Chapter III: Part 3

"I have not sinned," said the prince, "and I will not!" He also put aside the green, depending branches of the Tree of Knowledge, and there sat the Fairy with her hands clasped, and the tears on her dark eyelashes!

"Weep not for me!" said he passionately. "There can be no sin in what I have done; weep not!" and he kissed away her tears, and his lips touched hers!

At once a thunder crash was heard--a loud and deep thunder crash, and all seemed hurled together! The beautiful, weeping Fairy, the Garden of Paradise, sunk--sunk so deep--so deep!--and the prince saw it sink in the deep night! Like a little gleaming star he saw it shining a long way off! The coldness of death went through his limbs; he closed his eyes, and lay long as if dead!

The cold rain fell upon his face; the keen wind blew around his head; his thoughts turned to the past.

"What have I done!" sighed he; "I have sinned like Adam! Sinned, and I have forfeited Paradise!"

He opened his eyes; the star so far off, which had shone to him like the sunken Paradise, he now saw was the morning star in heaven.

He raised himself up, and was in the great wood near to the cave of the winds; the old woman sat by his side, she looked angrily at him, and lifted up her arm.

"Already! the first time of trial!" said she: "I expected as much! Yes, if thou wast a lad of mine, I would punish thee!"

"Punishment will come!" said a strong old man, with a scythe in his hand, and with large, black wings!--"I shall lay him in his coffin, but not now. Let him return to the world, atone for his sin, and become good in deed, and not alone in word. I shall come again; if he be then good and pious, I will take him above the stars, where blooms the Garden of Paradise; and he shall enter in at its beautiful pearl gates, and be a dweller in it forever and ever; but if then his thoughts are evil, and his heart full of sin, he will sink deeper than Paradise seemed to sink--sink deeper, and that forever!--Farewell!"

The prince arose--the old woman was gone--the cave of the winds was nothing now but a hollow in the rock; he wondered how it had seemed so large the night before; the morning star had set, and the sun shone with a clear and cheerful light upon the little flowers and blades of grass, which were heavy with the last night's rain; the birds sang, and the bees hummed in the blossoms of the lime tree. The prince walked home to his castle. He told his grandmother how he had been to the Garden of Paradise, and what had happened to him there, and what the old man with the black wings had said.

"This will do thee more good than many book-lessons," said the old grandmother; "never let it go out of thy memory!"--and the prince never did.

A NIGHT IN THE KITCHEN.

Once upon a time, there was a bunch of brimstone matches, which were exceedingly proud, because they were of high descent; their ancestral tree, that is to say, the great fir tree, of which they were little bits of chips, had been a great, old tree in the forest. The brimstone matches now lay beside the kitchen fender, together with the tinder and an old iron pot, and were speaking of their youth.

"Yes, we were then on the green branch," said they; "then we were really and truly on a green branch; every morning and evening we drank diamond tea, that was the dew; every day we had sunshine, if the sun shone, and all the little birds told us tales. We could very well observe also, that we were rich; for the common trees were only dressed in summer, but our family had a good stock of green clothing both winter and summer. But then came the wood-cutters--that was a great revolution, and our family was cut up root and branch; the main head of the family, he took a place as mainmast in a magnificent ship, which sailed round the world wherever it would; the other branches, some took one place, and some took another; and we have now the post of giving light to the common herd; and, therefore, high-born as we are, are we now in the kitchen."

"Yes, it was different with me," said the iron pot, when the matches were silent; "as soon as ever I came into the world I was cleaned and boiled many a time! I care for the solid, and am properly spoken of as first in the house. My only pleasure is, as soon as dinner is over, to lie clean and bright upon the shelf, and head a long row of comrades. If I except the water-bucket, which now and then goes down in the yard, we always live in-doors. Our only newsmonger is the coal-box; but it talks so violently about government and the people!--yes, lately there was an old pot, which, out of horror of it, fell down and broke to pieces!"

"Thou chatterest too much!" interrupted the tinder, and the steel struck the flint until sparks came out. "Should we not have a merry evening?"

"Yes; let us talk about who is the most well-bred among us," said the brimstone matches.

