk
The Loveliest Rose in the World
The Mail-coach Passengers
The Marsh King's Daughter
The Metal Pig
The Money-box
What the Moon Saw
The Neighbouring Families
The Nightingale
There is no Doubt about it
In the Nursery
The Old Bachelor's Nightcap
The Old Church Bell
The Old Grave-stone
The Old House
What the Old Man Does is Always Right
The Old Street Lamp
Ole-Luk-Oie, the Dream God
Ole the Tower-keeper
Our Aunt
The Garden of Paradise
The Pea Blossom
The Pen and the Inkstand
The Philosopher's Stone
The Phoenix Bird
The Portuguese Duck
The Porter's Son
Poultry Meg's Family
The Princess and the Pea
The Psyche
The Puppet-show Man
The Races
The Red Shoes
Everything in the Right Place
A Rose from Homer's Grave
The Snail and the Rose-tree
A Story from the Sand-hills
The Saucy Boy
The Shadow
The Shepherdess and the Sheep
The Silver Shilling
The Shirt-collar
The Snow Man
The Snow Queen
The Snowdrop
Something
Soup from a Sausage Skewer
The Storks
The Storm Shakes the Shield
The Story of a Mother
The Sunbeam and the Captive
The Swan's Nest
The Swineherd
The Thistle's Experiences
The Thorny Road of Honor
In a Thousand Years
The Brave Tin Soldier
The Tinder-box
The Toad
The Top and Ball
The Travelling Companion
Two Brothers
Two Maidens
The Ugly Duckling
Under the Willow Tree
In the Uttermost Parts of the Sea
What One Can Invent
The Wicked Prince
The Wild Swans
The Will-o-the-Wisp in the Town, Says the Wild Woman
The Story of the Wind
The Windmill
The Story of the Year
A STORY
In the garden all the apple-trees were in blossom. They had
hastened to bring forth flowers before they got green leaves, and in
the yard all the ducklings walked up and down, and the cat too: it
basked in the sun and licked the sunshine from its own paws. And
when one looked at the fields, how beautifully the corn stood and
how green it shone, without comparison! and there was a twittering and
a fluttering of all the little birds, as if the day were a great
festival; and so it was, for it was Sunday. All the bells were
ringing, and all the people went to church, looking cheerful, and
dressed in their best clothes. There was a look of cheerfulness on
everything. The day was so warm and beautiful that one might well have
said: "God's kindness to us men is beyond all limits." But inside
the church the pastor stood in the pulpit, and spoke very loudly and
angrily. He said that all men were wicked, and God would punish them
for their sins, and that the wicked, when they died, would be cast
into hell, to burn for ever and ever. He spoke very excitedly,
saying that their evil propensities would not be destroyed, nor
would the fire be extinguished, and they should never find rest.
That was terrible to hear, and he said it in such a tone of
conviction; he described hell to them as a miserable hole where all
the refuse of the world gathers. There was no air beside the hot
burning sulphur flame, and there was no ground under their feet; they,
the wicked ones, sank deeper and deeper, while eternal silence
surrounded them! It was dreadful to hear all that, for the preacher
spoke from his heart, and all the people in the church were terrified.
Meanwhile, the birds sang merrily outside, and the sun was shining
so beautifully warm, it seemed as though every little flower said:
"God, Thy kindness towards us all is without limits." Indeed,
outside it was not at all like the pastor's sermon.
The same evening, upon going to bed, the pastor noticed his wife
sitting there quiet and pensive.
"What is the matter with you?" he asked her.
"Well, the matter with me is," she said, "that I cannot collect my
thoughts, and am unable to grasp the meaning of what you said to-day
in church--that there are so many wicked people, and that they
should burn eternally. Alas! eternally--how long! I am only a woman
and a sinner before God, but I should not have the heart to let even
the worst sinner burn for ever, and how could our Lord to do so, who
is so infinitely good, and who knows how the wickedness comes from
without and within? No, I am unable to imagine that, although you
say so."
It was autumn; the trees dropped their leaves, the earnest and
severe pastor sat at the bedside of a dying person. A pious,
faithful soul closed her eyes for ever; she was the pastor's wife.
..."If any one shall find rest in the grave and mercy before our
Lord you shall certainly do so," said the pastor. He folded her
hands and read a psalm over the dead woman.
She was buried; two large tears rolled over the cheeks of the
earnest man, and in the parsonage it was empty and still, for its
sun had set for ever. She had gone home.
It was night. A cold wind swept over the pastor's head; he
opened his eyes, and it seemed to him as if the moon was shining
into his room. It was not so, however; there was a being standing
before his bed, and looking like the ghost of his deceased wife. She
fixed her eyes upon him with such a kind and sad expression, just as
if she wished to say something to him. The pastor raised himself in
bed and stretched his arms towards her, saying, "Not even you can find
eternal rest! You suffer, you best and most pious woman?"
The dead woman nodded her head as if to say "Yes," and put her
hand on her breast.
"And can I not obtain rest in the grave for you?"
"Yes," was the answer.
"And how?"
"Give me one hair--only one single hair--from the head of the
sinner for whom the fire shall never be extinguished, of the sinner
whom God will condemn to eternal punishment in hell."
"Yes, one ought to be able to redeem you so easily, you pure,
pious woman," he said.
"Follow me," said the dead woman. "It is thus granted to us. By my
side you will be able to fly wherever your thoughts wish to go.
Invisible to men, we shall penetrate into their most secret
chambers; but with sure hand you must find out him who is destined
to eternal torture, and before the cock crows he must be found!" As
quickly as if carried by the winged thoughts they were in the great
city, and from the walls the names of the deadly sins shone in flaming
letters: pride, avarice, drunkenness, wantonness--in short, the
whole seven-coloured bow of sin.
"Yes, therein, as I believed, as I knew it," said the pastor, "are
living those who are abandoned to the eternal fire." And they were
standing before the magnificently illuminated gate; the broad steps
were adorned with carpets and flowers, and dance music was sounding
through the festive halls. A footman dressed in silk and velvet
stood with a large silver-mounted rod near the entrance.
"Our ball can compare favourably with the king's," he said, and
turned with contempt towards the gazing crowd in the street. What he
thought was sufficiently expressed in his features and movements:
"Miserable beggars, who are looking in, you are nothing in
comparison to me."
"Pride," said the dead woman; "do you see him?"
"The footman?" asked the pastor. "He is but a poor fool, and not
doomed to be tortured eternally by fire!"
"Only a fool!" It sounded through the whole house of pride: they
were all fools there.
Then they flew within the four naked walls of the miser. Lean as a
skeleton, trembling with cold, and hunger, the old man was clinging
with all his thoughts to his money. They saw him jump up feverishly
from his miserable couch and take a loose stone out of the wall; there
lay gold coins in an old stocking. They saw him anxiously feeling over
an old ragged coat in which pieces of gold were sewn, and his clammy
fingers trembled.
"He is ill! That is madness--a joyless madness--besieged by fear
and dreadful dreams!"
They quickly went away and came before the beds of the
criminals; these unfortunate people slept side by side, in long
rows. Like a ferocious animal, one of them rose out of his sleep and
uttered a horrible cry, and gave his comrade a violent dig in the ribs
with his pointed elbow, and this one turned round in his sleep:
"Be quiet, monster--sleep! This happens every night!"
"Every night!" repeated the other. "Yes, every night he comes
and tortures me! In my violence I have done this and that. I was
born with an evil mind, which has brought me hither for the second
time; but if I have done wrong I suffer punishment for it. One
thing, however, I have not yet confessed. When I came out a little
while ago, and passed by the yard of my former master, evil thoughts
rose within me when I remembered this and that. I struck a match a
little bit on the wall; probably it came a little too close to the
thatched roof. All burnt down--a great heat rose, such as sometimes
overcomes me. I myself helped to rescue cattle and things, nothing
alive burnt, except a flight of pigeons, which flew into the fire, and
the yard dog, of which I had not thought; one could hear him howl
out of the fire, and this howling I still hear when I wish to sleep;
and when I have fallen asleep, the great rough dog comes and places
himself upon me, and howls, presses, and tortures me. Now listen to
what I tell you! You can snore; you are snoring the whole night, and I
hardly a quarter of an hour!" And the blood rose to the head of the
excited criminal; he threw himself upon his comrade, and beat him with
his clenched fist in the face.
"Wicked Matz has become mad again!" they said amongst
themselves. The other criminals seized him, wrestled with him, and
bent him double, so that his head rested between his knees, and they
tied him, so that the blood almost came out of his eyes and out of all
his pores.
"You are killing the unfortunate man," said the pastor, and as
he stretched out his hand to protect him who already suffered too
much, the scene changed. They flew through rich halls and wretched
hovels; wantonness and envy, all the deadly sins, passed before
them. An angel of justice read their crimes and their defence; the
latter was not a brilliant one, but it was read before God, Who
reads the heart, Who knows everything, the wickedness that comes
from within and from without, Who is mercy and love personified. The
pastor's hand trembled; he dared not stretch it out, he did not
venture to pull a hair out of the sinner's head. And tears gushed from
his eyes like a stream of mercy and love, the cooling waters of
which extinguished the eternal fire of hell.
Just then the cock crowed.
"Father of all mercy, grant Thou to her the peace that I was
unable to procure for her!"
"I have it now!" said the dead woman. "It was your hard words,
your despair of mankind, your gloomy belief in God and His creation,
which drove me to you. Learn to know mankind! Even in the wicked one
lives a part of God--and this extinguishes and conquers the flame of
hell!"
The pastor felt a kiss on his lips; a gleam of light surrounded
him--God's bright sun shone into the room, and his wife, alive,
sweet and full of love, awoke him from a dream which God had sent him!
BY THE ALMSHOUSE WINDOW
Near the grass-covered rampart which encircles Copenhagen lies a
great red house. Balsams and other flowers greet us from the long rows
of windows in the house, whose interior is sufficiently
poverty-stricken; and poor and old are the people who inhabit it.
The building is the Warton Almshouse.
Look! at the window there leans an old maid. She plucks the
withered leaf from the balsam, and looks at the grass-covered rampart,
on which many children are playing. What is the old maid thinking
of? A whole life drama is unfolding itself before her inward gaze.
"The poor little children, how happy they are--how merrily they
play and romp together! What red cheeks and what angels' eyes! but
they have no shoes nor stockings. They dance on the green rampart,
just on the place where, according to the old story, the ground always
sank in, and where a sportive, frolicsome child had been lured by
means of flowers, toys and sweetmeats into an open grave ready dug for
it, and which was afterwards closed over the child; and from that
moment, the old story says, the ground gave way no longer, the mound
remained firm and fast, and was quickly covered with the green turf.
The little people who now play on that spot know nothing of the old
tale, else would they fancy they heard a child crying deep below the
earth, and the dewdrops on each blade of grass would be to them
tears of woe. Nor do they know anything of the Danish King who here,
in the face of the coming foe, took an oath before all his trembling
courtiers that he would hold out with the citizens of his capital, and
die here in his nest; they know nothing of the men who have fought
here, or of the women who from here have drenched with boiling water
the enemy, clad in white, and 'biding in the snow to surprise the
city.
"No! the poor little ones are playing with light, childish
spirits. Play on, play on, thou little maiden! Soon the years will
come--yes, those glorious years. The priestly hands have been laid
on the candidates for confirmation; hand in hand they walk on the
green rampart. Thou hast a white frock on; it has cost thy mother much
labor, and yet it is only cut down for thee out of an old larger
dress! You will also wear a red shawl; and what if it hang too far
down? People will only see how large, how very large it is. You are
thinking of your dress, and of the Giver of all good--so glorious is
it to wander on the green rampart!
"And the years roll by; they have no lack of dark days, but you
have your cheerful young spirit, and you have gained a friend--you
know not how. You met, oh, how often! You walk together on the rampart
in the fresh spring, on the high days and holidays, when all the world
come out to walk upon the ramparts, and all the bells of the church
steeples seem to be singing a song of praise for the coming spring.
"Scarcely have the violets come forth, but there on the rampart,
just opposite the beautiful Castle of Rosenberg, there is a tree
bright with the first green buds. Every year this tree sends forth
fresh green shoots. Alas! It is not so with the human heart! Dark
mists, more in number than those that cover the northern skies,
cloud the human heart. Poor child! thy friend's bridal chamber is a
black coffin, and thou becomest an old maid. From the almshouse
window, behind the balsams, thou shalt look on the merry children at
play, and shalt see thine own history renewed."
And that is the life drama that passes before the old maid while
she looks out upon the rampart, the green, sunny rampart, where the
children, with their red cheeks and bare shoeless feet, are
rejoicing merrily, like the other free little birds.
THE ANGEL
"Whenever a good child dies, an angel of God comes down from
heaven, takes the dead child in his arms, spreads out his great
white wings, and flies with him over all the places which the child
had loved during his life. Then he gathers a large handful of flowers,
which he carries up to the Almighty, that they may bloom more brightly
in heaven than they do on earth. And the Almighty presses the
flowers to His heart, but He kisses the flower that pleases Him
best, and it receives a voice, and is able to join the song of the
chorus of bliss."
These words were spoken by an angel of God, as he carried a dead
child up to heaven, and the child listened as if in a dream. Then they
passed over well-known spots, where the little one had often played,
and through beautiful gardens full of lovely flowers.
"Which of these shall we take with us to heaven to be transplanted
there?" asked the angel.
Close by grew a slender, beautiful, rose-bush, but some wicked
hand had broken the stem, and the half-opened rosebuds hung faded
and withered on the trailing branches.
"Poor rose-bush!" said the child, "let us take it with us to
heaven, that it may bloom above in God's garden."
The angel took up the rose-bush; then he kissed the child, and the
little one half opened his eyes. The angel gathered also some
beautiful flowers, as well as a few humble buttercups and
heart's-ease.
"Now we have flowers enough," said the child; but the angel only
nodded, he did not fly upward to heaven.
It was night, and quite still in the great town. Here they
remained, and the angel hovered over a small, narrow street, in
which lay a large heap of straw, ashes, and sweepings from the
houses of people who had removed. There lay fragments of plates,
pieces of plaster, rags, old hats, and other rubbish not pleasant to
see. Amidst all this confusion, the angel pointed to the pieces of a
broken flower-pot, and to a lump of earth which had fallen out of
it. The earth had been kept from falling to pieces by the roots of a
withered field-flower, which had been thrown amongst the rubbish.
"We will take this with us," said the angel, "I will tell you
why as we fly along."
And as they flew the angel related the history.
"Down in that narrow lane, in a low cellar, lived a poor sick boy;
he had been afflicted from his childhood, and even in his best days he
could just manage to walk up and down the room on crutches once or
twice, but no more. During some days in summer, the sunbeams would lie
on the floor of the cellar for about half an hour. In this spot the
poor sick boy would sit warming himself in the sunshine, and
watching the red blood through his delicate fingers as he held them
before his face. Then he would say he had been out, yet he knew
nothing of the green forest in its spring verdure, till a neighbor's
son brought him a green bough from a beech-tree. This he would place
over his head, and fancy that he was in the beech-wood while the sun
shone, and the birds carolled gayly. One spring day the neighbor's boy
brought him some field-flowers, and among them was one to which the
root still adhered. This he carefully planted in a flower-pot, and
placed in a window-seat near his bed. And the flower had been
planted by a fortunate hand, for it grew, put forth fresh shoots,
and blossomed every year. It became a splendid flower-garden to the
sick boy, and his little treasure upon earth. He watered it, and
cherished it, and took care it should have the benefit of every
sunbeam that found its way into the cellar, from the earliest
morning ray to the evening sunset. The flower entwined itself even
in his dreams--for him it bloomed, for him spread its perfume. And
it gladdened his eyes, and to the flower he turned, even in death,
when the Lord called him. He has been one year with God. During that
time the flower has stood in the window, withered and forgotten,
till at length cast out among the sweepings into the street, on the
day of the lodgers' removal. And this poor flower, withered and
faded as it is, we have added to our nosegay, because it gave more
real joy than the most beautiful flower in the garden of a queen."
"But how do you know all this?" asked the child whom the angel was
carrying to heaven.
"I know it," said the angel, "because I myself was the poor sick
boy who walked upon crutches, and I know my own flower well."
Then the child opened his eyes and looked into the glorious
happy face of the angel, and at the same moment they found
themselves in that heavenly home where all is happiness and joy. And
God pressed the dead child to His heart, and wings were given him so
that he could fly with the angel, hand in hand. Then the Almighty
pressed all the flowers to His heart; but He kissed the withered
field-flower, and it received a voice. Then it joined in the song of
the angels, who surrounded the throne, some near, and others in a
distant circle, but all equally happy. They all joined in the chorus
of praise, both great and small,--the good, happy child, and the
poor field-flower, that once lay withered and cast away on a heap of
rubbish in a narrow, dark street.
ANNE LISBETH
Anne Lisbeth was a beautiful young woman, with a red and white
complexion, glittering white teeth, and clear soft eyes; and her
footstep was light in the dance, but her mind was lighter still. She
had a little child, not at all pretty; so he was put out to be
nursed by a laborer's wife, and his mother went to the count's castle.
She sat in splendid rooms, richly decorated with silk and velvet;
not a breath of air was allowed to blow upon her, and no one was
allowed to speak to her harshly, for she was nurse to the count's
child. He was fair and delicate as a prince, and beautiful as an
angel; and how she loved this child! Her own boy was provided for by
being at the laborer's where the mouth watered more frequently than
the pot boiled, and where in general no one was at home to take care
of the child. Then he would cry, but what nobody knows nobody cares
for; so he would cry till he was tired, and then fall asleep; and
while we are asleep we can feel neither hunger nor thirst. Ah, yes;
sleep is a capital invention.
As years went on, Anne Lisbeth's child grew apace like weeds,
although they said his growth had been stunted. He had become quite
a member of the family in which he dwelt; they received money to
keep him, so that his mother got rid of him altogether. She had become
quite a lady; she had a comfortable home of her own in the town; and
out of doors, when she went for a walk, she wore a bonnet; but she
never walked out to see the laborer: that was too far from the town,
and, indeed, she had nothing to go for, the boy now belonged to
these laboring people. He had food, and he could also do something
towards earning his living; he took care of Mary's red cow, for he
knew how to tend cattle and make himself useful.
The great dog by the yard gate of a nobleman's mansion sits
proudly on the top of his kennel when the sun shines, and barks at
every one that passes; but if it rains, he creeps into his house,
and there he is warm and dry. Anne Lisbeth's boy also sat in the
sunshine on the top of the fence, cutting out a little toy. If it
was spring-time, he knew of three strawberry-plants in blossom,
which would certainly bear fruit. This was his most hopeful thought,
though it often came to nothing. And he had to sit out in the rain
in the worst weather, and get wet to the skin, and let the cold wind
dry the clothes on his back afterwards. If he went near the farmyard
belonging to the count, he was pushed and knocked about, for the men
and the maids said he was so horrible ugly; but he was used to all
this, for nobody loved him. This was how the world treated Anne
Lisbeth's boy, and how could it be otherwise. It was his fate to be
beloved by no one. Hitherto he had been a land crab; the land at
last cast him adrift. He went to sea in a wretched vessel, and sat
at the helm, while the skipper sat over the grog-can. He was dirty and
ugly, half-frozen and half-starved; he always looked as if he never
had enough to eat, which was really the case.
Late in the autumn, when the weather was rough, windy, and wet,
and the cold penetrated through the thickest clothing, especially at
sea, a wretched boat went out to sea with only two men on board, or,
more correctly, a man and a half, for it was the skipper and his
boy. There had only been a kind of twilight all day, and it soon
grew quite dark, and so bitterly cold, that the skipper took a dram to
warm him. The bottle was old, and the glass too. It was perfect in the
upper part, but the foot was broken off, and it had therefore been
fixed upon a little carved block of wood, painted blue. A dram is a
great comfort, and two are better still, thought the skipper, while
the boy sat at the helm, which he held fast in his hard seamed
hands. He was ugly, and his hair was matted, and he looked crippled
and stunted; they called him the field-laborer's boy, though in the
church register he was entered as Anne Lisbeth's son. The wind cut
through the rigging, and the boat cut through the sea. The sails,
filled by the wind, swelled out and carried them along in wild career.