"No, I don't think it right to talk about ourselves," said an earthen jug; "let us have an evening's entertainment. I will begin; I will tell something which everybody has experienced; people can do that so seldom, and it is so pleasant. By the Baltic sea--"

"That is a beautiful beginning!" said all the talkers; "it will certainly be a history which we shall like."

"Yes, then I passed my youth in a quiet family; the furniture was of wood; the floors were scoured; they had clean curtains every fortnight."

"How interestingly you tell it!" said the dusting-brush; "one can immediately tell that the narrator is a lady, such a thread of purity always runs through their relations."

"Yes, that one can feel!" said the water-bucket, and made a little skip of pleasure on the floor.

And the earthen jug continued her story, and the end of it was like the beginning.

All the talkers shook for pleasure; and the dusting-brush took green parsley leaves from the dust-heap, and crowned the jug; for he knew that it would vex the others; and thinks he to himself, "If I crown her to-day, she will crown me to-morrow!"

"Now we will dance," said the fire-tongs; and began dancing. Yes, indeed! and it is wonderful how he set one leg before the other; the old shoehorn, which hung on a hook, jumped up to see it. "Perhaps I, too, may get crowned," said the fire-tongs; and it was crowned.

"They are only the rabble!" thought the brimstone matches.

The tea-urn was then asked to sing; but it said it had got a cold, and it could not sing unless it was boiling; but it was nothing but an excuse, because it did not like to sing, unless it stood upon the table, in grand company.

In the window there sat an old pen, which the servant-girl was accustomed to write with: there was nothing remarkable about it; it was dipped deep into the ink-stand. "If the tea-urn will not sing," said the pen, "then she can let it alone! Outside there hangs a nightingale in a cage, which can sing, and which has not regularly learned any thing; but we will not talk scandal this evening!"

"I think it highly unbecoming," said the tea-kettle, which was the kitchen singer, and half-sister to the tea-urn, "that such a foreign bird should be listened to! Is it patriotic? I will let the coal-box judge."

"It only vexes me," said the coal-box; "it vexes me so much, that no one can think! Is this a proper way to spend an evening? Would it not be much better to put the house to rights? Every one go to his place, and I will rule; that will produce a change!"

"Yes, let us do something out of the common way!" said all the things together.

At that very moment the door opened. It was the servant-girl, and so they all stood stock still; not a sound was heard; but there was not a pot among them that did not know what they might have done, and how genteel they were.

"If I might have had my way," thought they, "then it would have been a regularly merry evening!"

The servant-girl took the brimstone matches, and put fire to them. Bless us! how they sputtered and burst into a flame!

"Now every one can see," thought they, "that we take the first rank! What splendor we have! what brilliancy!"--and with that they were burnt out.

LITTLE IDA'S FLOWERS.

"My poor flowers are quite dead," said little Ida. "They were so beautiful last evening, and now all their leaves hang withered. How can that be?" asked she from the student who sat on the sofa. She was very fond of him, for he knew the most beautiful tales, and could cut out such wonderful pictures; he could cut out hearts with little dancing ladies in them; flowers he could cut out, and castles with doors that would open. He was a very charming student.

"Why do the flowers look so miserably to-day?" again asked she, and showed him a whole bouquet of withered flowers.

"Dost thou not know what ails them?" said the student; "the flowers have been to a ball last night, and therefore they droop so."

"But flowers cannot dance," said little Ida.

"Yes, when it is dark, and we are all asleep, then they dance about merrily; nearly every night they have a ball!" said the student.

"Can no child go to the ball?" inquired Ida.

"Yes," said the student, "little tiny daisies and lilies of the valley."

"Where do the prettiest flowers dance?" asked little Ida.

"Hast thou not," said the student, "gone out of the city gate to the great castle where the king lives in summer, where there is a beautiful garden, with a great many flowers in it? Thou hast certainly seen the swans which come sailing to thee for little bits of bread. There is a regular ball, thou mayst believe!"

"I was in the garden yesterday with my mother," said Ida, "but all the leaves were off the trees, and there were hardly any flowers at all! Where are they? In summer I saw such a many."