It was wet and rough above and below, and might still be worse.
Hold! what is that? What has struck the boat? Was it a waterspout,
or a heavy sea rolling suddenly upon them?
"Heaven help us!" cried the boy at the helm, as the boat heeled
over and lay on its beam ends. It had struck on a rock, which rose
from the depths of the sea, and sank at once, like an old shoe in a
puddle. "It sank at once with mouse and man," as the saying is.
There might have been mice on board, but only one man and a half,
the skipper and the laborer's boy. No one saw it but the skimming
sea-gulls and the fishes beneath the water; and even they did not
see it properly, for they darted back with terror as the boat filled
with water and sank. There it lay, scarcely a fathom below the
surface, and those two were provided for, buried, and forgotten. The
glass with the foot of blue wood was the only thing that did not sink,
for the wood floated and the glass drifted away to be cast upon the
shore and broken; where and when, is indeed of no consequence. It
had served its purpose, and it had been loved, which Anne Lisbeth's
boy had not been. But in heaven no soul will be able to say, "Never
loved."
Anne Lisbeth had now lived in the town many years; she was
called "Madame," and felt dignified in consequence; she remembered the
old, noble days, in which she had driven in the carriage, and had
associated with countess and baroness. Her beautiful, noble child
had been a dear angel, and possessed the kindest heart; he had loved
her so much, and she had loved him in return; they had kissed and
loved each other, and the boy had been her joy, her second life. Now
he was fourteen years of age, tall, handsome, and clever. She had
not seen him since she carried him in her arms; neither had she been
for years to the count's palace; it was quite a journey thither from
the town.
"I must make one effort to go," said Anne Lisbeth, "to see my
darling, the count's sweet child, and press him to my heart. Certainly
he must long to see me, too, the young count; no doubt he thinks of me
and loves me, as in those days when he would fling his angel-arms
round my neck, and lisp 'Anne Liz.' It was music to my ears. Yes, I
must make an effort to see him again." She drove across the country in
a grazier's cart, and then got out, and continued her journey on foot,
and thus reached the count's castle. It was as great and magnificent
as it had always been, and the garden looked the same as ever; all the
servants were strangers to her, not one of them knew Anne Lisbeth, nor
of what consequence she had once been there; but she felt sure the
countess would soon let them know it, and her darling boy, too: how
she longed to see him!
Now that Anne Lisbeth was at her journey's end, she was kept
waiting a long time; and for those who wait, time passes slowly. But
before the great people went in to dinner, she was called in and
spoken to very graciously. She was to go in again after dinner, and
then she would see her sweet boy once more. How tall, and slender, and
thin he had grown; but the eyes and the sweet angel mouth were still
beautiful. He looked at her, but he did not speak, he certainly did
not know who she was. He turned round and was going away, but she
seized his hand and pressed it to her lips.
"Well, well," he said; and with that he walked out of the room. He
who filled her every thought! he whom she loved best, and who was
her whole earthly pride!
Anne Lisbeth went forth from the castle into the public road,
feeling mournful and sad; he whom she had nursed day and night, and
even now carried about in her dreams, had been cold and strange, and
had not a word or thought respecting her. A great black raven darted
down in front of her on the high road, and croaked dismally.
"Ah," said she, "what bird of ill omen art thou?" Presently she
passed the laborer's hut; his wife stood at the door, and the two
women spoke to each other.
"You look well," said the woman; "you're fat and plump; you are
well off."
"Oh yes," answered Anne Lisbeth.
"The boat went down with them," continued the woman; "Hans the
skipper and the boy were both drowned; so there's an end of them. I
always thought the boy would be able to help me with a few dollars.
He'll never cost you anything more, Anne Lisbeth."
"So they were drowned," repeated Anne Lisbeth; but she said no
more, and the subject was dropped. She felt very low-spirited, because
her count-child had shown no inclination to speak to her who loved him
so well, and who had travelled so far to see him. The journey had cost
money too, and she had derived no great pleasure from it. Still she
said not a word of all this; she could not relieve her heart by
telling the laborer's wife, lest the latter should think she did not
enjoy her former position at the castle. Then the raven flew over her,
screaming again as he flew.
"The black wretch!" said Anne Lisbeth, "he will end by frightening
me today." She had brought coffee and chicory with her, for she
thought it would be a charity to the poor woman to give them to her to
boil a cup of coffee, and then she would take a cup herself.
The woman prepared the coffee, and in the meantime Anne Lisbeth
seated her in a chair and fell asleep. Then she dreamed of something
which she had never dreamed before; singularly enough she dreamed of
her own child, who had wept and hungered in the laborer's hut, and had
been knocked about in heat and in cold, and who was now lying in the
depths of the sea, in a spot only known by God. She fancied she was
still sitting in the hut, where the woman was busy preparing the
coffee, for she could smell the coffee-berries roasting. But
suddenly it seemed to her that there stood on the threshold a
beautiful young form, as beautiful as the count's child, and this
apparition said to her, "The world is passing away; hold fast to me,
for you are my mother after all; you have an angel in heaven, hold
me fast;" and the child-angel stretched out his hand and seized her.
Then there was a terrible crash, as of a world crumbling to pieces,
and the angel-child was rising from the earth, and holding her by
the sleeve so tightly that she felt herself lifted from the ground;
but, on the other hand, something heavy hung to her feet and dragged
her down, and it seemed as if hundreds of women were clinging to
her, and crying, "If thou art to be saved, we must be saved too.
Hold fast, hold fast." And then they all hung on her, but there were
too many; and as they clung the sleeve was torn, and Anne Lisbeth fell
down in horror, and awoke. Indeed she was on the point of falling over
in reality with the chair on which she sat; but she was so startled
and alarmed that she could not remember what she had dreamed, only
that it was something very dreadful.
They drank their coffee and had a chat together, and then Anne
Lisbeth went away towards the little town where she was to meet the
carrier, who was to drive her back to her own home. But when she
came to him she found that he would not be ready to start till the
evening of the next day. Then she began to think of the expense, and
what the distance would be to walk. She remembered that the route by
the sea-shore was two miles shorter than by the high road; and as
the weather was clear, and there would be moonlight, she determined to
make her way on foot, and to start at once, that she might reach
home the next day.
The sun had set, and the evening bells sounded through the air
from the tower of the village church, but to her it was not the bells,
but the cry of the frogs in the marshes. Then they ceased, and all
around became still; not a bird could be heard, they were all at rest,
even the owl had not left her hiding place; deep silence reigned on
the margin of the wood by the sea-shore. As Anne Lisbeth walked on she
could hear her own footsteps in the sands; even the waves of the sea
were at rest, and all in the deep waters had sunk into silence.
There was quiet among the dead and the living in the deep sea. Anne
Lisbeth walked on, thinking of nothing at all, as people say, or
rather her thoughts wandered, but not away from her, for thought is
never absent from us, it only slumbers. Many thoughts that have lain
dormant are roused at the proper time, and begin to stir in the mind
and the heart, and seem even to come upon us from above. It is
written, that a good deed bears a blessing for its fruit; and it is
also written, that the wages of sin is death. Much has been said and
much written which we pass over or know nothing of. A light arises
within us, and then forgotten things make themselves remembered; and
thus it was with Anne Lisbeth. The germ of every vice and every virtue
lies in our heart, in yours and in mine; they lie like little grains
of seed, till a ray of sunshine, or the touch of an evil hand, or
you turn the corner to the right or to the left, and the decision is
made. The little seed is stirred, it swells and shoots up, and pours
its sap into your blood, directing your course either for good or
evil. Troublesome thoughts often exist in the mind, fermenting
there, which are not realized by us while the senses are as it were
slumbering; but still they are there. Anne Lisbeth walked on thus with
her senses half asleep, but the thoughts were fermenting within her.
From one Shrove Tuesday to another, much may occur to weigh down
the heart; it is the reckoning of a whole year; much may be forgotten,
sins against heaven in word and thought, sins against our neighbor,
and against our own conscience. We are scarcely aware of their
existence; and Anne Lisbeth did not think of any of her errors. She
had committed no crime against the law of the land; she was an
honorable person, in a good position--that she knew.
She continued her walk along by the margin of the sea. What was it
she saw lying there? An old hat; a man's hat. Now when might that have
been washed overboard? She drew nearer, she stopped to look at the
hat; "Ha! what was lying yonder?" She shuddered; yet it was nothing
save a heap of grass and tangled seaweed flung across a long stone,
but it looked like a corpse. Only tangled grass, and yet she was
frightened at it. As she turned to walk away, much came into her
mind that she had heard in her childhood: old superstitions of
spectres by the sea-shore; of the ghosts of drowned but unburied
people, whose corpses had been washed up on the desolate beach. The
body, she knew, could do no harm to any one, but the spirit could
pursue the lonely wanderer, attach itself to him, and demand to be
carried to the churchyard, that it might rest in consecrated ground.
"Hold fast! hold fast!" the spectre would cry; and as Anne Lisbeth
murmured these words to herself, the whole of her dream was suddenly
recalled to her memory, when the mother had clung to her, and
uttered these words, when, amid the crashing of worlds, her sleeve had
been torn, and she had slipped from the grasp of her child, who wanted
to hold her up in that terrible hour. Her child, her own child,
which she had never loved, lay now buried in the sea, and might rise
up, like a spectre, from the waters, and cry, "Hold fast; carry me
to consecrated ground!"
As these thoughts passed through her mind, fear gave speed to
her feet, so that she walked faster and faster. Fear came upon her
as if a cold, clammy hand had been laid upon her heart, so that she
almost fainted. As she looked across the sea, all there grew darker; a
heavy mist came rolling onwards, and clung to bush and tree,
distorting them into fantastic shapes. She turned and glanced at the
moon, which had risen behind her. It looked like a pale, rayless
surface, and a deadly weight seemed to hang upon her limbs. "Hold,"
thought she; and then she turned round a second time to look at the
moon. A white face appeared quite close to her, with a mist, hanging
like a garment from its shoulders. "Stop! carry me to consecrated
earth," sounded in her ears, in strange, hollow tones. The sound did
not come from frogs or ravens; she saw no sign of such creatures. "A
grave! dig me a grave!" was repeated quite loud. Yes, it was indeed
the spectre of her child. The child that lay beneath the ocean, and
whose spirit could have no rest until it was carried to the
churchyard, and until a grave had been dug for it in consecrated
ground. She would go there at once, and there she would dig. She
turned in the direction of the church, and the weight on her heart
seemed to grow lighter, and even to vanish altogether; but when she
turned to go home by the shortest way, it returned. "Stop! stop!"
and the words came quite clear, though they were like the croak of a
frog, or the wail of a bird. "A grave! dig me a grave!"
The mist was cold and damp, her hands and face were moist and
clammy with horror, a heavy weight again seized her and clung to
her, her mind became clear for thoughts that had never before been
there.
In these northern regions, a beech-wood often buds in a single
night and appears in the morning sunlight in its full glory of
youthful green. So, in a single instant, can the consciousness of
the sin that has been committed in thoughts, words, and actions of our
past life, be unfolded to us. When once the conscience is awakened, it
springs up in the heart spontaneously, and God awakens the
conscience when we least expect it. Then we can find no excuse for
ourselves; the deed is there and bears witness against us. The
thoughts seem to become words, and to sound far out into the world. We
are horrified at the thought of what we have carried within us, and at
the consciousness that we have not overcome the evil which has its
origin in thoughtlessness and pride. The heart conceals within
itself the vices as well as the virtues, and they grow in the
shallowest ground. Anne Lisbeth now experienced in thought what we
have clothed in words. She was overpowered by them, and sank down
and crept along for some distance on the ground. "A grave! dig me a
grave!" sounded again in her ears, and she would have gladly buried
herself, if in the grave she could have found forgetfulness of her
actions.
It was the first hour of her awakening, full of anguish and
horror. Superstition made her alternately shudder with cold or burn
with the heat of fever. Many things, of which she had feared even to
speak, came into her mind. Silently, as the cloud-shadows in the
moonshine, a spectral apparition flitted by her; she had heard of it
before. Close by her galloped four snorting steeds, with fire flashing
from their eyes and nostrils. They dragged a burning coach, and within
it sat the wicked lord of the manor, who had ruled there a hundred
years before. The legend says that every night, at twelve o'clock,
he drove into his castleyard and out again. He was not as pale as dead
men are, but black as a coal. He nodded, and pointed to Anne
Lisbeth, crying out, "Hold fast! hold fast! and then you may ride
again in a nobleman's carriage, and forget your child."
She gathered herself up, and hastened to the churchyard; but black
crosses and black ravens danced before her eyes, and she could not
distinguish one from the other. The ravens croaked as the raven had
done which she saw in the daytime, but now she understood what they
said. "I am the raven-mother; I am the raven-mother," each raven
croaked, and Anne Lisbeth felt that the name also applied to her;
and she fancied she should be transformed into a black bird, and
have to cry as they cried, if she did not dig the grave. And she threw
herself upon the earth, and with her hands dug a grave in the hard
ground, so that the blood ran from her fingers. "A grave! dig me a
grave!" still sounded in her ears; she was fearful that the cock might
crow, and the first red streak appear in the east, before she had
finished her work; and then she would be lost. And the cock crowed,
and the day dawned in the east, and the grave was only half dug. An
icy hand passed over her head and face, and down towards her heart.
"Only half a grave," a voice wailed, and fled away. Yes, it fled
away over the sea; it was the ocean spectre; and, exhausted and
overpowered, Anne Lisbeth sunk to the ground, and her senses left her.
It was a bright day when she came to herself, and two men were
raising her up; but she was not lying in the churchyard, but on the
sea-shore, where she had dug a deep hole in the sand, and cut her hand
with a piece of broken glass, whose sharp stern was stuck in a
little block of painted wood. Anne Lisbeth was in a fever.
Conscience had roused the memories of superstitions, and had so
acted upon her mind, that she fancied she had only half a soul, and
that her child had taken the other half down into the sea. Never would
she be able to cling to the mercy of Heaven till she had recovered
this other half which was now held fast in the deep water.
Anne Lisbeth returned to her home, but she was no longer the woman
she had been. Her thoughts were like a confused, tangled skein; only
one thread, only one thought was clear to her, namely that she must
carry the spectre of the sea-shore to the churchyard, and dig a
grave for him there; that by so doing she might win back her soul.
Many a night she was missed from her home, and was always found on the
sea-shore waiting for the spectre.
In this way a whole year passed; and then one night she vanished
again, and was not to be found. The whole of the next day was spent in
a useless search after her.
Towards evening, when the clerk entered the church to toll the
vesper bell, he saw by the altar Anne Lisbeth, who had spent the whole
day there. Her powers of body were almost exhausted, but her eyes
flashed brightly, and on her cheeks was a rosy flush. The last rays of
the setting sun shone upon her, and gleamed over the altar upon the
shining clasps of the Bible, which lay open at the words of the
prophet Joel, "Rend your hearts and not your garments, and turn unto
the Lord."
"That was just a chance," people said; but do things happen by
chance? In the face of Anne Lisbeth, lighted up by the evening sun,
could be seen peace and rest. She said she was happy now, for she
had conquered. The spectre of the shore, her own child, had come to
her the night before, and had said to her, "Thou hast dug me only half
a grave: but thou hast now, for a year and a day, buried me altogether
in thy heart, and it is there a mother can best hide her child!" And
then he gave her back her lost soul, and brought her into the
church. "Now I am in the house of God," she said, "and in that house
we are happy."
When the sun set, Anne Lisbeth's soul had risen to that region
where there is no more pain; and Anne Lisbeth's troubles were at an
end.
THE CONCEITED APPLE-BRANCH
It was the month of May. The wind still blew cold; but from bush
and tree, field and flower, came the welcome sound, "Spring is
come." Wild-flowers in profusion covered the hedges. Under the
little apple-tree, Spring seemed busy, and told his tale from one of
the branches which hung fresh and blooming, and covered with
delicate pink blossoms that were just ready to open. The branch well
knew how beautiful it was; this knowledge exists as much in the leaf
as in the blood; I was therefore not surprised when a nobleman's
carriage, in which sat the young countess, stopped in the road just
by. She said that an apple-branch was a most lovely object, and an
emblem of spring in its most charming aspect. Then the branch was
broken off for her, and she held it in her delicate hand, and
sheltered it with her silk parasol. Then they drove to the castle,
in which were lofty halls and splendid drawing-rooms. Pure white
curtains fluttered before the open windows, and beautiful flowers
stood in shining, transparent vases; and in one of them, which
looked as if it had been cut out of newly fallen snow, the
apple-branch was placed, among some fresh, light twigs of beech. It
was a charming sight. Then the branch became proud, which was very
much like human nature.
People of every description entered the room, and, according to
their position in society, so dared they to express their
admiration. Some few said nothing, others expressed too much, and
the apple-branch very soon got to understand that there was as much
difference in the characters of human beings as in those of plants and
flowers. Some are all for pomp and parade, others have a great deal to
do to maintain their own importance, while the rest might be spared
without much loss to society. So thought the apple-branch, as he stood
before the open window, from which he could see out over gardens and
fields, where there were flowers and plants enough for him to think
and reflect upon; some rich and beautiful, some poor and humble
indeed.
"Poor, despised herbs," said the apple-branch; "there is really
a difference between them and such as I am. How unhappy they must
be, if they can feel as those in my position do! There is a difference
indeed, and so there ought to be, or we should all be equals."
And the apple-branch looked with a sort of pity upon them,
especially on a certain little flower that is found in fields and in
ditches. No one bound these flowers together in a nosegay; they were
too common; they were even known to grow between the paving-stones,
shooting up everywhere, like bad weeds; and they bore the very ugly
name of "dog-flowers" or "dandelions."
"Poor, despised plants," said the apple-bough, "it is not your
fault that you are so ugly, and that you have such an ugly name; but
it is with plants as with men,--there must be a difference."
"A difference!" cried the sunbeam, as he kissed the blooming
apple-branch, and then kissed the yellow dandelion out in the
fields. All were brothers, and the sunbeam kissed them--the poor
flowers as well as the rich.
The apple-bough had never thought of the boundless love of God,
which extends over all the works of creation, over everything which
lives, and moves, and has its being in Him; he had never thought of
the good and beautiful which are so often hidden, but can never remain
forgotten by Him,--not only among the lower creation, but also among
men. The sunbeam, the ray of light, knew better.
"You do not see very far, nor very clearly," he said to the
apple-branch. "Which is the despised plant you so specially pity?"
"The dandelion," he replied. "No one ever places it in a
nosegay; it is often trodden under foot, there are so many of them;
and when they run to seed, they have flowers like wool, which fly away
in little pieces over the roads, and cling to the dresses of the
people. They are only weeds; but of course there must be weeds. O, I
am really very thankful that I was not made like one of these
flowers."
There came presently across the fields a whole group of
children, the youngest of whom was so small that it had to be
carried by the others; and when he was seated on the grass, among
the yellow flowers, he laughed aloud with joy, kicked out his little
legs, rolled about, plucked the yellow flowers, and kissed them in
childlike innocence. The elder children broke off the flowers with
long stems, bent the stalks one round the other, to form links, and
made first a chain for the neck, then one to go across the
shoulders, and hang down to the waist, and at last a wreath to wear
round the head, so that they looked quite splendid in their garlands
of green stems and golden flowers. But the eldest among them
gathered carefully the faded flowers, on the stem of which was grouped
together the seed, in the form of a white feathery coronal. These
loose, airy wool-flowers are very beautiful, and look like fine
snowy feathers or down. The children held them to their mouths, and
tried to blow away the whole coronal with one puff of the breath. They
had been told by their grandmothers that who ever did so would be sure
to have new clothes before the end of the year. The despised flower
was by this raised to the position of a prophet or foreteller of
events.
"Do you see," said the sunbeam, "do you see the beauty of these
flowers? do you see their powers of giving pleasure?"
"Yes, to children," said the apple-bough.
By-and-by an old woman came into the field, and, with a blunt
knife without a handle, began to dig round the roots of some of the
dandelion-plants, and pull them up. With some of these she intended to
make tea for herself; but the rest she was going to sell to the
chemist, and obtain some money.
"But beauty is of higher value than all this," said the apple-tree
branch; "only the chosen ones can be admitted into the realms of the
beautiful. There is a difference between plants, just as there is a
difference between men."
Then the sunbeam spoke of the boundless love of God, as seen in
creation, and over all that lives, and of the equal distribution of
His gifts, both in time and in eternity.
"That is your opinion," said the apple-bough.
Then some people came into the room, and, among them, the young
countess,--the lady who had placed the apple-bough in the
transparent vase, so pleasantly beneath the rays of the sunlight.
She carried in her hand something that seemed like a flower. The
object was hidden by two or three great leaves, which covered it
like a shield, so that no draught or gust of wind could injure it, and
it was carried more carefully than the apple-branch had ever been.
Very cautiously the large leaves were removed, and there appeared
the feathery seed-crown of the despised dandelion. This was what the
lady had so carefully plucked, and carried home so safely covered,
so that not one of the delicate feathery arrows of which its mist-like
shape was so lightly formed, should flutter away. She now drew it
forth quite uninjured, and wondered at its beautiful form, and airy
lightness, and singular construction, so soon to be blown away by
the wind.
"See," she exclaimed, "how wonderfully God has made this little
flower. I will paint it with the apple-branch together. Every one
admires the beauty of the apple-bough; but this humble flower has been
endowed by Heaven with another kind of loveliness; and although they
differ in appearance, both are the children of the realms of beauty."
Then the sunbeam kissed the lowly flower, and he kissed the
blooming apple-branch, upon whose leaves appeared a rosy blush.
BEAUTY OF FORM AND BEAUTY OF MIND
There was once a sculptor, named Alfred, who having won the
large gold medal and obtained a travelling scholarship, went to Italy,
and then came back to his native land. He was young at that
time--indeed, he is young still, although he is ten years older than he
was then. On his return, he went to visit one of the little towns in
the island of Zealand. The whole town knew who the stranger was; and
one of the richest men in the place gave a party in his honor, and all
who were of any consequence, or who possessed some property, were
invited. It was quite an event, and all the town knew of it, so that
it was not necessary to announce it by beat of drum. Apprentice-boys,
children of the poor, and even the poor people themselves, stood
before the house, watching the lighted windows; and the watchman
might easily fancy he was giving a party also, there were so many
people in the streets. There was quite an air of festivity about
it, and the house was full of it; for Mr. Alfred, the sculptor, was
there. He talked and told anecdotes, and every one listened to him
with pleasure, not unmingled with awe; but none felt so much respect
for him as did the elderly widow of a naval officer. She seemed, so
far as Mr. Alfred was concerned, to be like a piece of fresh
blotting-paper that absorbed all he said and asked for more. She
was very appreciative, and incredibly ignorant--a kind of female
Gaspar Hauser.
"I should like to see Rome," she said; "it must be a lovely
city, or so many foreigners would not be constantly arriving there.
Now, do give me a description of Rome. How does the city look when you
enter in at the gate?"
"I cannot very well describe it," said the sculptor; "but you
enter on a large open space, in the centre of which stands an obelisk,
which is a thousand years old."
"An organist!" exclaimed the lady, who had never heard the word
'obelisk.' Several of the guests could scarcely forbear laughing,
and the sculptor would have had some difficulty in keeping his
countenance, but the smile on his lips faded away; for he caught sight
of a pair of dark-blue eyes close by the side of the inquisitive lady.
They belonged to her daughter; and surely no one who had such a
daughter could be silly. The mother was like a fountain of
questions; and the daughter, who listened but never spoke, might
have passed for the beautiful maid of the fountain. How charming she
was! She was a study for the sculptor to contemplate, but not to
converse with; for she did not speak, or, at least, very seldom.
"Has the pope a great family?" inquired the lady.
The young man answered considerately, as if the question had
been a different one, "No; he does not come from a great family."
"That is not what I asked," persisted the widow; "I mean, has he a
wife and children?"
"The pope is not allowed to marry," replied the gentleman.
"I don't like that," was the lady's remark.
She certainly might have asked more sensible questions; but if she
had not been allowed to say just what she liked, would her daughter
have been there, leaning so gracefully on her shoulder, and looking
straight before her, with a smile that was almost mournful on her
face?
Mr. Alfred again spoke of Italy, and of the glorious colors in
Italian scenery; the purple hills, the deep blue of the Mediterranean,
the azure of southern skies, whose brightness and glory could only
be surpassed in the north by the deep-blue eyes of a maiden; and he
said this with a peculiar intonation; but she who should have
understood his meaning looked quite unconscious of it, which also
was charming.
"Beautiful Italy!" sighed some of the guests.
"Oh, to travel there!" exclaimed others.
"Charming! Charming!" echoed from every voice.
"I may perhaps win a hundred thousand dollars in the lottery,"
said the naval officer's widow; "and if I do, we will travel--I and my
daughter; and you, Mr. Alfred, must be our guide. We can all three
travel together, with one or two more of our good friends." And she
nodded in such a friendly way at the company, that each imagined
himself to be the favored person who was to accompany them to Italy.
"Yes, we must go," she continued; "but not to those parts where
there are robbers. We will keep to Rome. In the public roads one is
always safe."
The daughter sighed very gently; and how much there may be in a
sigh, or attributed to it! The young man attributed a great deal of
meaning to this sigh. Those deep-blue eyes, which had been lit up this
evening in honor of him, must conceal treasures, treasures of heart
and mind, richer than all the glories of Rome; and so when he left the
party that night, he had lost it completely to the young lady. The
house of the naval officer's widow was the one most constantly visited
by Mr. Alfred, the sculptor. It was soon understood that his visits
were not intended for that lady, though they were the persons who kept
up the conversation. He came for the sake of the daughter. They called
her Kaela. Her name was really Karen Malena, and these two names had
been contracted into the one name Kaela. She was really beautiful; but
some said she was rather dull, and slept late of a morning.
"She has been accustomed to that," her mother said. "She is a
beauty, and they are always easily tired. She does sleep rather
late; but that makes her eyes so clear."
What power seemed to lie in the depths of those dark eyes! The
young man felt the truth of the proverb, "Still waters run deep:"
and his heart had sunk into their depths. He often talked of his
adventures, and the mamma was as simple and eager in her questions
as on the first evening they met. It was a pleasure to hear Alfred
describe anything. He showed them colored plates of Naples, and
spoke of excursions to Mount Vesuvius, and the eruptions of fire
from it. The naval officer's widow had never heard of them before.
"Good heavens!" she exclaimed. "So that is a burning mountain; but
is it not very dangerous to the people who live near it?"
"Whole cities have been destroyed," he replied; "for instance,
Herculaneum and Pompeii."
"Oh, the poor people! And you saw all that with your own eyes?"
"No; I did not see any of the eruptions which are represented in
those pictures; but I will show you a sketch of my own, which
represents an eruption I once saw."
He placed a pencil sketch on the table; and mamma, who had been
over-powered with the appearance of the colored plates, threw a glance
at the pale drawing and cried in astonishment, "What, did you see it
throw up white fire?"
For a moment, Alfred's respect for Kaela's mamma underwent a
sudden shock, and lessened considerably; but, dazzled by the light
which surrounded Kaela, he soon found it quite natural that the old
lady should have no eye for color. After all, it was of very little
consequence; for Kaela's mamma had the best of all possessions;
namely, Kaela herself.
Alfred and Kaela were betrothed, which was a very natural
result; and the betrothal was announced in the newspaper of the little
town. Mama purchased thirty copies of the paper, that she might cut
out the paragraph and send it to friends and acquaintances. The
betrothed pair were very happy, and the mother was happy too. She said
it seemed like connecting herself with Thorwalsden.
"You are a true successor of Thorwalsden," she said to Alfred; and
it seemed to him as if, in this instance, mamma had said a clever
thing. Kaela was silent; but her eyes shone, her lips smiled, every
movement was graceful,--in fact, she was beautiful; that cannot be
repeated too often. Alfred decided to take a bust of Kaela as well
as of her mother. They sat to him accordingly, and saw how he
moulded and formed the soft clay with his fingers.
"I suppose it is only on our account that you perform this
common-place work yourself, instead of leaving it to your servant to
do all that sticking together."
"It is really necessary that I should mould the clay myself," he
replied.
"Ah, yes, you are always so polite," said mamma, with a smile; and
Kaela silently pressed his hand, all soiled as it was with the clay.
Then he unfolded to them both the beauties of Nature, in all her
works; he pointed out to them how, in the scale of creation, inanimate
matter was inferior to animate nature; the plant above the mineral,
the animal above the plant, and man above them all. He strove to
show them how the beauty of the mind could be displayed in the outward
form, and that it was the sculptor's task to seize upon that beauty of
expression, and produce it in his works. Kaela stood silent, but
nodded in approbation of what he said, while mamma-in-law made the
following confession:--
"It is difficult to follow you; but I go hobbling along after
you with my thoughts, though what you say makes my head whirl round
and round. Still I contrive to lay hold on some of it."
Kaela's beauty had a firm hold on Alfred; it filled his soul,
and held a mastery over him. Beauty beamed from Kaela's every feature,
glittered in her eyes, lurked in the corners of her mouth, and
pervaded every movement of her agile fingers. Alfred, the sculptor,
saw this. He spoke only to her, thought only of her, and the two
became one; and so it may be said she spoke much, for he was always
talking to her; and he and she were one. Such was the betrothal, and
then came the wedding, with bride's-maids and wedding presents, all
duly mentioned in the wedding speech. Mamma-in-law had set up
Thorwalsden's bust at the end of the table, attired in a
dressing-gown; it was her fancy that he should be a guest. Songs
were sung, and cheers given; for it was a gay wedding, and they were a
handsome pair. "Pygmalion loved his Galatea," said one of the songs.
"Ah, that is some of your mythologies," said mamma-in-law.
Next day the youthful pair started for Copenhagen, where they were
to live; mamma-in-law accompanied them, to attend to the "coarse
work," as she always called the domestic arrangements. Kaela looked
like a doll in a doll's house, for everything was bright and new,
and so fine. There they sat, all three; and as for Alfred, a proverb
may describe his position--he looked like a swan amongst the geese.
The magic of form had enchanted him; he had looked at the casket
without caring to inquire what it contained, and that omission often
brings the greatest unhappiness into married life. The casket may be
injured, the gilding may fall off, and then the purchaser regrets
his bargain.
In a large party it is very disagreeable to find a button giving
way, with no studs at hand to fall back upon; but it is worse still in
a large company to be conscious that your wife and mother-in-law are
talking nonsense, and that you cannot depend upon yourself to
produce a little ready wit to carry off the stupidity of the whole
affair.
The young married pair often sat together hand in hand; he would
talk, but she could only now and then let fall a word in the same
melodious voice, the same bell-like tones. It was a mental relief when
Sophy, one of her friends, came to pay them a visit. Sophy was not,
pretty. She was, however, quite free from any physical deformity,
although Kaela used to say she was a little crooked; but no eye,
save an intimate acquaintance, would have noticed it. She was a very
sensible girl, yet it never occurred to her that she might be a
dangerous person in such a house. Her appearance created a new
atmosphere in the doll's house, and air was really required, they
all owned that. They felt the want of a change of air, and
consequently the young couple and their mother travelled to Italy.
"Thank heaven we are at home again within our own four walls,"
said mamma-in-law and daughter both, on their return after a year's
absence.
"There is no real pleasure in travelling," said mamma; "to tell
the truth, it's very wearisome; I beg pardon for saying so. I was soon
very tired of it, although I had my children with me; and, besides,
it's very expensive work travelling, very expensive. And all those
galleries one is expected to see, and the quantity of things you are
obliged to run after! It must be done, for very shame; you are sure to
be asked when you come back if you have seen everything, and will most
likely be told that you've omitted to see what was best worth seeing
of all. I got tired at last of those endless Madonnas; I began to
think I was turning into a Madonna myself."
"And then the living, mamma," said Kaela.
"Yes, indeed," she replied, "no such a thing as a respectable meat
soup--their cookery is miserable stuff."
The journey had also tired Kaela; but she was always fatigued,
that was the worst of it. So they sent for Sophy, and she was taken
into the house to reside with them, and her presence there was a great
advantage. Mamma-in-law acknowledged that Sophy was not only a
clever housewife, but well-informed and accomplished, though that
could hardly be expected in a person of her limited means. She was
also a generous-hearted, faithful girl; she showed that thoroughly
while Kaela lay sick, fading away. When the casket is everything,
the casket should be strong, or else all is over. And all was over
with the casket, for Kaela died.
"She was beautiful," said her mother; "she was quite different
from the beauties they call 'antiques,' for they are so damaged. A
beauty ought to be perfect, and Kaela was a perfect beauty."
Alfred wept, and mamma wept, and they both wore mourning. The
black dress suited mamma very well, and she wore mourning the longest.
She had also to experience another grief in seeing Alfred marry again,
marry Sophy, who was nothing at all to look at. "He's gone to the very
extreme," said mamma-in-law; "he has gone from the most beautiful to
the ugliest, and he has forgotten his first wife. Men have no
constancy. My husband was a very different man,--but then he died
before me."
"'Pygmalion loved his Galatea,' was in the song they sung at my
first wedding," said Alfred; "I once fell in love with a beautiful
statue, which awoke to life in my arms; but the kindred soul, which is
a gift from heaven, the angel who can feel and sympathize with and
elevate us, I have not found and won till now. You came, Sophy, not in
the glory of outward beauty, though you are even fairer than is
necessary. The chief thing still remains. You came to teach the
sculptor that his work is but dust and clay only, an outward form made
of a material that decays, and that what we should seek to obtain is
the ethereal essence of mind and spirit. Poor Kaela! our life was
but as a meeting by the way-side; in yonder world, where we shall know
each other from a union of mind, we shall be but mere acquaintances."
"That was not a loving speech," said Sophy, "nor spoken like a
Christian. In a future state, where there is neither marrying nor
giving in marriage, but where, as you say, souls are attracted to each
other by sympathy; there everything beautiful develops itself, and
is raised to a higher state of existence: her soul will acquire such
completeness that it may harmonize with yours, even more than mine,
and you will then once more utter your first rapturous exclamation
of your love, 'Beautiful, most beautiful!'"
THE BEETLE WHO WENT ON HIS TRAVELS
There was once an Emperor who had a horse shod with gold. He had a
golden shoe on each foot, and why was this? He was a beautiful
creature, with slender legs, bright, intelligent eyes, and a mane that
hung down over his neck like a veil. He had carried his master through
fire and smoke in the battle-field, with the bullets whistling round
him; he had kicked and bitten, and taken part in the fight, when the
enemy advanced; and, with his master on his back, he had dashed over
the fallen foe, and saved the golden crown and the Emperor's life,
which was of more value than the brightest gold. This is the reason of
the Emperor's horse wearing golden shoes.
A beetle came creeping forth from the stable, where the farrier
had been shoeing the horse. "Great ones, first, of course," said he,
"and then the little ones; but size is not always a proof of
greatness." He stretched out his thin leg as he spoke.
"And pray what do you want?" asked the farrier.
"Golden shoes," replied the beetle.
"Why, you must be out of your senses," cried the farrier.
"Golden shoes for you, indeed!"
"Yes, certainly; golden shoes," replied the beetle. "Am I not just
as good as that great creature yonder, who is waited upon and brushed,
and has food and drink placed before him? And don't I belong to the
royal stables?"
"But why does the horse have golden shoes?" asked the farrier; "of
course you understand the reason?"
"Understand! Well, I understand that it is a personal slight to
me," cried the beetle. "It is done to annoy me, so I intend to go
out into the world and seek my fortune."
"Go along with you," said the farrier.
"You're a rude fellow," cried the beetle, as he walked out of
the stable; and then he flew for a short distance, till he found
himself in a beautiful flower-garden, all fragrant with roses and
lavender. The lady-birds, with red and black shells on their backs,
and delicate wings, were flying about, and one of them said, "Is it
not sweet and lovely here? Oh, how beautiful everything is."
"I am accustomed to better things," said the beetle. "Do you
call this beautiful? Why, there is not even a dung-heap." Then he went
on, and under the shadow of a large haystack he found a caterpillar
crawling along. "How beautiful this world is!" said the caterpillar.
"The sun is so warm, I quite enjoy it. And soon I shall go to sleep,
and die as they call it, but I shall wake up with beautiful wings to
fly with, like a butterfly."
"How conceited you are!" exclaimed the beetle. "Fly about as a
butterfly, indeed! what of that. I have come out of the Emperor's
stable, and no one there, not even the Emperor's horse, who, in
fact, wears my cast-off golden shoes, has any idea of flying,
excepting myself. To have wings and fly! why, I can do that
already;" and so saying, he spread his wings and flew away. "I don't
want to be disgusted," he said to himself, "and yet I can't help
it." Soon after, he fell down upon an extensive lawn, and for a time
pretended to sleep, but at last fell asleep in earnest. Suddenly a
heavy shower of rain came falling from the clouds. The beetle woke
up with the noise and would have been glad to creep into the earth for
shelter, but he could not. He was tumbled over and over with the rain,
sometimes swimming on his stomach and sometimes on his back; and as
for flying, that was out of the question. He began to doubt whether he
should escape with his life, so he remained, quietly lying where he
was. After a while the weather cleared up a little, and the beetle was
able to rub the water from his eyes, and look about him. He saw
something gleaming, and he managed to make his way up to it. It was
linen which had been laid to bleach on the grass. He crept into a fold
of the damp linen, which certainly was not so comfortable a place to
lie in as the warm stable, but there was nothing better, so he
remained lying there for a whole day and night, and the rain kept on
all the time. Towards morning he crept out of his hiding-place,
feeling in a very bad temper with the climate. Two frogs were
sitting on the linen, and their bright eyes actually glistened with
pleasure.
"Wonderful weather this," cried one of them, "and so refreshing.
This linen holds the water together so beautifully, that my hind
legs quiver as if I were going to swim."
"I should like to know," said another, "If the swallow who flies
so far in her many journeys to foreign lands, ever met with a better
climate than this. What delicious moisture! It is as pleasant as lying
in a wet ditch. I am sure any one who does not enjoy this has no
love for his fatherland."
"Have you ever been in the Emperor's stable?" asked the beetle.
"There the moisture is warm and refreshing; that's the climate for me,
but I could not take it with me on my travels. Is there not even a
dunghill here in this garden, where a person of rank, like myself,
could take up his abode and feel at home?" But the frogs either did
not or would not understand him.
"I never ask a question twice," said the beetle, after he had
asked this one three times, and received no answer. Then he went on
a little farther and stumbled against a piece of broken crockery-ware,
which certainly ought not to have been lying there. But as it was
there, it formed a good shelter against wind and weather to several
families of earwigs who dwelt in it. Their requirements were not many,
they were very sociable, and full of affection for their children,
so much so that each mother considered her own child the most
beautiful and clever of them all.
"Our dear son has engaged himself," said one mother, "dear
innocent boy; his greatest ambition is that he may one day creep
into a clergyman's ear. That is a very artless and loveable wish;
and being engaged will keep him steady. What happiness for a mother!"
"Our son," said another, "had scarcely crept out of the egg,
when he was off on his travels. He is all life and spirits, I expect
he will wear out his horns with running. How charming this is for a
mother, is it not Mr. Beetle?" for she knew the stranger by his
horny coat.
"You are both quite right," said he; so they begged him to walk
in, that is to come as far as he could under the broken piece of
earthenware.
"Now you shall also see my little earwigs," said a third and a
fourth mother, "they are lovely little things, and highly amusing.
They are never ill-behaved, except when they are uncomfortable in
their inside, which unfortunately often happens at their age."
Thus each mother spoke of her baby, and their babies talked
after their own fashion, and made use of the little nippers they
have in their tails to nip the beard of the beetle.
"They are always busy about something, the little rogues," said
the mother, beaming with maternal pride; but the beetle felt it a
bore, and he therefore inquired the way to the nearest dung-heap.
"That is quite out in the great world, on the other side of the
ditch," answered an earwig, "I hope none of my children will ever go
so far, it would be the death of me."
"But I shall try to get so far," said the beetle, and he walked
off without taking any formal leave, which is considered a polite
thing to do.
When he arrived at the ditch, he met several friends, all them
beetles; "We live here," they said, "and we are very comfortable.
May we ask you to step down into this rich mud, you must be fatigued
after your journey."
"Certainly," said the beetle, "I shall be most happy; I have
been exposed to the rain, and have had to lie upon linen, and
cleanliness is a thing that greatly exhausts me; I have also pains
in one of my wings from standing in the draught under a piece of
broken crockery. It is really quite refreshing to be with one's own
kindred again."
"Perhaps you came from a dung-heap," observed the oldest of them.
"No, indeed, I came from a much grander place," replied the
beetle; "I came from the emperor's stable, where I was born, with
golden shoes on my feet. I am travelling on a secret embassy, but
you must not ask me any questions, for I cannot betray my secret."
Then the beetle stepped down into the rich mud, where sat three
young-lady beetles, who tittered, because they did not know what to
say.
"None of them are engaged yet," said their mother, and the
beetle maidens tittered again, this time quite in confusion.
"I have never seen greater beauties, even in the royal stables,"
exclaimed the beetle, who was now resting himself.
"Don't spoil my girls," said the mother; "and don't talk to
them, pray, unless you have serious intentions."
But of course the beetle's intentions were serious, and after a
while our friend was engaged. The mother gave them her blessing, and
all the other beetles cried "hurrah."
Immediately after the betrothal came the marriage, for there was
no reason to delay. The following day passed very pleasantly, and
the next was tolerably comfortable; but on the third it became
necessary for him to think of getting food for his wife, and, perhaps,
for children.
"I have allowed myself to be taken in," said our beetle to
himself, "and now there's nothing to be done but to take them in, in
return."
No sooner said than done. Away he went, and stayed away all day
and all night, and his wife remained behind a forsaken widow.
"Oh," said the other beetles, "this fellow that we have received
into our family is nothing but a complete vagabond. He has gone away
and left his wife a burden upon our hands."
"Well, she can be unmarried again, and remain here with my other
daughters," said the mother. "Fie on the villain that forsook her!"
In the mean time the beetle, who had sailed across the ditch on
a cabbage leaf, had been journeying on the other side. In the
morning two persons came up to the ditch. When they saw him they
took him up and turned him over and over, looking very learned all the
time, especially one, who was a boy. "Allah sees the black beetle in
the black stone, and the black rock. Is not that written in the
Koran?" he asked.
Then he translated the beetle's name into Latin, and said a
great deal upon the creature's nature and history. The second
person, who was older and a scholar, proposed to carry the beetle
home, as they wanted just such good specimens as this. Our beetle
considered this speech a great insult, so he flew suddenly out of
the speaker's hand. His wings were dry now, so they carried him to a
great distance, till at last he reached a hothouse, where a sash of
the glass roof was partly open, so he quietly slipped in and buried
himself in the warm earth. "It is very comfortable here," he said to
himself, and soon after fell asleep. Then he dreamed that the
emperor's horse was dying, and had left him his golden shoes, and also
promised that he should have two more. All this was very delightful,
and when the beetle woke up he crept forth and looked around him. What
a splendid place the hothouse was! At the back, large palm-trees
were growing; and the sunlight made the leaves--look quite glossy; and
beneath them what a profusion of luxuriant green, and of flowers red
like flame, yellow as amber, or white as new-fallen snow! "What a
wonderful quantity of plants," cried the beetle; "how good they will
taste when they are decayed! This is a capital store-room. There
must certainly be some relations of mine living here; I will just
see if I can find any one with whom I can associate. I'm proud,
certainly; but I'm also proud of being so." Then he prowled about in
the earth, and thought what a pleasant dream that was about the
dying horse, and the golden shoes he had inherited. Suddenly a hand
seized the beetle, and squeezed him, and turned him round and round.
The gardener's little son and his playfellow had come into the
hothouse, and, seeing the beetle, wanted to have some fun with him.
First, he was wrapped, in a vine-leaf, and put into a warm trousers'
pocket. He twisted and turned about with all his might, but he got a
good squeeze from the boy's hand, as a hint for him to keep quiet.
Then the boy went quickly towards a lake that lay at the end of the
garden. Here the beetle was put into an old broken wooden shoe, in
which a little stick had been fastened upright for a mast, and to this
mast the beetle was bound with a piece of worsted. Now he was a
sailor, and had to sail away. The lake was not very large, but to
the beetle it seemed an ocean, and he was so astonished at its size
that he fell over on his back, and kicked out his legs. Then the
little ship sailed away; sometimes the current of the water seized it,
but whenever it went too far from the shore one of the boys turned
up his trousers, and went in after it, and brought it back to land.
But at last, just as it went merrily out again, the two boys were
called, and so angrily, that they hastened to obey, and ran away as
fast as they could from the pond, so that the little ship was left
to its fate. It was carried away farther and farther from the shore,
till it reached the open sea. This was a terrible prospect for the
beetle, for he could not escape in consequence of being bound to the
mast. Then a fly came and paid him a visit. "What beautiful
weather," said the fly; "I shall rest here and sun myself. You must
have a pleasant time of it."
"You speak without knowing the facts," replied the beetle;
"don't you see that I am a prisoner?"
"Ah, but I'm not a prisoner," remarked the fly, and away he flew.
"Well, now I know the world," said the beetle to himself; "it's an
abominable world; I'm the only respectable person in it. First, they
refuse me my golden shoes; then I have to lie on damp linen, and to
stand in a draught; and to crown all, they fasten a wife upon me.
Then, when I have made a step forward in the world, and found out a
comfortable position, just as I could wish it to be, one of these
human boys comes and ties me up, and leaves me to the mercy of the
wild waves, while the emperor's favorite horse goes prancing about
proudly on his golden shoes. This vexes me more than anything. But
it is useless to look for sympathy in this world. My career has been
very interesting, but what's the use of that if nobody knows
anything about it? The world does not deserve to be made acquainted
with my adventures, for it ought to have given me golden shoes when
the emperor's horse was shod, and I stretched out my feet to be
shod, too. If I had received golden shoes I should have been an
ornament to the stable; now I am lost to the stable and to the
world. It is all over with me."
But all was not yet over. A boat, in which were a few young girls,
came rowing up. "Look, yonder is an old wooden shoe sailing along,"
said one of the younger girls.
"And there's a poor little creature bound fast in it," said
another.
The boat now came close to our beetle's ship, and the young
girls fished it out of the water. One of them drew a small pair of
scissors from her pocket, and cut the worsted without hurting the
beetle, and when she stepped on shore she placed him on the grass.
"There," she said, "creep away, or fly, if thou canst. It is a
splendid thing to have thy liberty." Away flew the beetle, straight
through the open window of a large building; there he sank down, tired
and exhausted, exactly on the mane of the emperor's favorite horse,
who was standing in his stable; and the beetle found himself at home
again. For some time he clung to the mane, that he might recover
himself. "Well," he said, "here I am, seated on the emperor's favorite
horse,--sitting upon him as if I were the emperor himself. But what
was it the farrier asked me? Ah, I remember now,--that's a good
thought,--he asked me why the golden shoes were given to the horse.
The answer is quite clear to me, now. They were given to the horse
on my account." And this reflection put the beetle into a good temper.
The sun's rays also came streaming into the stable, and shone upon
him, and made the place lively and bright. "Travelling expands the
mind very much," said the beetle. "The world is not so bad after
all, if you know how to take things as they come."
THE BELL
In the narrow streets of a large town people often heard in the
evening, when the sun was setting, and his last rays gave a golden
tint to the chimney-pots, a strange noise which resembled the sound of
a church bell; it only lasted an instant, for it was lost in the
continual roar of traffic and hum of voices which rose from the
town. "The evening bell is ringing," people used to say; "the sun is
setting!" Those who walked outside the town, where the houses were
less crowded and interspersed by gardens and little fields, saw the
evening sky much better, and heard the sound of the bell much more
clearly. It seemed as though the sound came from a church, deep in the
calm, fragrant wood, and thither people looked with devout feelings.
A considerable time elapsed: one said to the other, "I really
wonder if there is a church out in the wood. The bell has indeed a
strange sweet sound! Shall we go there and see what the cause of it
is?" The rich drove, the poor walked, but the way seemed to them
extraordinarily long, and when they arrived at a number of willow
trees on the border of the wood they sat down, looked up into the
great branches and thought they were now really in the wood. A
confectioner from the town also came out and put up a stall there;
then came another confectioner who hung a bell over his stall, which
was covered with pitch to protect it from the rain, but the clapper
was wanting.
When people came home they used to say that it had been very
romantic, and that really means something else than merely taking tea.
Three persons declared that they had gone as far as the end of the
wood; they had always heard the strange sound, but there it seemed
to them as if it came from the town. One of them wrote verses about
the bell, and said that it was like the voice of a mother speaking
to an intelligent and beloved child; no tune, he said, was sweeter
than the sound of the bell.
The emperor of the country heard of it, and declared that he who
would really find out where the sound came from should receive the
title of "Bellringer to the World," even if there was no bell at all.
Now many went out into the wood for the sake of this splendid
berth; but only one of them came back with some sort of explanation.
None of them had gone far enough, nor had he, and yet he said that the
sound of the bell came from a large owl in a hollow tree. It was a
wisdom owl, which continually knocked its head against the tree, but
he was unable to say with certainty whether its head or the hollow
trunk of the tree was the cause of the noise.
He was appointed "Bellringer to the World," and wrote every year a
short dissertation on the owl, but by this means people did not become
any wiser than they had been before.
It was just confirmation-day. The clergyman had delivered a
beautiful and touching sermon, the candidates were deeply moved by it;
it was indeed a very important day for them; they were all at once
transformed from mere children to grown-up people; the childish soul
was to fly over, as it were, into a more reasonable being.
The sun shone most brightly; and the sound of the great unknown
bell was heard more distinctly than ever. They had a mind to go
thither, all except three. One of them wished to go home and try on
her ball dress, for this very dress and the ball were the cause of her
being confirmed this time, otherwise she would not have been allowed
to go. The second, a poor boy, had borrowed a coat and a pair of boots
from the son of his landlord to be confirmed in, and he had to
return them at a certain time. The third said that he never went
into strange places if his parents were not with him; he had always
been a good child, and wished to remain so, even after being
confirmed, and they ought not to tease him for this; they, however,
did it all the same. These three, therefore did not go; the others
went on. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and the
confirmed children sang too, holding each other by the hand, for
they had no position yet, and they were all equal in the eyes of
God. Two of the smallest soon became tired and returned to the town;
two little girls sat down and made garlands of flowers, they,
therefore, did not go on. When the others arrived at the willow trees,
where the confectioner had put up his stall, they said: "Now we are
out here; the bell does not in reality exist--it is only something
that people imagine!"
Then suddenly the sound of the bell was heard so beautifully and
solemnly from the wood that four or five made up their minds to go
still further on. The wood was very thickly grown. It was difficult to
advance: wood lilies and anemones grew almost too high; flowering
convolvuli and brambles were hanging like garlands from tree to
tree; while the nightingales were singing and the sunbeams played.
That was very beautiful! But the way was unfit for the girls; they
would have torn their dresses. Large rocks, covered with moss of
various hues, were lying about; the fresh spring water rippled forth
with a peculiar sound. "I don't think that can be the bell," said
one of the confirmed children, and then he lay down and listened.
"We must try to find out if it is!" And there he remained, and let the
others walk on.
They came to a hut built of the bark of trees and branches; a
large crab-apple tree spread its branches over it, as if it intended
to pour all its fruit on the roof, upon which roses were blooming; the
long boughs covered the gable, where a little bell was hanging. Was
this the one they had heard? All agreed that it must be so, except one
who said that the bell was too small and too thin to be heard at
such a distance, and that it had quite a different sound to that which
had so touched men's hearts.
He who spoke was a king's son, and therefore the others said
that such a one always wishes to be cleverer than other people.
Therefore they let him go alone; and as he walked on, the solitude
of the wood produced a feeling of reverence in his breast; but still
he heard the little bell about which the others rejoiced, and
sometimes, when the wind blew in that direction, he could hear the
sounds from the confectioner's stall, where the others were singing at
tea. But the deep sounds of the bell were much stronger; soon it
seemed to him as if an organ played an accompaniment--the sound came
from the left, from the side where the heart is. Now something rustled
among the bushes, and a little boy stood before the king's son, in
wooden shoes and such a short jacket that the sleeves did not reach to
his wrists. They knew each other: the boy was the one who had not been
able to go with them because he had to take the coat and boots back to
his landlord's son. That he had done, and had started again in his
wooden shoes and old clothes, for the sound of the bell was too
enticing--he felt he must go on.
"We might go together," said the king's son. But the poor boy with
the wooden shoes was quite ashamed; he pulled at the short sleeves
of his jacket, and said that he was afraid he could not walk so
fast; besides, he was of opinion that the bell ought to be sought at
the right, for there was all that was grand and magnificent.
"Then we shall not meet," said the king's son, nodding to the poor
boy, who went into the deepest part of the wood, where the thorns tore
his shabby clothes and scratched his hands, face, and feet until
they bled. The king's son also received several good scratches, but
the sun was shining on his way, and it is he whom we will now
follow, for he was a quick fellow. "I will and must find the bell," he
said, "if I have to go to the end of the world."
Ugly monkeys sat high in the branches and clenched their teeth.
"Shall we beat him?" they said. "Shall we thrash him? He is a king's
son!"
But he walked on undaunted, deeper and deeper into the wood, where
the most wonderful flowers were growing; there were standing white
star lilies with blood-red stamens, sky-blue tulips shining when the
wind moved them; apple-trees covered with apples like large glittering
soap bubbles: only think how resplendent these trees were in the
sunshine! All around were beautiful green meadows, where hart and hind
played in the grass. There grew magnificent oaks and beech-trees;
and if the bark was split of any of them, long blades of grass grew
out of the clefts; there were also large smooth lakes in the wood,
on which the swans were swimming about and flapping their wings. The
king's son often stood still and listened; sometimes he thought that
the sound of the bell rose up to him out of one of these deep lakes,
but soon he found that this was a mistake, and that the bell was
ringing still farther in the wood. Then the sun set, the clouds were
as red as fire; it became quiet in the wood; he sank down on his
knees, sang an evening hymn and said: "I shall never find what I am
looking for! Now the sun is setting, and the night, the dark night, is
approaching. Yet I may perhaps see the round sun once more before he
disappears beneath the horizon. I will climb up these rocks, they
are as high as the highest trees!" And then, taking hold of the
creepers and roots, he climbed up on the wet stones, where
water-snakes were wriggling and the toads, as it were, barked at
him: he reached the top before the sun, seen from such a height, had
quite set. "Oh, what a splendour!" The sea, the great majestic sea,
which was rolling its long waves against the shore, stretched out
before him, and the sun was standing like a large bright altar and
there where sea and heaven met--all melted together in the most
glowing colours; the wood was singing, and his heart too. The whole of
nature was one large holy church, in which the trees and hovering
clouds formed the pillars, the flowers and grass the woven velvet
carpet, and heaven itself was the great cupola; up there the flame
colour vanished as soon as the sun disappeared, but millions of
stars were lighted; diamond lamps were shining, and the king's son
stretched his arms out towards heaven, towards the sea, and towards
the wood. Then suddenly the poor boy with the short-sleeved jacket and
the wooden shoes appeared; he had arrived just as quickly on the
road he had chosen. And they ran towards each other and took one
another's hand, in the great cathedral of nature and poesy, and
above them sounded the invisible holy bell; happy spirits surrounded
them, singing hallelujahs and rejoicing.
THE BELL-DEEP
"Ding-dong! ding-dong!" It sounds up from the "bell-deep" in the
Odense-Au. Every child in the old town of Odense, on the island of
Funen, knows the Au, which washes the gardens round about the town,
and flows on under the wooden bridges from the dam to the
water-mill. In the Au grow the yellow water-lilies and brown
feathery reeds; the dark velvety flag grows there, high and thick; old
and decayed willows, slanting and tottering, hang far out over the
stream beside the monk's meadow and by the bleaching ground; but
opposite there are gardens upon gardens, each different from the rest,
some with pretty flowers and bowers like little dolls' pleasure
grounds, often displaying cabbage and other kitchen plants; and here
and there the gardens cannot be seen at all, for the great elder trees
that spread themselves out by the bank, and hang far out over the
streaming waters, which are deeper here and there than an oar can
fathom. Opposite the old nunnery is the deepest place, which is called
the "bell-deep," and there dwells the old water spirit, the "Au-mann."
This spirit sleeps through the day while the sun shines down upon
the water; but in starry and moonlit nights he shows himself. He is
very old. Grandmother says that she has heard her own grandmother tell
of him; he is said to lead a solitary life, and to have nobody with
whom he can converse save the great old church Bell. Once the Bell
hung in the church tower; but now there is no trace left of the
tower or of the church, which was called St. Alban's.
"Ding-dong! ding-dong!" sounded the Bell, when the tower still
stood there; and one evening, while the sun was setting, and the
Bell was swinging away bravely, it broke loose and came flying down
through the air, the brilliant metal shining in the ruddy beam.
"Ding-dong! ding-dong! Now I'll retire to rest!" sang the Bell,
and flew down into the Odense-Au, where it is deepest; and that is why
the place is called the "bell-deep."
But the Bell got neither rest nor sleep. Down in the Au-mann's
haunt it sounds and rings, so that the tones sometimes pierce upward
through the waters; and many people maintain that its strains forebode
the death of some one; but that is not true, for the Bell is only
talking with the Au-mann, who is now no longer alone.
And what is the Bell telling? It is old, very old, as we have
already observed; it was there long before grandmother's grandmother
was born; and yet it is but a child in comparison with the Au-mann,
who is quite an old quiet personage, an oddity, with his hose of
eel-skin, and his scaly Jacket with the yellow lilies for buttons, and
a wreath of reed in his hair and seaweed in his beard; but he looks
very pretty for all that.
What the Bell tells? To repeat it all would require years and
days; for year by year it is telling the old stories, sometimes
short ones, sometimes long ones, according to its whim; it tells of
old times, of the dark hard times, thus:
"In the church of St. Alban, the monk had mounted up into the
tower. He was young and handsome, but thoughtful exceedingly. He
looked through the loophole out upon the Odense-Au, when the bed of
the water was yet broad, and the monks' meadow was still a lake. He
looked out over it, and over the rampart, and over the nuns' hill
opposite, where the convent lay, and the light gleamed forth from
the nun's cell. He had known the nun right well, and he thought of
her, and his heart beat quicker as he thought. Ding-dong! ding-dong!"
Yes, this was the story the Bell told.
"Into the tower came also the dapper man-servant of the bishop;
and when I, the Bell, who am made of metal, rang hard and loud, and
swung to and fro, I might have beaten out his brains. He sat down
close under me, and played with two little sticks as if they had
been a stringed instrument; and he sang to it. 'Now I may sing it
out aloud, though at other times I may not whisper it. I may sing of
everything that is kept concealed behind lock and bars. Yonder it is
cold and wet. The rats are eating her up alive! Nobody knows of it!
Nobody hears of it! Not even now, for the bell is ringing and
singing its loud Ding-dong, ding-dong!'
"There was a King in those days. They called him Canute. He
bowed himself before bishop and monk; but when he offended the free
peasants with heavy taxes and hard words, they seized their weapons
and put him to flight like a wild beast. He sought shelter in the
church, and shut gate and door behind him. The violent band surrounded
the church; I heard tell of it. The crows, ravens and magpies
started up in terror at the yelling and shouting that sounded
around. They flew into the tower and out again, they looked down
upon the throng below, and they also looked into the windows of the
church, and screamed out aloud what they saw there. King Canute
knelt before the altar in prayer; his brothers Eric and Benedict stood
by him as a guard with drawn swords; but the King's servant, the
treacherous Blake, betrayed his master. The throng in front of the
church knew where they could hit the King, and one of them flung a
stone through a pane of glass, and the King lay there dead! The
cries and screams of the savage horde and of the birds sounded through
the air, and I joined in it also; for I sang 'Ding-dong! ding-dong!'
"The church bell hangs high, and looks far around, and sees the
birds around it, and understands their language. The wind roars in
upon it through windows and loopholes; and the wind knows
everything, for he gets it from the air, which encircles all things,
and the church bell understands his tongue, and rings it out into
the world, 'Ding-dong! ding-dong!'
"But it was too much for me to hear and to know; I was not able
any longer to ring it out. I became so tired, so heavy, that the
beam broke, and I flew out into the gleaming Au, where the water is
deepest, and where the Au-mann lives, solitary and alone; and year
by year I tell him what I have heard and what I know. Ding-dong!
ding-dong!"
Thus it sounds complainingly out of the bell-deep in the
Odense-Au. That is what grandmother told us.
But the schoolmaster says that there was not any bell that rung
down there, for that it could not do so; and that no Au-mann dwelt
yonder, for there was no Au-mann at all! And when all the other church
bells are sounding sweetly, he says that it is not really the bells
that are sounding, but that it is the air itself which sends forth the
notes; and grandmother said to us that the Bell itself said it was the
air who told it to him, consequently they are agreed on that point,
and this much is sure.
"Be cautious, cautious, and take good heed to thyself," they
both say.
The air knows everything. It is around us, it is in us, it talks
of our thoughts and of our deeds, and it speaks longer of them than
does the Bell down in the depths of the Odense-Au where the Au-mann
dwells. It rings it out in the vault of heaven, far, far out,
forever and ever, till the heaven bells sound "Ding-dong! ding-dong!"
THE BIRD OF POPULAR SONG
In is winter-time. The earth wears a snowy garment, and looks like
marble hewn out of the rock; the air is bright and clear; the wind
is sharp as a well-tempered sword, and the trees stand like branches
of white coral or blooming almond twigs, and here it is keen as on the
lofty Alps.
The night is splendid in the gleam of the Northern Lights, and
in the glitter of innumerable twinkling stars.
But we sit in the warm room, by the hot stove, and talk about
the old times. And we listen to this story:
By the open sea was a giant's grave; and on the grave-mound sat at
midnight the spirit of the buried hero, who had been a king. The
golden circlet gleamed on his brow, his hair fluttered in the wind,
and he was clad in steel and iron. He bent his head mournfully, and
sighed in deep sorrow, as an unquiet spirit might sigh.
And a ship came sailing by. Presently the sailors lowered the
anchor and landed. Among them was a singer, and he approached the
royal spirit, and said,
"Why mournest thou, and wherefore dost thou suffer thus?"
And the dead man answered,
"No one has sung the deeds of my life; they are dead and
forgotten. Song doth not carry them forth over the lands, nor into the
hearts of men; therefore I have no rest and no peace."
And he spoke of his works, and of his warlike deeds, which his
contemporaries had known, but which had not been sung, because there
was no singer among his companions.
Then the old bard struck the strings of his harp, and sang of
the youthful courage of the hero, of the strength of the man, and of
the greatness of his good deeds. Then the face of the dead one gleamed
like the margin of the cloud in the moonlight. Gladly and of good
courage, the form arose in splendor and in majesty, and vanished
like the glancing of the northern light. Nought was to be seen but the
green turfy mound, with the stones on which no Runic record has been
graven; but at the last sound of the harp there soared over the
hill, as though he had fluttered from the harp, a little bird, a
charming singing-bird, with ringing voice of the thrush, with the
moving voice pathos of the human heart, with a voice that told of
home, like the voice that is heard by the bird of passage. The
singing-bird soared away, over mountain and valley, over field and
wood--he was the Bird of Popular Song, who never dies.
We hear his song--we hear it now in the room while the white
bees are swarming without, and the storm clutches the windows. The
bird sings not alone the requiem of heroes; he sings also sweet gentle
songs of love, so many and so warm, of Northern fidelity and truth. He
has stories in words and in tones; he has proverbs and snatches of
proverbs; songs which, like Runes laid under a dead man's tongue,
force him to speak; and thus Popular Song tells of the land of his
birth.
In the old heathen days, in the times of the Vikings, the
popular speech was enshrined in the harp of the bard.
In the days of knightly castles, when the strongest fist held
the scales of justice, when only might was right, and a peasant and
a dog were of equal importance, where did the Bird of Song find
shelter and protection? Neither violence nor stupidity gave him a
thought.
But in the gabled window of the knightly castle, the lady of the
castle sat with the parchment roll before her, and wrote down the
old recollections in song and legend, while near her stood the old
woman from the wood, and the travelling peddler who went wandering
through the country. As these told their tales, there fluttered around
them, with twittering and song, the Bird of Popular Song, who never
dies so long as the earth has a hill upon which his foot may rest.
And now he looks in upon us and sings. Without are the night and
the snow-storm. He lays the Runes beneath our tongues, and we know the
land of our home. Heaven speaks to us in our native tongue, in the
voice of the Bird of Popular Song. The old remembrances awake, the
faded colors glow with a fresh lustre, and story and song pour us a
blessed draught which lifts up our minds and our thoughts, so that the
evening becomes as a Christmas festival.
The snow-flakes chase each other, the ice cracks, the storm
rules without, for he has the might, he is lord--but not the LORD OF
ALL.
It is winter time. The wind is sharp as a two-edged sword, the
snow-flakes chase each other; it seems as though it had been snowing
for days and weeks, and the snow lies like a great mountain over the
whole town, like a heavy dream of the winter night. Everything on
the earth is hidden away, only the golden cross of the church, the
symbol of faith, arises over the snow grave, and gleams in the blue
air and in the bright sunshine.
And over the buried town fly the birds of heaven, the small and
the great; they twitter and they sing as best they may, each bird with
his beak.
First comes the band of sparrows: they pipe at every trifle in the
streets and lanes, in the nests and the houses; they have stories to
tell about the front buildings and the back buildings.
"We know the buried town," they say; "everything living in it is
piep! piep! piep!"
The black ravens and crows flew on over the white snow.
"Grub, grub!" they cried. "There's something to be got down there;
something to swallow, and that's most important. That's the opinion of
most of them down there, and the opinion is goo-goo-good!"
The wild swans come flying on whirring pinions, and sing of the
noble and the great, that will still sprout in the hearts of men, down
in the town which is resting beneath its snowy veil.
No death is there--life reigns yonder; we hear it on the notes
that swell onward like the tones of the church organ, which seize us
like sounds from the elf-hill, like the songs of Ossian, like the
rushing swoop of the wandering spirits' wings. What harmony! That
harmony speaks to our hearts, and lifts up our souls! It is the Bird
of Popular Song whom we hear.
And at this moment the warm breath of heaven blows down from the
sky. There are gaps in the snowy mountains, the sun shines into the
clefts; spring is coming, the birds are returning, and new races are
coming with the same home sounds in their hearts.
Hear the story of the year: "The night of the snow-storm, the
heavy dream of the winter night, all shall be dissolved, all shall
rise again in the beauteous notes of the Bird of Popular Song, who
never dies!"
THE BISHOP OF BORGLUM AND HIS WARRIORS
Our scene is laid in Northern Jutland, in the so-called "wild
moor." We hear what is called the "Wester-wow-wow"--the peculiar
roar of the North Sea as it breaks against the western coast of
Jutland. It rolls and thunders with a sound that penetrates for
miles into the land; and we are quite near the roaring. Before us
rises a great mound of sand--a mountain we have long seen, and towards
which we are wending our way, driving slowly along through the deep
sand. On this mountain of sand is a lofty old building--the convent of
Borglum. In one of its wings (the larger one) there is still a church.
And at this convent we now arrive in the late evening hour; but the
weather is clear in the bright June night around us, and the eye can
range far, far over field and moor to the Bay of Aalborg, over heath
and meadow, and far across the deep blue sea.
Now we are there, and roll past between barns and other farm
buildings; and at the left of the gate we turn aside to the Old Castle
Farm, where the lime trees stand in lines along the walls, and,
sheltered from the wind and weather, grow so luxuriantly that their
twigs and leaves almost conceal the windows.
We mount the winding staircase of stone, and march through the
long passages under the heavy roof-beams. The wind moans very
strangely here, both within and without. It is hardly known how, but
the people say--yes, people say a great many things when they are
frightened or want to frighten others--they say that the old dead
choir-men glide silently past us into the church, where mass is
sung. They can be heard in the rushing of the storm, and their singing
brings up strange thoughts in the hearers--thoughts of the old times
into which we are carried back.
On the coast a ship is stranded; and the bishop's warriors are
there, and spare not those whom the sea has spared. The sea washes
away the blood that has flowed from the cloven skulls. The stranded
goods belong to the bishop, and there is a store of goods here. The
sea casts up tubs and barrels filled with costly wine for the
convent cellar, and in the convent is already good store of beer and
mead. There is plenty in the kitchen--dead game and poultry, hams
and sausages; and fat fish swim in the ponds without.
The Bishop of Borglum is a mighty lord. He has great
possessions, but still he longs for more--everything must bow before
the mighty Olaf Glob. His rich cousin at Thyland is dead, and his
widow is to have the rich inheritance. But how comes it that one
relation is always harder towards another than even strangers would
be? The widow's husband had possessed all Thyland, with the
exception of the church property. Her son was not at home. In his
boyhood he had already started on a journey, for his desire was to see
foreign lands and strange people. For years there had been no news
of him. Perhaps he had been long laid in the grave, and would never
come back to his home, to rule where his mother then ruled.
"What has a woman to do with rule?" said the bishop.
He summoned the widow before a law court; but what did he gain
thereby? The widow had never been disobedient to the law, and was
strong in her just rights.
Bishop Olaf of Borglum, what dost thou purpose? What writest
thou on yonder smooth parchment, sealing it with thy seal, and
intrusting it to the horsemen and servants, who ride away, far away,
to the city of the Pope?
It is the time of falling leaves and of stranded ships, and soon
icy winter will come.
Twice had icy winter returned before the bishop welcomed the
horsemen and servants back to their home. They came from Rome with a
papal decree--a ban, or bull, against the widow who had dared to
offend the pious bishop. "Cursed be she and all that belongs to her.
Let her be expelled from the congregation and the Church. Let no man
stretch forth a helping hand to her, and let friends and relations
avoid her as a plague and a pestilence!"
"What will not bend must break," said the Bishop of Borglum
And all forsake the widow; but she holds fast to her God. He is
her helper and defender.
One servant only--an old maid--remained faithful to her; and
with the old servant, the widow herself followed the plough; and the
crop grew, although the land had been cursed by the Pope and by the
bishop.
"Thou child of perdition, I will yet carry out my purpose!"
cried the Bishop of Borglum. "Now will I lay the hand of the Pope upon
thee, to summon thee before the tribunal that shall condemn thee!"
Then did the widow yoke the last two oxen that remained to her
to a wagon, and mounted up on the wagon, with her old servant, and
travelled away across the heath out of the Danish land. As a
stranger she came into a foreign country, where a strange tongue was
spoken and where new customs prevailed. Farther and farther she
journeyed, to where green hills rise into mountains, and the vine
clothes their sides. Strange merchants drive by her, and they look
anxiously after their wagons laden with merchandise. They fear an
attack from the armed followers of the robber-knights. The two poor
women, in their humble vehicle drawn by two black oxen, travel
fearlessly through the dangerous sunken road and through the
darksome forest. And now they were in Franconia. And there met them
a stalwart knight, with a train of twelve armed followers. He
paused, gazed at the strange vehicle, and questioned the women as to
the goal of their journey and the place whence they came. Then one
of them mentioned Thyland in Denmark, and spoke of her sorrows, of her
woes, which were soon to cease, for so Divine Providence had willed
it. For the stranger knight is the widow's son! He seized her hand, he
embraced her, and the mother wept. For years she had not been able
to weep, but had only bitten her lips till the blood started.
It is the time of falling leaves and of stranded ships, and soon
will icy winter come.
The sea rolled wine-tubs to the shore for the bishop's cellar.
In the kitchen the deer roasted on the spit before the fire. At
Borglum it was warm and cheerful in the heated rooms, while cold
winter raged without, when a piece of news was brought to the
bishop. "Jens Glob, of Thyland, has come back, and his mother with
him." Jens Glob laid a complaint against the bishop, and summoned
him before the temporal and the spiritual court.
"That will avail him little," said the bishop. "Best leave off thy
efforts, knight Jens."
Again it is the time of falling leaves and stranded ships. Icy
winter comes again, and the "white bees" are swarming, and sting the
traveller's face till they melt.
"Keen weather to-day!" say the people, as they step in.
Jens Glob stands so deeply wrapped in thought, that he singes
the skirt of his wide garment.
"Thou Borglum bishop," he exclaims, "I shall subdue thee after
all! Under the shield of the Pope, the law cannot reach thee; but Jens
Glob shall reach thee!"
Then he writes a letter to his brother-in-law, Olaf Hase, in
Sallingland, and prays that knight to meet him on Christmas eve, at
mass, in the church at Widberg. The bishop himself is to read the
mass, and consequently will journey from Borglum to Thyland; and
this is known to Jens Glob.
Moorland and meadow are covered with ice and snow. The marsh
will bear horse and rider, the bishop with his priests and armed
men. They ride the shortest way, through the waving reeds, where the
wind moans sadly.
Blow thy brazen trumpet, thou trumpeter clad in fox-skin! it
sounds merrily in the clear air. So they ride on over heath and
moorland--over what is the garden of Fata Morgana in the hot summer,
though now icy, like all the country--towards the church of Widberg.
The wind is blowing his trumpet too--blowing it harder and harder.
He blows up a storm--a terrible storm--that increases more and more.
Towards the church they ride, as fast as they may through the storm.
The church stands firm, but the storm careers on over field and
moorland, over land and sea.
Borglum's bishop reaches the church; but Olaf Hase will scarce
do so, however hard he may ride. He journeys with his warriors on
the farther side of the bay, in order that he may help Jens Glob,
now that the bishop is to be summoned before the judgment seat of
the Highest.
The church is the judgment hall; the altar is the council table.
The lights burn clear in the heavy brass candelabra. The storm reads
out the accusation and the sentence, roaming in the air over moor
and heath, and over the rolling waters. No ferry-boat can sail over
the bay in such weather as this.
Olaf Hase makes halt at Ottesworde. There he dismisses his
warriors, presents them with their horses and harness, and gives
them leave to ride home and greet his wife. He intends to risk his
life alone in the roaring waters; but they are to bear witness for him
that it is not his fault if Jens Glob stands without reinforcement
in the church at Widberg. The faithful warriors will not leave him,
but follow him out into the deep waters. Ten of them are carried away;
but Olaf Hase and two of the youngest men reach the farther side. They
have still four miles to ride.
It is past midnight. It is Christmas. The wind has abated. The
church is lighted up; the gleaming radiance shines through the
window-frames, and pours out over meadow and heath. The mass has
long been finished, silence reigns in the church, and the wax is heard
dropping from the candles to the stone pavement. And now Olaf Hase
arrives.
In the forecourt Jens Glob greets him kindly, and says,
"I have just made an agreement with the bishop."
"Sayest thou so?" replied Olaf Hase. "Then neither thou nor the
bishop shall quit this church alive."
And the sword leaps from the scabbard, and Olaf Hase deals a
blow that makes the panel of the church door, which Jens Glob
hastily closes between them, fly in fragments.
"Hold, brother! First hear what the agreement was that I made. I
have slain the bishop and his warriors and priests. They will have
no word more to say in the matter, nor will I speak again of all the
wrong that my mother has endured."
The long wicks of the altar lights glimmer red; but there is a
redder gleam upon the pavement, where the bishop lies with cloven
skull, and his dead warriors around him, in the quiet of the holy
Christmas night.
And four days afterwards the bells toll for a funeral in the
convent of Borglum. The murdered bishop and the slain warriors and
priests are displayed under a black canopy, surrounded by candelabra
decked with crape. There lies the dead man, in the black cloak wrought
with silver; the crozier in the powerless hand that was once so
mighty. The incense rises in clouds, and the monks chant the funeral
hymn. It sounds like a wail--it sounds like a sentence of wrath and
condemnation, that must be heard far over the land, carried by the
wind--sung by the wind--the wail that sometimes is silent, but never
dies; for ever again it rises in song, singing even into our own
time this legend of the Bishop of Borglum and his hard nephew. It is
heard in the dark night by the frightened husbandman, driving by in
the heavy sandy road past the convent of Borglum. It is heard by the
sleepless listener in the thickly-walled rooms at Borglum. And not
only to the ear of superstition is the sighing and the tread of
hurrying feet audible in the long echoing passages leading to the
convent door that has long been locked. The door still seems to
open, and the lights seem to flame in the brazen candlesticks; the
fragrance of incense arises; the church gleams in its ancient
splendor; and the monks sing and say the mass over the slain bishop,
who lies there in the black silver-embroidered mantle, with the
crozier in his powerless hand; and on his pale proud forehead gleams
the red wound like fire, and there burn the worldly mind and the
wicked thoughts.
Sink down into his grave--into oblivion--ye terrible shapes of the
times of old!
Hark to the raging of the angry wind, sounding above the rolling
sea! A storm approaches without, calling aloud for human lives. The
sea has not put on a new mind with the new time. This night it is a
horrible pit to devour up lives, and to-morrow, perhaps, it may be a
glassy mirror--even as in the old time that we have buried. Sleep
sweetly, if thou canst sleep!
Now it is morning.
The new time flings sunshine into the room. The wind still keeps
up mightily. A wreck is announced--as in the old time.
During the night, down yonder by Lokken, the little fishing
village with the red-tiled roofs--we can see it up here from the
window--a ship has come ashore. It has struck, and is fast embedded in
the sand; but the rocket apparatus has thrown a rope on board, and
formed a bridge from the wreck to the mainland; and all on board are
saved, and reach the land, and are wrapped in warm blankets; and
to-day they are invited to the farm at the convent of Borglum. In
comfortable rooms they encounter hospitality and friendly faces.
They are addressed in the language of their country, and the piano
sounds for them with melodies of their native land; and before these
have died away, the chord has been struck, the wire of thought that
reaches to the land of the sufferers announces that they are
rescued. Then their anxieties are dispelled; and at even they join
in the dance at the feast given in the great hall at Borglum.
Waltzes and Styrian dances are given, and Danish popular songs, and
melodies of foreign lands in these modern times.
Blessed be thou, new time! Speak thou of summer and of purer
gales! Send thy sunbeams gleaming into our hearts and thoughts! On thy
glowing canvas let them be painted--the dark legends of the rough hard
times that are past!
THE BOTTLE NECK
Close to the corner of a street, among other abodes of poverty,
stood an exceedingly tall, narrow house, which had been so knocked
about by time that it seemed out of joint in every direction. This
house was inhabited by poor people, but the deepest poverty was
apparent in the garret lodging in the gable. In front of the little
window, an old bent bird-cage hung in the sunshine, which had not even
a proper water-glass, but instead of it the broken neck of a bottle,
turned upside down, and a cork stuck in to make it hold the water with
which it was filled. An old maid stood at the window; she had hung
chickweed over the cage, and the little linnet which it contained
hopped from perch to perch and sang and twittered merrily.
"Yes, it's all very well for you to sing," said the bottle neck:
that is, he did not really speak the words as we do, for the neck of a
bottle cannot speak; but he thought them to himself in his own mind,
just as people sometimes talk quietly to themselves.
"Yes, you may sing very well, you have all your limbs uninjured;
you should feel what it is like to lose your body, and only have a
neck and a mouth left, with a cork stuck in it, as I have: you
wouldn't sing then, I know. After all, it is just as well that there
are some who can be happy. I have no reason to sing, nor could I
sing now if I were ever so happy; but when I was a whole bottle, and
they rubbed me with a cork, didn't I sing then? I used to be called
a complete lark. I remember when I went out to a picnic with the
furrier's family, on the day his daughter was betrothed,--it seems
as if it only happened yesterday. I have gone through a great deal
in my time, when I come to recollect: I have been in the fire and in
the water, I have been deep in the earth, and have mounted higher in
the air than most other people, and now I am swinging here, outside
a bird-cage, in the air and the sunshine. Oh, indeed, it would be
worth while to hear my history; but I do not speak it aloud, for a
good reason--because I cannot."
Then the bottle neck related his history, which was really
rather remarkable; he, in fact, related it to himself, or, at least,
thought it in his own mind. The little bird sang his own song merrily;
in the street below there was driving and running to and fro, every
one thought of his own affairs, or perhaps of nothing at all; but
the bottle neck thought deeply. He thought of the blazing furnace in
the factory, where he had been blown into life; he remembered how
hot it felt when he was placed in the heated oven, the home from which
he sprang, and that he had a strong inclination to leap out again
directly; but after a while it became cooler, and he found himself
very comfortable. He had been placed in a row, with a whole regiment
of his brothers and sisters all brought out of the same furnace;
some of them had certainly been blown into champagne bottles, and
others into beer bottles, which made a little difference between them.
In the world it often happens that a beer bottle may contain the
most precious wine, and a champagne bottle be filled with blacking,
but even in decay it may always be seen whether a man has been well
born. Nobility remains noble, as a champagne bottle remains the
same, even with blacking in its interior. When the bottles were packed
our bottle was packed amongst them; it little expected then to
finish its career as a bottle neck, or to be used as a water-glass
to a bird's-cage, which is, after all, a place of honor, for it is
to be of some use in the world. The bottle did not behold the light of
day again, until it was unpacked with the rest in the wine
merchant's cellar, and, for the first time, rinsed with water, which
caused some very curious sensations. There it lay empty, and without a
cork, and it had a peculiar feeling, as if it wanted something it knew
not what. At last it was filled with rich and costly wine, a cork
was placed in it, and sealed down. Then it was labelled "first
quality," as if it had carried off the first prize at an
examination; besides, the wine and the bottle were both good, and
while we are young is the time for poetry. There were sounds of song
within the bottle, of things it could not understand, of green sunny
mountains, where the vines grow and where the merry vine-dressers
laugh, sing, and are merry. "Ah, how beautiful is life." All these
tones of joy and song in the bottle were like the working of a young
poet's brain, who often knows not the meaning of the tones which are
sounding within him. One morning the bottle found a purchaser in the
furrier's apprentice, who was told to bring one of the best bottles of
wine. It was placed in the provision basket with ham and cheese and
sausages. The sweetest fresh butter and the finest bread were put into
the basket by the furrier's daughter herself, for she packed it. She
was young and pretty; her brown eyes laughed, and a smile lingered
round her mouth as sweet as that in her eyes. She had delicate
hands, beautifully white, and her neck was whiter still. It could
easily be seen that she was a very lovely girl, and as yet she was not
engaged. The provision basket lay in the lap of the young girl as
the family drove out to the forest, and the neck of the bottle
peeped out from between the folds of the white napkin. There was the
red wax on the cork, and the bottle looked straight at the young
girl's face, and also at the face of the young sailor who sat near
her. He was a young friend, the son of a portrait painter. He had
lately passed his examination with honor, as mate, and the next
morning he was to sail in his ship to a distant coast. There had
been a great deal of talk on this subject while the basket was being
packed, and during this conversation the eyes and the mouth of the
furrier's daughter did not wear a very joyful expression. The young
people wandered away into the green wood, and talked together. What
did they talk about? The bottle could not say, for he was in the
provision basket. It remained there a long time; but when at last it
was brought forth it appeared as if something pleasant had happened,
for every one was laughing; the furrier's daughter laughed too, but
she said very little, and her cheeks were like two roses. Then her
father took the bottle and the cork-screw into his hands. What a
strange sensation it was to have the cork drawn for the first time!
The bottle could never after that forget the performance of that
moment; indeed there was quite a convulsion within him as the cork
flew out, and a gurgling sound as the wine was poured forth into the
glasses.
"Long life to the betrothed," cried the papa, and every glass
was emptied to the dregs, while the young sailor kissed his
beautiful bride.
"Happiness and blessing to you both," said the old people-father
and mother, and the young man filled the glasses again.
"Safe return, and a wedding this day next year," he cried; and
when the glasses were empty he took the bottle, raised it on high, and
said, "Thou hast been present here on the happiest day of my life;
thou shalt never be used by others!" So saying, he hurled it high in
the air.
The furrier's daughter thought she should never see it again,
but she was mistaken. It fell among the rushes on the borders of a
little woodland lake. The bottle neck remembered well how long it
lay there unseen. "I gave them wine, and they gave me muddy water," he
had said to himself, "but I suppose it was all well meant." He could
no longer see the betrothed couple, nor the cheerful old people; but
for a long time he could hear them rejoicing and singing. At length
there came by two peasant boys, who peeped in among the reeds and
spied out the bottle. Then they took it up and carried it home with
them, so that once more it was provided for. At home in their wooden
cottage these boys had an elder brother, a sailor, who was about to
start on a long voyage. He had been there the day before to say
farewell, and his mother was now very busy packing up various things
for him to take with him on his voyage. In the evening his father
was going to carry the parcel to the town to see his son once more,
and take him a farewell greeting from his mother. A small bottle had
already been filled with herb tea, mixed with brandy, and wrapped in a
parcel; but when the boys came in they brought with them a larger
and stronger bottle, which they had found. This bottle would hold so
much more than the little one, and they all said the brandy would be
so good for complaints of the stomach, especially as it was mixed with
medical herbs. The liquid which they now poured into the bottle was
not like the red wine with which it had once been filled; these were
bitter drops, but they are of great use sometimes-for the stomach. The
new large bottle was to go, not the little one: so the bottle once
more started on its travels. It was taken on board (for Peter Jensen
was one of the crew) the very same ship in which the young mate was to
sail. But the mate did not see the bottle: indeed, if he had he
would not have known it, or supposed it was the one out of which
they had drunk to the felicity of the betrothed and to the prospect of
a marriage on his own happy return. Certainly the bottle no longer
poured forth wine, but it contained something quite as good; and so it
happened that whenever Peter Jensen brought it out, his messmates gave
it the name of "the apothecary," for it contained the best medicine to
cure the stomach, and he gave it out quite willingly as long as a drop
remained. Those were happy days, and the bottle would sing when rubbed
with a cork, and it was called a great lark, "Peter Jensen's lark."
Long days and months rolled by, during which the bottle stood
empty in a corner, when a storm arose--whether on the passage out or
home it could not tell, for it had never been ashore. It was a
terrible storm, great waves arose, darkly heaving and tossing the
vessel to and fro. The main mast was split asunder, the ship sprang
a leak, and the pumps became useless, while all around was black as
night. At the last moment, when the ship was sinking, the young mate
wrote on a piece of paper, "We are going down: God's will be done."
Then he wrote the name of his betrothed, his own name, and that of the
ship. Then he put the leaf in an empty bottle that happened to be at
hand, corked it down tightly, and threw it into the foaming sea. He
knew not that it was the very same bottle from which the goblet of joy
and hope had once been filled for him, and now it was tossing on the
waves with his last greeting, and a message from the dead. The ship
sank, and the crew sank with her; but the bottle flew on like a
bird, for it bore within it a loving letter from a loving heart. And
as the sun rose and set, the bottle felt as at the time of its first
existence, when in the heated glowing stove it had a longing to fly
away. It outlived the storms and the calm, it struck against no rocks,
was not devoured by sharks, but drifted on for more than a year,
sometimes towards the north, sometimes towards the south, just as
the current carried it. It was in all other ways its own master, but
even of that one may get tired. The written leaf, the last farewell of
the bridegroom to his bride, would only bring sorrow when once it
reached her hands; but where were those hands, so soft and delicate,
which had once spread the table-cloth on the fresh grass in the
green wood, on the day of her betrothal? Ah, yes! where was the
furrier's daughter? and where was the land which might lie nearest
to her home?
The bottle knew not, it travelled onward and onward, and at last
all this wandering about became wearisome; at all events it was not
its usual occupation. But it had to travel, till at length it
reached land--a foreign country. Not a word spoken in this country
could the bottle understand; it was a language it had never before
heard, and it is a great loss not to be able to understand a language.
The bottle was fished out of the water, and examined on all sides. The
little letter contained within it was discovered, taken out, and
turned and twisted in every direction; but the people could not
understand what was written upon it. They could be quite sure that the
bottle had been thrown overboard from a vessel, and that something
about it was written on this paper: but what was written? that was the
question,--so the paper was put back into the bottle, and then both
were put away in a large cupboard of one of the great houses of the
town. Whenever any strangers arrived, the paper was taken out and
turned over and over, so that the address, which was only written in
pencil, became almost illegible, and at last no one could
distinguish any letters on it at all. For a whole year the bottle
remained standing in the cupboard, and then it was taken up to the
loft, where it soon became covered with dust and cobwebs. Ah! how
often then it thought of those better days--of the times when in the
fresh, green wood, it had poured forth rich wine; or, while rocked
by the swelling waves, it had carried in its bosom a secret, a letter,
a last parting sigh. For full twenty years it stood in the loft, and
it might have stayed there longer but that the house was going to be
rebuilt. The bottle was discovered when the roof was taken off; they
talked about it, but the bottle did not understand what they said--a
language is not to be learnt by living in a loft, even for twenty
years. "If I had been down stairs in the room," thought the bottle, "I
might have learnt it." It was now washed and rinsed, which process was
really quite necessary, and afterwards it looked clean and
transparent, and felt young again in its old age; but the paper
which it had carried so faithfully was destroyed in the washing.
They filled the bottle with seeds, though it scarcely knew what had
been placed in it. Then they corked it down tightly, and carefully
wrapped it up. There not even the light of a torch or lantern could
reach it, much less the brightness of the sun or moon. "And yet,"
thought the bottle, "men go on a journey that they may see as much
as possible, and I can see nothing." However, it did something quite
as important; it travelled to the place of its destination, and was
unpacked.
"What trouble they have taken with that bottle over yonder!"
said one, "and very likely it is broken after all." But the bottle
was not broken, and, better still, it understood every word that was
said: this language it had heard at the furnaces and at the wine
merchant's; in the forest and on the ship,--it was the only good old
language it could understand. It had returned home, and the language
was as a welcome greeting. For very joy, it felt ready to jump out
of people's hands, and scarcely noticed that its cork had been
drawn, and its contents emptied out, till it found itself carried to a
cellar, to be left there and forgotten. "There's no place like home,
even if it's a cellar." It never occurred to him to think that he
might lie there for years, he felt so comfortable. For many long years
he remained in the cellar, till at last some people came to carry away
the bottles, and ours amongst the number.
Out in the garden there was a great festival. Brilliant lamps hung
in festoons from tree to tree; and paper lanterns, through which the
light shone till they looked like transparent tulips. It was a
beautiful evening, and the weather mild and clear. The stars twinkled;
and the new moon, in the form of a crescent, was surrounded by the
shadowy disc of the whole moon, and looked like a gray globe with a
golden rim: it was a beautiful sight for those who had good eyes.
The illumination extended even to the most retired of the garden
walks, at least not so retired that any one need lose himself there.
In the borders were placed bottles, each containing a light, and among
them the bottle with which we are acquainted, and whose fate it was,
one day, to be only a bottle neck, and to serve as a water-glass to
a bird's-cage. Everything here appeared lovely to our bottle, for it
was again in the green wood, amid joy and feasting; again it heard
music and song, and the noise and murmur of a crowd, especially in
that part of the garden where the lamps blazed, and the paper lanterns
displayed their brilliant colors. It stood in a distant walk
certainly, but a place pleasant for contemplation; and it carried a
light; and was at once useful and ornamental. In such an hour it is
easy to forget that one has spent twenty years in a loft, and a good
thing it is to be able to do so. Close before the bottle passed a
single pair, like the bridal pair--the mate and the furrier's
daughter--who had so long ago wandered in the wood. It seemed to the
bottle as if he were living that time over again. Not only the
guests but other people were walking in the garden, who were allowed
to witness the splendor and the festivities. Among the latter came
an old maid, who seemed to be quite alone in the world. She was
thinking, like the bottle, of the green wood, and of a young betrothed
pair, who were closely connected with herself; she was thinking of
that hour, the happiest of her life, in which she had taken part, when
she had herself been one of that betrothed pair; such hours are
never to be forgotten, let a maiden be as old as she may. But she
did not recognize the bottle, neither did the bottle notice the old
maid. And so we often pass each other in the world when we meet, as
did these two, even while together in the same town.
The bottle was taken from the garden, and again sent to a wine
merchant, where it was once more filled with wine, and sold to an
aeronaut, who was to make an ascent in his balloon on the following
Sunday. A great crowd assembled to witness the sight; military music
had been engaged, and many other preparations made. The bottle saw
it all from the basket in which he lay close to a live rabbit. The
rabbit was quite excited because he knew that he was to be taken up,
and let down again in a parachute. The bottle, however, knew nothing
of the "up," or the "down;" he saw only that the balloon was
swelling larger and larger till it could swell no more, and began to
rise and be restless. Then the ropes which held it were cut through,
and the aerial ship rose in the air with the aeronaut and the basket
containing the bottle and the rabbit, while the music sounded and
all the people shouted "Hurrah."
"This is a wonderful journey up into the air," thought the bottle;
"it is a new way of sailing, and here, at least, there is no fear of
striking against anything."
Thousands of people gazed at the balloon, and the old maid who was
in the garden saw it also; for she stood at the open window of the
garret, by which hung the cage containing the linnet, who then had
no water-glass, but was obliged to be contented with an old cup. In
the window-sill stood a myrtle in a pot, and this had been pushed a
little on one side, that it might not fall out; for the old maid was
leaning out of the window, that she might see. And she did see
distinctly the aeronaut in the balloon, and how he let down the rabbit
in the parachute, and then drank to the health of all the spectators
in the wine from the bottle. After doing this, he hurled it high
into the air. How little she thought that this was the very same
bottle which her friend had thrown aloft in her honor, on that happy
day of rejoicing, in the green wood, in her youthful days. The
bottle had no time to think, when raised so suddenly; and before it
was aware, it reached the highest point it had ever attained in its
life. Steeples and roofs lay far, far beneath it, and the people
looked as tiny as possible. Then it began to descend much more rapidly
than the rabbit had done, made somersaults in the air, and felt itself
quite young and unfettered, although it was half full of wine. But
this did not last long. What a journey it was! All the people could
see the bottle; for the sun shone upon it. The balloon was already far
away, and very soon the bottle was far away also; for it fell upon a
roof, and broke in pieces. But the pieces had got such an impetus in
them, that they could not stop themselves. They went jumping and
rolling about, till at last they fell into the court-yard, and were
broken into still smaller pieces; only the neck of the bottle
managed to keep whole, and it was broken off as clean as if it had
been cut with a diamond.
"That would make a capital bird's glass," said one of the
cellar-men; but none of them had either a bird or a cage, and it was
not to be expected they would provide one just because they had
found a bottle neck that could be used as a glass. But the old maid
who lived in the garret had a bird, and it really might be useful to
her; so the bottle neck was provided with a cork, and taken up to her;
and, as it often happens in life, the part that had been uppermost was
now turned downwards, and it was filled with fresh water. Then they
hung it in the cage of the little bird, who sang and twittered more
merrily than ever.
"Ah, you have good reason to sing," said the bottle neck, which
was looked upon as something very remarkable, because it had been in a
balloon; nothing further was known of its history. As it hung there in
the bird's-cage, it could hear the noise and murmur of the people in
the street below, as well as the conversation of the old maid in the
room within. An old friend had just come to visit her, and they
talked, not about the bottle neck, but of the myrtle in the window.
"No, you must not spend a dollar for your daughter's bridal
bouquet," said the old maid; "you shall have a beautiful little
bunch for a nosegay, full of blossoms. Do you see how splendidly the
tree has grown? It has been raised from only a little sprig of
myrtle that you gave me on the day after my betrothal, and from
which I was to make my own bridal bouquet when a year had passed:
but that day never came; the eyes were closed which were to have
been my light and joy through life. In the depths of the sea my
beloved sleeps sweetly; the myrtle has become an old tree, and I am
a still older woman. Before the sprig you gave me faded, I took a
spray, and planted it in the earth; and now, as you see, it has become
a large tree, and a bunch of the blossoms shall at last appear at a
wedding festival, in the bouquet of your daughter."
There were tears in the eyes of the old maid, as she spoke of
the beloved of her youth, and of their betrothal in the wood. Many
thoughts came into her mind; but the thought never came, that quite
close to her, in that very window, was a remembrance of those olden
times,--the neck of the bottle which had, as it were shouted for joy
when the cork flew out with a bang on the betrothal day. But the
bottle neck did not recognize the old maid; he had not been
listening to what she had related, perhaps because he was thinking
so much about her.
THE BUCKWHEAT
Very often, after a violent thunder-storm, a field of buckwheat
appears blackened and singed, as if a flame of fire had passed over
it. The country people say that this appearance is caused by
lightning; but I will tell you what the sparrow says, and the
sparrow heard it from an old willow-tree which grew near a field of
buckwheat, and is there still. It is a large venerable tree, though
a little crippled by age. The trunk has been split, and out of the
crevice grass and brambles grow. The tree bends for-ward slightly, and
the branches hang quite down to the ground just like green hair.
Corn grows in the surrounding fields, not only rye and barley, but
oats,-pretty oats that, when ripe, look like a number of little golden
canary-birds sitting on a bough. The corn has a smiling look and the
heaviest and richest ears bend their heads low as if in pious
humility. Once there was also a field of buckwheat, and this field was
exactly opposite to old willow-tree. The buckwheat did not bend like
the other grain, but erected its head proudly and stiffly on the stem.
"I am as valuable as any other corn," said he, "and I am much
handsomer; my flowers are as beautiful as the bloom of the apple
blossom, and it is a pleasure to look at us. Do you know of anything
prettier than we are, you old willow-tree?"
And the willow-tree nodded his head, as if he would say, "Indeed I
do."
But the buckwheat spread itself out with pride, and said,
"Stupid tree; he is so old that grass grows out of his body."
There arose a very terrible storm. All the field-flowers folded
their leaves together, or bowed their little heads, while the storm
passed over them, but the buckwheat stood erect in its pride. "Bend
your head as we do," said the flowers.
"I have no occasion to do so," replied the buckwheat.
"Bend your head as we do," cried the ears of corn; "the angel of
the storm is coming; his wings spread from the sky above to the
earth beneath. He will strike you down before you can cry for mercy."
"But I will not bend my head," said the buckwheat.
"Close your flowers and bend your leaves," said the old
willow-tree. "Do not look at the lightning when the cloud bursts; even
men cannot do that. In a flash of lightning heaven opens, and we can
look in; but the sight will strike even human beings blind. What
then must happen to us, who only grow out of the earth, and are so
inferior to them, if we venture to do so?"
"Inferior, indeed!" said the buckwheat. "Now I intend to have a
peep into heaven." Proudly and boldly he looked up, while the
lightning flashed across the sky as if the whole world were in flames.
When the dreadful storm had passed, the flowers and the corn
raised their drooping heads in the pure still air, refreshed by the
rain, but the buckwheat lay like a weed in the field, burnt to
blackness by the lightning. The branches of the old willow-tree
rustled in the wind, and large water-drops fell from his green leaves
as if the old willow were weeping. Then the sparrows asked why he was
weeping, when all around him seemed so cheerful. "See," they said,
"how the sun shines, and the clouds float in the blue sky. Do you not
smell the sweet perfume from flower and bush? Wherefore do you weep,
old willow-tree?" Then the willow told them of the haughty pride of
the buckwheat, and of the punishment which followed in consequence.
This is the story told me by the sparrows one evening when I
begged them to relate some tale to me.
THE BUTTERFLY
There was once a butterfly who wished for a bride, and, as may
be supposed, he wanted to choose a very pretty one from among the
flowers. He glanced, with a very critical eye, at all the flower-beds,
and found that the flowers were seated quietly and demurely on their
stalks, just as maidens should sit before they are engaged; but
there was a great number of them, and it appeared as if his search
would become very wearisome. The butterfly did not like to take too
much trouble, so he flew off on a visit to the daisies. The French
call this flower "Marguerite," and they say that the little daisy
can prophesy. Lovers pluck off the leaves, and as they pluck each
leaf, they ask a question about their lovers; thus: "Does he or she
love me?--Ardently? Distractedly? Very much? A little? Not at all?"
and so on. Every one speaks these words in his own language. The
butterfly came also to Marguerite to inquire, but he did not pluck off
her leaves; he pressed a kiss on each of them, for he thought there
was always more to be done by kindness.
"Darling Marguerite daisy," he said to her, "you are the wisest
woman of all the flowers. Pray tell me which of the flowers I shall
choose for my wife. Which will be my bride? When I know, I will fly
directly to her, and propose."
But Marguerite did not answer him; she was offended that he should
call her a woman when she was only a girl; and there is a great
difference. He asked her a second time, and then a third; but she
remained dumb, and answered not a word. Then he would wait no
longer, but flew away, to commence his wooing at once. It was in the
early spring, when the crocus and the snowdrop were in full bloom.
"They are very pretty," thought the butterfly; "charming little
lasses; but they are rather formal."
Then, as the young lads often do, he looked out for the elder
girls. He next flew to the anemones; these were rather sour to his
taste. The violet, a little too sentimental. The lime-blossoms, too
small, and besides, there was such a large family of them. The
apple-blossoms, though they looked like roses, bloomed to-day, but
might fall off to-morrow, with the first wind that blew; and he
thought that a marriage with one of them might last too short a
time. The pea-blossom pleased him most of all; she was white and
red, graceful and slender, and belonged to those domestic maidens
who have a pretty appearance, and can yet be useful in the kitchen. He
was just about to make her an offer, when, close by the maiden, he saw
a pod, with a withered flower hanging at the end.
"Who is that?" he asked.
"That is my sister," replied the pea-blossom.
"Oh, indeed; and you will be like her some day," said he; and he
flew away directly, for he felt quite shocked.
A honeysuckle hung forth from the hedge, in full bloom; but
there were so many girls like her, with long faces and sallow
complexions. No; he did not like her. But which one did he like?
Spring went by, and summer drew towards its close; autumn came;
but he had not decided. The flowers now appeared in their most
gorgeous robes, but all in vain; they had not the fresh, fragrant
air of youth. For the heart asks for fragrance, even when it is no
longer young; and there is very little of that to be found in the
dahlias or the dry chrysanthemums; therefore the butterfly turned to
the mint on the ground. You know, this plant has no blossom; but it is
sweetness all over,--full of fragrance from head to foot, with the
scent of a flower in every leaf.
"I will take her," said the butterfly; and he made her an offer.
But the mint stood silent and stiff, as she listened to him. At last
she said,--
"Friendship, if you please; nothing more. I am old, and you are
old, but we may live for each other just the same; as to marrying--no;
don't let us appear ridiculous at our age."
And so it happened that the butterfly got no wife at all. He had
been too long choosing, which is always a bad plan. And the
butterfly became what is called an old bachelor.
It was late in the autumn, with rainy and cloudy weather. The cold
wind blew over the bowed backs of the willows, so that they creaked
again. It was not the weather for flying about in summer clothes;
but fortunately the butterfly was not out in it. He had got a
shelter by chance. It was in a room heated by a stove, and as warm
as summer. He could exist here, he said, well enough.
"But it is not enough merely to exist," said he, "I need
freedom, sunshine, and a little flower for a companion."
Then he flew against the window-pane, and was seen and admired
by those in the room, who caught him, and stuck him on a pin, in a box
of curiosities. They could not do more for him.
"Now I am perched on a stalk, like the flowers," said the
butterfly. "It is not very pleasant, certainly; I should imagine it is
something like being married; for here I am stuck fast." And with this
thought he consoled himself a little.
"That seems very poor consolation," said one of the plants in
the room, that grew in a pot.
"Ah," thought the butterfly, "one can't very well trust these
plants in pots; they have too much to do with mankind."
A CHEERFUL TEMPER
From my father I received the best inheritance, namely a "good
temper." "And who was my father?" That has nothing to do with the good
temper; but I will say he was lively, good-looking round, and fat;
he was both in appearance and character a complete contradiction to
his profession. "And pray what was his profession and his standing
in respectable society?" Well, perhaps, if in the beginning of a
book these were written and printed, many, when they read it, would
lay the book down and say, "It seems to me a very miserable title, I
don't like things of this sort." And yet my father was not a
skin-dresser nor an executioner; on the contrary, his employment
placed him at the head of the grandest people of the town, and it
was his place by right. He had to precede the bishop, and even the
princes of the blood; he always went first,--he was a hearse driver!
There, now, the truth is out. And I will own, that when people saw
my father perched up in front of the omnibus of death, dressed in
his long, wide, black cloak, and his black-edged, three-cornered hat
on his head, and then glanced at his round, jocund face, round as
the sun, they could not think much of sorrow or the grave. That face
said, "It is nothing, it will all end better than people think." So
I have inherited from him, not only my good temper, but a habit of
going often to the churchyard, which is good, when done in a proper
humor; and then also I take in the Intelligencer, just as he used to
do.
I am not very young, I have neither wife nor children, nor a
library, but, as I said, I read the Intelligencer, which is enough for
me; it is to me a delightful paper, and so it was to my father. It
is of great use, for it contains all that a man requires to know;
the names of the preachers at the church, and the new books which
are published; where houses, servants, clothes, and provisions may
be obtained. And then what a number of subscriptions to charities, and
what innocent verses! Persons seeking interviews and engagements,
all so plainly and naturally stated. Certainly, a man who takes in the
Intelligencer may live merrily and be buried contentedly, and by the
end of his life will have such a capital stock of paper that he can
lie on a soft bed of it, unless he prefers wood shavings for his
resting-place. The newspaper and the churchyard were always exciting
objects to me. My walks to the latter were like bathing-places to my
good humor. Every one can read the newspaper for himself, but come
with me to the churchyard while the sun shines and the trees are
green, and let us wander among the graves. Each of them is like a
closed book, with the back uppermost, on which we can read the title
of what the book contains, but nothing more. I had a great deal of
information from my father, and I have noticed a great deal myself.
I keep it in my diary, in which I write for my own use and pleasure
a history of all who lie here, and a few more beside.
Now we are in the churchyard. Here, behind the white iron
railings, once a rose-tree grew; it is gone now, but a little bit of
evergreen, from a neighboring grave, stretches out its green tendrils,
and makes some appearance; there rests a very unhappy man, and yet
while he lived he might be said to occupy a very good position. He had
enough to live upon, and something to spare; but owing to his
refined tastes the least thing in the world annoyed him. If he went to
a theatre of an evening, instead of enjoying himself he would be quite
annoyed if the machinist had put too strong a light into one side of
the moon, or if the representations of the sky hung over the scenes
when they ought to have hung behind them; or if a palm-tree was
introduced into a scene representing the Zoological Gardens of Berlin,
or a cactus in a view of Tyrol, or a beech-tree in the north of
Norway. As if these things were of any consequence! Why did he not
leave them alone? Who would trouble themselves about such trifles?
especially at a comedy, where every one is expected to be amused. Then
sometimes the public applauded too much, or too little, to please him.
"They are like wet wood," he would say, looking round to see what sort
of people were present, "this evening; nothing fires them." Then he
would vex and fret himself because they did not laugh at the right
time, or because they laughed in the wrong places; and so he fretted
and worried himself till at last the unhappy man fretted himself
into the grave.
Here rests a happy man, that is to say, a man of high birth and
position, which was very lucky for him, otherwise he would have been
scarcely worth notice. It is beautiful to observe how wisely nature
orders these things. He walked about in a coat embroidered all over,
and in the drawing-rooms of society looked just like one of those rich
pearl-embroidered bell-pulls, which are only made for show; and behind
them always hangs a good thick cord for use. This man also had a
stout, useful substitute behind him, who did duty for him, and
performed all his dirty work. And there are still, even now, these
serviceable cords behind other embroidered bell-ropes. It is all so
wisely arranged, that a man may well be in a good humor.
Here rests,--ah, it makes one feel mournful to think of him!--but
here rests a man who, during sixty-seven years, was never
remembered to have said a good thing; he lived only in the hope of
having a good idea. At last he felt convinced, in his own mind, that
he really had one, and was so delighted that he positively died of joy
at the thought of having at last caught an idea. Nobody got anything
by it; indeed, no one even heard what the good thing was. Now I can
imagine that this same idea may prevent him from resting quietly in
his grave; for suppose that to produce a good effect, it is
necessary to bring out his new idea at breakfast, and that he can only
make his appearance on earth at midnight, as ghosts are believed
generally to do; why then this good idea would not suit the hour,
and the man would have to carry it down again with him into the
grave--that must be a troubled grave.
The woman who lies here was so remarkably stingy, that during
her life she would get up in the night and mew, that her neighbors
might think she kept a cat. What a miser she was!
Here rests a young lady, of a good family, who would always make
her voice heard in society, and when she sang "Mi manca la voce,"[1]
it was the only true thing she ever said in her life.
Here lies a maiden of another description. She was engaged to be
married,--but, her story is one of every-day life; we will leave her
to rest in the grave.
Here rests a widow, who, with music in her tongue, carried gall in
her heart. She used to go round among the families near, and search
out their faults, upon which she preyed with all the envy and malice
of her nature. This is a family grave. The members of this family held
so firmly together in their opinions, that they would believe in no
other. If the newspapers, or even the whole world, said of a certain
subject, "It is so-and-so;" and a little schoolboy declared he had
learned quite differently, they would take his assertion as the only
true one, because he belonged to the family. And it is well known that
if the yard-cock belonging to this family happened to crow at
midnight, they would declare it was morning, although the watchman and
all the clocks in the town were proclaiming the hour of twelve at
night.
The great poet Goethe concludes his Faust with the words, "may
be continued;" so might our wanderings in the churchyard be continued.
I come here often, and if any of my friends, or those who are not my
friends, are too much for me, I go out and choose a plot of ground
in which to bury him or her. Then I bury them, as it were; there
they lie, dead and powerless, till they come back new and better
characters. Their lives and their deeds, looked at after my own
fashion, I write down in my diary, as every one ought to do. Then,
if any of our friends act absurdly, no one need to be vexed about
it. Let them bury the offenders out of sight, and keep their good
temper. They can also read the Intelligencer, which is a paper written
by the people, with their hands guided. When the time comes for the
history of my life, to be bound by the grave, then they will write
upon it as my epitaph--
"The man with a cheerful temper."
And this is my story.
[1] "I want a voice," or, "I have no voice."
THE CHILD IN THE GRAVE
It was a very sad day, and every heart in the house felt the
deepest grief; for the youngest child, a boy of four years old, the
joy and hope of his parents, was dead. Two daughters, the elder of
whom was going to be confirmed, still remained: they were both good,
charming girls; but the lost child always seems the dearest; and
when it is youngest, and a son, it makes the trial still more heavy.
The sisters mourned as young hearts can mourn, and were especially
grieved at the sight of their parents' sorrow. The father's heart
was bowed down, but the mother sunk completely under the deep grief.
Day and night she had attended to the sick child, nursing and carrying
it in her bosom, as a part of herself. She could not realize the
fact that the child was dead, and must be laid in a coffin to rest
in the ground. She thought God could not take her darling little one
from her; and when it did happen notwithstanding her hopes and her
belief, and there could be no more doubt on the subject, she said in
her feverish agony, "God does not know it. He has hard-hearted
ministering spirits on earth, who do according to their own will,
and heed not a mother's prayers." Thus in her great grief she fell
away from her faith in God, and dark thoughts arose in her mind
respecting death and a future state. She tried to believe that man was
but dust, and that with his life all existence ended. But these doubts
were no support to her, nothing on which she could rest, and she
sunk into the fathomless depths of despair. In her darkest hours she
ceased to weep, and thought not of the young daughters who were
still left to her. The tears of her husband fell on her forehead,
but she took no notice of him; her thoughts were with her dead
child; her whole existence seemed wrapped up in the remembrances of
the little one and of every innocent word it had uttered.
The day of the little child's funeral came. For nights
previously the mother had not slept, but in the morning twilight of
this day she sunk from weariness into a deep sleep; in the mean time
the coffin was carried into a distant room, and there nailed down,
that she might not hear the blows of the hammer. When she awoke, and
wanted to see her child, the husband, with tears, said, "We have
closed the coffin; it was necessary to do so."
"When God is so hard to me, how can I expect men to be better?"
she said with groans and tears.
The coffin was carried to the grave, and the disconsolate mother
sat with her young daughters. She looked at them, but she saw them
not; for her thoughts were far away from the domestic hearth. She gave
herself up to her grief, and it tossed her to and fro, as the sea
tosses a ship without compass or rudder. So the day of the funeral
passed away, and similar days followed, of dark, wearisome pain.
With tearful eyes and mournful glances, the sorrowing daughters and
the afflicted husband looked upon her who would not hear their words
of comfort; and, indeed, what comforting words could they speak,
when they were themselves so full of grief? It seemed as if she
would never again know sleep, and yet it would have been her best
friend, one who would have strengthened her body and poured peace into
her soul. They at last persuaded her to lie down, and then she would
lie as still as if she slept.
One night, when her husband listened, as he often did, to her
breathing, he quite believed that she had at length found rest and
relief in sleep. He folded his arms and prayed, and soon sunk
himself into healthful sleep; therefore he did not notice that his
wife arose, threw on her clothes, and glided silently from the
house, to go where her thoughts constantly lingered--to the grave of
her child. She passed through the garden, to a path across a field
that led to the churchyard. No one saw her as she walked, nor did
she see any one; for her eyes were fixed upon the one object of her
wanderings. It was a lovely starlight night in the beginning of
September, and the air was mild and still. She entered the
churchyard, and stood by the little grave, which looked like a large
nosegay of fragrant flowers. She sat down, and bent her head low over
the grave, as if she could see her child through the earth that
covered him--her little boy, whose smile was so vividly before her,
and the gentle expression of whose eyes, even on his sick-bed, she
could not forget. How full of meaning that glance had been, as she
leaned over him, holding in hers the pale hand which he had no longer
strength to raise! As she had sat by his little cot, so now she sat
by his grave; and here she could weep freely, and her tears fell upon
it.
"Thou wouldst gladly go down and be with thy child," said a
voice quite close to her,--a voice that sounded so deep and clear,
that it went to her heart.
She looked up, and by her side stood a man wrapped in a black
cloak, with a hood closely drawn over his face; but her keen glance
could distinguish the face under the hood. It was stern, yet
awakened confidence, and the eyes beamed with youthful radiance.
"Down to my child," she repeated; and tones of despair and
entreaty sounded in the words.
"Darest thou to follow me?" asked the form. "I am Death."
She bowed her head in token of assent. Then suddenly it appeared
as if all the stars were shining with the radiance of the full moon on
the many-colored flowers that decked the grave. The earth that covered
it was drawn back like a floating drapery. She sunk down, and the
spectre covered her with a black cloak; night closed around her, the
night of death. She sank deeper than the spade of the sexton could
penetrate, till the churchyard became a roof above her. Then the cloak
was removed, and she found herself in a large hall, of wide-spreading
dimensions, in which there was a subdued light, like twilight,
reigning, and in a moment her child appeared before her, smiling,
and more beautiful than ever; with a silent cry she pressed him
to her heart. A glorious strain of music sounded--now distant, now
near. Never had she listened to such tones as these; they came from
beyond a large dark curtain which separated the regions of death
from the land of eternity.
"My sweet, darling mother," she heard the child say. It was the
well-known, beloved voice; and kiss followed kiss, in boundless
delight. Then the child pointed to the dark curtain. "There is nothing
so beautiful on earth as it is here. Mother, do you not see them
all? Oh, it is happiness indeed."
But the mother saw nothing of what the child pointed out, only the
dark curtain. She looked with earthly eyes, and could not see as the
child saw,--he whom God has called to be with Himself. She could
hear the sounds of music, but she heard not the words, the Word in
which she was to trust.
"I can fly now, mother," said the child; "I can fly with other
happy children into the presence of the Almighty. I would fain fly
away now; but if you weep for me as you are weeping now, you may never
see me again. And yet I would go so gladly. May I not fly away? And
you will come to me soon, will you not, dear mother?"
"Oh, stay, stay!" implored the mother; "only one moment more; only
once more, that I may look upon thee, and kiss thee, and press thee to
my heart."
Then she kissed and fondled her child. Suddenly her name was
called from above; what could it mean? her name uttered in a plaintive
voice.
"Hearest thou?" said the child. "It is my father who calls
thee." And in a few moments deep sighs were heard, as of children
weeping. "They are my sisters," said the child. "Mother, surely you
have not forgotten them."
And then she remembered those she left behind, and a great
terror came over her. She looked around her at the dark night. Dim
forms flitted by. She seemed to recognize some of them, as they
floated through the regions of death towards the dark curtain, where
they vanished. Would her husband and her daughters flit past? No;
their sighs and lamentations still sounded from above; and she had
nearly forgotten them, for the sake of him who was dead.
"Mother, now the bells of heaven are ringing," said the child;
"mother, the sun is going to rise."
An overpowering light streamed in upon her, the child had
vanished, and she was being borne upwards. All around her became cold;
she lifted her head, and saw that she was lying in the churchyard,
on the grave of her child. The Lord, in a dream, had been a guide to
her feet and a light to her spirit. She bowed her knees, and prayed
for forgiveness. She had wished to keep back a soul from its
immortal flight; she had forgotten her duties towards the living who
were left her. And when she had offered this prayer, her heart felt
lighter. The sun burst forth, over her head a little bird carolled his
song, and the church-bells sounded for the early service. Everything
around her seemed holy, and her heart was chastened. She
acknowledged the goodness of God, she acknowledged the duties she
had to perform, and eagerly she returned home. She bent over her
husband, who still slept; her warm, devoted kiss awakened him, and
words of heartfelt love fell from the lips of both. Now she was gentle
and strong as a wife can be; and from her lips came the words of
faith: "Whatever He doeth is right and best."
Then her husband asked, "From whence hast thou all at once derived
such strength and comforting faith?"
And as she kissed him and her children, she said, "It came from
God, through my child in the grave."
CHILDREN'S PRATTLE
At a rich merchant's house there was a children's party, and the
children of rich and great people were there. The merchant was a
learned man, for his father had sent him to college, and he had passed
his examination. His father had been at first only a cattle dealer,
but always honest and industrious, so that he had made money, and
his son, the merchant, had managed to increase his store. Clever as he
was, he had also a heart; but there was less said of his heart than of
his money. All descriptions of people visited at the merchant's house,
well born, as well as intellectual, and some who possessed neither
of these recommendations.
Now it was a children's party, and there was children's prattle,
which always is spoken freely from the heart. Among them was a
beautiful little girl, who was terribly proud; but this had been
taught her by the servants, and not by her parents, who were far too
sensible people.
Her father was groom of the Chambers, which is a high office at
court, and she knew it. "I am a child of the court," she said; now she
might just as well have been a child of the cellar, for no one can
help his birth; and then she told the other children that she was
well-born, and said that no one who was not well-born could rise in
the world. It was no use to read and be industrious, for if a person
was not well-born, he could never achieve anything. "And those whose
names end with 'sen,'" said she, "can never be anything at all. We
must put our arms akimbo, and make the elbow quite pointed, so as to
keep these 'sen' people at a great distance." And then she stuck out
her pretty little arms, and made the elbows quite pointed, to show how
it was to be done; and her little arms were very pretty, for she was a
sweet-looking child.
But the little daughter of the merchant became very angry at
this speech, for her father's name was Petersen, and she knew that the
name ended in "sen," and therefore she said as proudly as she could,
"But my papa can buy a hundred dollars' worth of bonbons, and give
them away to children. Can your papa do that?"
"Yes; and my papa," said the little daughter of the editor of a
paper, "my papa can put your papa and everybody's papa into the
newspaper. All sorts of people are afraid of him, my mamma says, for
he can do as he likes with the paper." And the little maiden looked
exceedingly proud, as if she had been a real princess, who may be
expected to look proud.
But outside the door, which stood ajar, was a poor boy, peeping
through the crack of the door. He was of such a lowly station that
he had not been allowed even to enter the room. He had been turning
the spit for the cook, and she had given him permission to stand
behind the door and peep in at the well-dressed children, who were
having such a merry time within; and for him that was a great deal.
"Oh, if I could be one of them," thought he, and then he heard what
was said about names, which was quite enough to make him more unhappy.
His parents at home had not even a penny to spare to buy a
newspaper, much less could they write in one; and worse than all,
his father's name, and of course his own, ended in "sen," and
therefore he could never turn out well, which was a very sad
thought. But after all, he had been born into the world, and the
station of life had been chosen for him, therefore he must be content.
And this is what happened on that evening.
Many years passed, and most of the children became grown-up
persons.
There stood a splendid house in the town, filled with all kinds of
beautiful and valuable objects. Everybody wished to see it, and people
even came in from the country round to be permitted to view the
treasures it contained.
Which of the children whose prattle we have described, could
call this house his own? One would suppose it very easy to guess.
No, no; it is not so very easy. The house belonged to the poor
little boy who had stood on that night behind the door. He had
really become something great, although his name ended in "sen,"--for
it was Thorwaldsen.
And the three other children--the children of good birth, of
money, and of intellectual pride,--well, they were respected and
honored in the world, for they had been well provided for by birth and
position, and they had no cause to reproach themselves with what
they had thought and spoken on that evening long ago, for, after
all, it was mere "children's prattle."
THE FARM-YARD COCK AND THE WEATHER-COCK
There were two cocks--one on the dung-hill, the other on the roof.
They were both arrogant, but which of the two rendered most service?
Tell us your opinion--we'll keep to ours just the same though.
The poultry yard was divided by some planks from another yard in
which there was a dung-hill, and on the dung-hill lay and grew a large
cucumber which was conscious of being a hot-bed plant.
"One is born to that," said the cucumber to itself. "Not all can
be born cucumbers; there must be other things, too. The hens, the
ducks, and all the animals in the next yard are creatures too. Now I
have a great opinion of the yard cock on the plank; he is certainly of
much more importance than the weather-cock who is placed so high and
can't even creak, much less crow. The latter has neither hens nor
chicks, and only thinks of himself and perspires verdigris. No, the
yard cock is really a cock! His step is a dance! His crowing is music,
and wherever he goes one knows what a trumpeter is like! If he would
only come in here! Even if he ate me up stump, stalk, and all, and I
had to dissolve in his body, it would be a happy death," said the
cucumber.
In the night there was a terrible storm. The hens, chicks, and
even the cock sought shelter; the wind tore down the planks between
the two yards with a crash; the tiles came tumbling down, but the
weather-cock sat firm. He did not even turn round, for he could not;
and yet he was young and freshly cast, but prudent and sedate. He
had been born old, and did not at all resemble the birds flying in the
air--the sparrows, and the swallows; no, he despised them, these
mean little piping birds, these common whistlers. He admitted that the
pigeons, large and white and shining like mother-o'-pearl, looked like
a kind of weather-cock; but they were fat and stupid, and all their
thoughts and endeavours were directed to filling themselves with food,
and besides, they were tiresome things to converse with. The birds
of passage had also paid the weather-cock a visit and told him of
foreign countries, of airy caravans and robber stories that made one's
hair stand on end. All this was new and interesting; that is, for
the first time, but afterwards, as the weather-cock found out, they
repeated themselves and always told the same stories, and that's
very tedious, and there was no one with whom one could associate,
for one and all were stale and small-minded.
"The world is no good!" he said. "Everything in it is so stupid."
The weather-cock was puffed up, and that quality would have made
him interesting in the eyes of the cucumber if it had known it, but it
had eyes only for the yard cock, who was now in the yard with it.
The wind had blown the planks, but the storm was over.
"What do you think of that crowing?" said the yard cock to the
hens and chickens. "It was a little rough--it wanted elegance."
And the hens and chickens came up on the dung-hill, and the cock
strutted about like a lord.
"Garden plant!" he said to the cucumber, and in that one word
his deep learning showed itself, and it forgot that he was pecking
at her and eating it up. "A happy death!"
The hens and the chickens came, for where one runs the others
run too; they clucked, and chirped, and looked at the cock, and were
proud that he was of their kind.
"Cock-a-doodle-doo!" he crowed, "the chickens will grow up into
great hens at once, if I cry it out in the poultry-yard of the world!"
And hens and chicks clucked and chirped, and the cock announced
a great piece of news.
"A cock can lay an egg! And do you know what's in that egg? A
basilisk. No one can stand the sight of such a thing; people know
that, and now you know it too--you know what is in me, and what a
champion of all cocks I am!"
With that the yard cock flapped his wings, made his comb swell up,
and crowed again; and they all shuddered, the hens and the little
chicks--but they were very proud that one of their number was such a
champion of all cocks. They clucked and chirped till the
weather-cock heard; he heard it; but he did not stir.
"Everything is very stupid," the weather-cock said to himself.
"The yard cock lays no eggs, and I am too lazy to do so; if I liked, I
could lay a wind-egg. But the world is not worth even a wind-egg.
Everything is so stupid! I don't want to sit here any longer."
With that the weather-cock broke off; but he did not kill the yard
cock, although the hens said that had been his intention. And what
is the moral? "Better to crow than to be puffed up and break off!"
THE DAISY
Now listen! In the country, close by the high road, stood a
farmhouse; perhaps you have passed by and seen it yourself. There
was a little flower garden with painted wooden palings in front of it;
close by was a ditch, on its fresh green bank grew a little daisy; the
sun shone as warmly and brightly upon it as on the magnificent
garden flowers, and therefore it thrived well. One morning it had
quite opened, and its little snow-white petals stood round the
yellow centre, like the rays of the sun. It did not mind that nobody
saw it in the grass, and that it was a poor despised flower; on the
contrary, it was quite happy, and turned towards the sun, looking
upward and listening to the song of the lark high up in the air.
The little daisy was as happy as if the day had been a great
holiday, but it was only Monday. All the children were at school,
and while they were sitting on the forms and learning their lessons,
it sat on its thin green stalk and learnt from the sun and from its
surroundings how kind God is, and it rejoiced that the song of the
little lark expressed so sweetly and distinctly its own feelings. With
a sort of reverence the daisy looked up to the bird that could fly and
sing, but it did not feel envious. "I can see and hear," it thought;
"the sun shines upon me, and the forest kisses me. How rich I am!"
In the garden close by grew many large and magnificent flowers,
and, strange to say, the less fragrance they had the haughtier and
prouder they were. The peonies puffed themselves up in order to be
larger than the roses, but size is not everything! The tulips had
the finest colours, and they knew it well, too, for they were standing
bolt upright like candles, that one might see them the better. In
their pride they did not see the little daisy, which looked over to
them and thought, "How rich and beautiful they are! I am sure the
pretty bird will fly down and call upon them. Thank God, that I
stand so near and can at least see all the splendour." And while the
daisy was still thinking, the lark came flying down, crying "Tweet,"
but not to the peonies and tulips--no, into the grass to the poor
daisy. Its joy was so great that it did not know what to think. The
little bird hopped round it and sang, "How beautifully soft the
grass is, and what a lovely little flower with its golden heart and
silver dress is growing here." The yellow centre in the daisy did
indeed look like gold, while the little petals shone as brightly as
silver.
How happy the daisy was! No one has the least idea. The bird
kissed it with its beak, sang to it, and then rose again up to the
blue sky. It was certainly more than a quarter of an hour before the
daisy recovered its senses. Half ashamed, yet glad at heart, it looked
over to the other flowers in the garden; surely they had witnessed its
pleasure and the honour that had been done to it; they understood
its joy. But the tulips stood more stiffly than ever, their faces were
pointed and red, because they were vexed. The peonies were sulky; it
was well that they could not speak, otherwise they would have given
the daisy a good lecture. The little flower could very well see that
they were ill at ease, and pitied them sincerely.
Shortly after this a girl came into the garden, with a large sharp
knife. She went to the tulips and began cutting them off, one after
another. "Ugh!" sighed the daisy, "that is terrible; now they are done
for."
The girl carried the tulips away. The daisy was glad that it was
outside, and only a small flower--it felt very grateful. At sunset
it folded its petals, and fell asleep, and dreamt all night of the sun
and the little bird.
On the following morning, when the flower once more stretched
forth its tender petals, like little arms, towards the air and
light, the daisy recognised the bird's voice, but what it sang sounded
so sad. Indeed the poor bird had good reason to be sad, for it had
been caught and put into a cage close by the open window. It sang of
the happy days when it could merrily fly about, of fresh green corn in
the fields, and of the time when it could soar almost up to the
clouds. The poor lark was most unhappy as a prisoner in a cage. The
little daisy would have liked so much to help it, but what could be
done? Indeed, that was very difficult for such a small flower to
find out. It entirely forgot how beautiful everything around it was,
how warmly the sun was shining, and how splendidly white its own
petals were. It could only think of the poor captive bird, for which
it could do nothing. Then two little boys came out of the garden;
one of them had a large sharp knife, like that with which the girl had
cut the tulips. They came straight towards the little daisy, which
could not understand what they wanted.
"Here is a fine piece of turf for the lark," said one of the boys,
and began to cut out a square round the daisy, so that it remained
in the centre of the grass.
"Pluck the flower off," said the other boy, and the daisy
trembled for fear, for to be pulled off meant death to it; and it
wished so much to live, as it was to go with the square of turf into
the poor captive lark's cage.
"No let it stay," said the other boy, "it looks so pretty."
And so it stayed, and was brought into the lark's cage. The poor
bird was lamenting its lost liberty, and beating its wings against the
wires; and the little daisy could not speak or utter a consoling word,
much as it would have liked to do so. So the forenoon passed.
"I have no water," said the captive lark, "they have all gone out,
and forgotten to give me anything to drink. My throat is dry and
burning. I feel as if I had fire and ice within me, and the air is
so oppressive. Alas! I must die, and part with the warm sunshine,
the fresh green meadows, and all the beauty that God has created." And
it thrust its beak into the piece of grass, to refresh itself a
little. Then it noticed the little daisy, and nodded to it, and kissed
it with its beak and said: "You must also fade in here, poor little
flower. You and the piece of grass are all they have given me in
exchange for the whole world, which I enjoyed outside. Each little
blade of grass shall be a green tree for me, each of your white petals
a fragrant flower. Alas! you only remind me of what I have lost."
"I wish I could console the poor lark," thought the daisy. It
could not move one of its leaves, but the fragrance of its delicate
petals streamed forth, and was much stronger than such flowers usually
have: the bird noticed it, although it was dying with thirst, and in
its pain tore up the green blades of grass, but did not touch the
flower.
The evening came, and nobody appeared to bring the poor bird a
drop of water; it opened its beautiful wings, and fluttered about in
its anguish; a faint and mournful "Tweet, tweet," was all it could
utter, then it bent its little head towards the flower, and its
heart broke for want and longing. The flower could not, as on the
previous evening, fold up its petals and sleep; it dropped
sorrowfully. The boys only came the next morning; when they saw the
dead bird, they began to cry bitterly, dug a nice grave for it, and
adorned it with flowers. The bird's body was placed in a pretty red
box; they wished to bury it with royal honours. While it was alive and
sang they forgot it, and let it suffer want in the cage; now, they
cried over it and covered it with flowers. The piece of turf, with the
little daisy in it, was thrown out on the dusty highway. Nobody
thought of the flower which had felt so much for the bird and had so
greatly desired to comfort it.
THE DARNING-NEEDLE
There was once a darning-needle who thought herself so fine that
she fancied she must be fit for embroidery. "Hold me tight," she would
say to the fingers, when they took her up, "don't let me fall; if
you do I shall never be found again, I am so very fine."
"That is your opinion, is it?" said the fingers, as they seized
her round the body.
"See, I am coming with a train," said the darning-needle,
drawing a long thread after her; but there was no knot in the thread.
The fingers then placed the point of the needle against the cook's
slipper. There was a crack in the upper leather, which had to be
sewn together.
"What coarse work!" said the darning-needle, "I shall never get
through. I shall break!--I am breaking!" and sure enough she broke.
"Did I not say so?" said the darning-needle, "I know I am too fine for
such work as that."
"This needle is quite useless for sewing now," said the fingers;
but they still held it fast, and the cook dropped some sealing-wax
on the needle, and fastened her handkerchief with it in front.
"So now I am a breast-pin," said the darning-needle; "I knew
very well I should come to honor some day: merit is sure to rise;" and
she laughed, quietly to herself, for of course no one ever saw a
darning-needle laugh. And there she sat as proudly as if she were in a
state coach, and looked all around her. "May I be allowed to ask if
you are made of gold?" she inquired of her neighbor, a pin; "you
have a very pretty appearance, and a curious head, although you are
rather small. You must take pains to grow, for it is not every one who
has sealing-wax dropped upon him;" and as she spoke, the
darning-needle drew herself up so proudly that she fell out of the
handkerchief right into the sink, which the cook was cleaning. "Now
I am going on a journey," said the needle, as she floated away with
the dirty water, "I do hope I shall not be lost." But she really was
lost in a gutter. "I am too fine for this world," said the
darning-needle, as she lay in the gutter; "but I know who I am, and
that is always some comfort." So the darning-needle kept up her
proud behavior, and did not lose her good humor. Then there floated
over her all sorts of things,--chips and straws, and pieces of old
newspaper. "See how they sail," said the darning-needle; "they do
not know what is under them. I am here, and here I shall stick. See,
there goes a chip, thinking of nothing in the world but himself--only
a chip. There's a straw going by now; how he turns and twists
about! Don't be thinking too much of yourself, or you may chance to
run against a stone. There swims a piece of newspaper; what is written
upon it has been forgotten long ago, and yet it gives itself airs. I
sit here patiently and quietly. I know who I am, so I shall not move."
One day something lying close to the darning-needle glittered so
splendidly that she thought it was a diamond; yet it was only a
piece of broken bottle. The darning-needle spoke to it, because it
sparkled, and represented herself as a breast-pin. "I suppose you
are really a diamond?" she said.
"Why yes, something of the kind," he replied; and so each believed
the other to be very valuable, and then they began to talk about the
world, and the conceited people in it.
"I have been in a lady's work-box," said the darning-needle,
"and this lady was the cook. She had on each hand five fingers, and
anything so conceited as these five fingers I have never seen; and yet
they were only employed to take me out of the box and to put me back
again."
"Were they not high-born?"
"High-born!" said the darning-needle, "no indeed, but so
haughty. They were five brothers, all born fingers; they kept very
proudly together, though they were of different lengths. The one who
stood first in the rank was named the thumb, he was short and thick,
and had only one joint in his back, and could therefore make but one
bow; but he said that if he were cut off from a man's hand, that man
would be unfit for a soldier. Sweet-tooth, his neighbor, dipped
himself into sweet or sour, pointed to the sun and moon, and formed
the letters when the fingers wrote. Longman, the middle finger, looked
over the heads of all the others. Gold-band, the next finger, wore a
golden circle round his waist. And little Playman did nothing at
all, and seemed proud of it. They were boasters, and boasters they
will remain; and therefore I left them."
"And now we sit here and glitter," said the piece of broken
bottle.
At the same moment more water streamed into the gutter, so that it
overflowed, and the piece of bottle was carried away.
"So he is promoted," said the darning-needle, "while I remain
here; I am too fine, but that is my pride, and what do I care?" And so
she sat there in her pride, and had many such thoughts as these,--"I
could almost fancy that I came from a sunbeam, I am so fine. It
seems as if the sunbeams were always looking for me under the water.
Ah! I am so fine that even my mother cannot find me. Had I still my
old eye, which was broken off, I believe I should weep; but no, I
would not do that, it is not genteel to cry."
One day a couple of street boys were paddling in the gutter, for
they sometimes found old nails, farthings, and other treasures. It was
dirty work, but they took great pleasure in it. "Hallo!" cried one, as
he pricked himself with the darning-needle, "here's a fellow for you."
"I am not a fellow, I am a young lady," said the darning-needle;
but no one heard her.
The sealing-wax had come off, and she was quite black; but black
makes a person look slender, so she thought herself even finer than
before.
"Here comes an egg-shell sailing along," said one of the boys;
so they stuck the darning-needle into the egg-shell.
"White walls, and I am black myself," said the darning-needle,
"that looks well; now I can be seen, but I hope I shall not be
sea-sick, or I shall break again." She was not sea-sick, and she did
not break. "It is a good thing against sea-sickness to have a steel
stomach, and not to forget one's own importance. Now my sea-sickness
has past: delicate people can bear a great deal."
Crack went the egg-shell, as a waggon passed over it. "Good
heavens, how it crushes!" said the darning-needle. "I shall be sick
now. I am breaking!" but she did not break, though the waggon went
over her as she lay at full length; and there let her lie.
DELAYING IS NOT FORGETTING
There was an old mansion surrounded by a marshy ditch with a
drawbridge which was but seldom let down:--not all guests are good
people. Under the roof were loopholes to shoot through, and to pour
down boiling water or even molten lead on the enemy, should he
approach. Inside the house the rooms were very high and had ceilings
of beams, and that was very useful considering the great deal of smoke
which rose up from the chimney fire where the large, damp logs of wood
smouldered. On the walls hung pictures of knights in armour and
proud ladies in gorgeous dresses; the most stately of all walked about
alive. She was called Meta Mogen; she was the mistress of the house,
to her belonged the castle.
Towards the evening robbers came; they killed three of her
people and also the yard-dog, and attached Mrs. Meta to the kennel
by the chain, while they themselves made good cheer in the hall and
drank the wine and the good ale out of her cellar. Mrs. Meta was now
on the chain, she could not even bark.
But lo! the servant of one of the robbers secretly approached her;
they must not see it, otherwise they would have killed him.
"Mrs. Meta Mogen," said the fellow, "do you still remember how
my father, when your husband was still alive, had to ride on the
wooden horse? You prayed for him, but it was no good, he was to ride
until his limbs were paralysed; but you stole down to him, as I
steal now to you, you yourself put little stones under each of his
feet that he might have support, nobody saw it, or they pretended
not to see it, for you were then the young gracious mistress. My
father has told me this, and I have not forgotten it! Now I will
free you, Mrs. Meta Mogen!"
Then they pulled the horses out of the stable and rode off in rain
and wind to obtain the assistance of friends.
"Thus the small service done to the old man was richly
rewarded!" said Meta Mogen.
"Delaying is not forgetting," said the fellow.
The robbers were hanged.
There was an old mansion, it is still there; it did not belong
to Mrs. Meta Mogen, it belonged to another old noble family.
We are now in the present time. The sun is shining on the gilt
knob of the tower, little wooded islands lie like bouquets on the
water, and wild swans are swimming round them. In the garden grow
roses; the mistress of the house is herself the finest rose petal, she
beams with joy, the joy of good deeds: however, not done in the wide
world, but in her heart, and what is preserved there is not forgotten.
Delaying is not forgetting!
Now she goes from the mansion to a little peasant hut in the
field. Therein lives a poor paralysed girl; the window of her little
room looks northward, the sun does not enter here. The girl can only
see a small piece of field which is surrounded by a high fence. But
to-day the sun shines here--the warm, beautiful sun of God is within
the little room; it comes from the south through the new window, where
formerly the wall was.
The paralysed girl sits in the warm sunshine and can see the
wood and the lake; the world had become so large, so beautiful, and
only through a single word from the kind mistress of the mansion.
"The word was so easy, the deed so small," she said, "the joy it
afforded me was infinitely great and sweet!"
And therefore she does many a good deed, thinks of all in the
humble cottages and in the rich mansions, where there are also
afflicted ones. It is concealed and hidden, but God does not forget
it. Delayed is not forgotten!
An old house stood there; it was in the large town with its busy
traffic. There are rooms and halls in it, but we do not enter them, we
remain in the kitchen, where it is warm and light, clean and tidy; the
copper utensils are shining, the table as if polished with beeswax;
the sink looks like a freshly scoured meatboard. All this a single
servant has done, and yet she has time to spare as if she wished to go
to church; she wears a bow on her cap, a black bow, that signifies
mourning. But she has no one to mourn, neither father nor mother,
neither relations nor sweetheart. She is a poor girl. One day she
was engaged to a poor fellow; they loved each other dearly.
One day he came to her and said:
"We both have nothing! The rich widow over the way in the basement
has made advances to me; she will make me rich, but you are in my
heart; what do you advise me to do?"
"I advise you to do what you think will turn out to your
happiness," said the girl. "Be kind and good to her, but remember
this; from the hour we part we shall never see each other again."
Years passed; then one day she met the old friend and sweetheart
in the street; he looked ill and miserable, and she could not help
asking him, "How are you?"
"Rich and prospering in every respect," he said; "the woman is
brave and good, but you are in my heart. I have fought the battle,
it will soon be ended; we shall not see each other again now until
we meet before God!"
A week has passed; this morning his death was in the newspaper,
that is the reason of the girl's mourning! Her old sweetheart is
dead and has left a wife and three step-children, as the paper says;
it sounds as if there is a crack, but the metal is pure.
The black bow signifies mourning, the girl's face points to the
same in a still higher degree; it
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