"They are gone into the castle," said the student. "Thou seest, as soon as the king and all his court go away to the city, the flowers go directly out of the garden into the castle, and are very merry. Thou shouldst see them! The two most beautiful roses sit upon the throne, and are king and queen; all the red cockscombs place themselves on each side, and stand and bow, they are the chamberlains. Then all the prettiest flowers come, and so there is a great ball; the blue violets represent young midshipmen and cadets, they dance with hyacinths and crocuses, which they call young ladies. The tulips and the great yellow lilies, they are old ladies who look on, and see that the dancing goes on properly, and that every thing is beautiful."

"But is there nobody who gives the flowers any thing while they dance in the king's castle?" asked little Ida.

"There is nobody who rightly knows about it," said the student. "In the summer season at night the old castle-steward goes regularly through the castle; he has a great bunch of keys with him, but as soon as ever the flowers hear the jingling of his keys, they are quite still, hide themselves behind the long curtains, and peep out with their little heads. 'I can smell flowers somewhere about,' says the old castle-steward, 'but I cannot see them!'"

"That is charming!" said little Ida, and clapped her hands; "but could not I see the flowers?"

"Yes," said the student, "only remember the next time thou art there to peep in at the window, and then thou wilt see them. I did so one day; there lay a tall yellow Turk's-cap lily on a sofa; that was a court lady."

"And can the flowers in the botanic garden go out there? Can they come such a long way?" asked Ida.

"Yes, that thou mayst believe," said the student; "for if they like they can fly. Hast thou not seen the pretty butterflies, the red, and yellow, and white ones, they look almost like flowers,--and so they have been; they have grown on stalks high up in the air, and have shot out leaves as if they were small wings, and so they fly, and when they can support them well, then they have leave given them to fly about by day. That thou must have seen thyself! But it is very possible that the flowers in the botanic garden never have been into the king's castle, nor know how merry they are there at night. And now, therefore, I will tell thee something that will put the professor of botany who lives beside the garden into a perplexity. Thou knowest him, dost thou not? Next time thou goest into his garden, do thou tell one of the flowers that there will be a great ball at the castle; it will tell it to its neighbor, and it to the next, and so on till they all know, and then they will all fly away. Then the professor will come into the garden, and will not find a single flower, and he will not be able to imagine what can have become of them."

"But how can one flower tell another? flowers cannot talk," said little Ida.

"No, they cannot properly talk," replied the student, "and so they have pantomime. Hast not thou seen when it blows a little the flowers nod and move all their green leaves; that is just as intelligible as if they talked."

"Can the professor understand pantomime?" inquired Ida.

"Yes, that thou mayst believe! He came one morning down into his garden, and saw a tall yellow nettle pantomiming to a beautiful red carnation, and it was all the same as if it had said, 'Thou art so handsome, that I am very fond of thee!' The professor was not pleased with that, and struck the nettle upon its leaves, which are its fingers; but they stung him so, that from that time he has never meddled with a nettle again."

"That is delightful!" said little Ida, and laughed.

"Is that the stuff to fill a child's mind with!" exclaimed the tiresome chancellor, who was come in on a visit, and now sat on the sofa. He could not bear the student, and always grumbled when he saw him cutting out the beautiful and funny pictures,--now a man hanging on a gallows, with a heart in his hand, because he had stolen hearts; and now an old lady riding on a horse, with her husband sitting on her nose. The cross old chancellor could not bear any of these, and always said as he did now, "Is that the stuff to cram a child's head with! It is stupid fancy!"

But for all that, little Ida thought that what the student had told her about the flowers was so charming, that she could not help thinking of it. The flowers hung down their heads, because they had been at the ball, and were quite worn out. So she took them away with her, to her other playthings, which lay upon a pretty little table, the drawers of which were all full of her fine things. In the doll's bed lay her doll, Sophie, asleep; but for all that little Ida said to her, "Thou must actually get up, Sophie, and be thankful to lie in the drawer to-night, for the poor flowers are ill, and so they must lie in thy bed, and, perhaps, they will then get well."

With this she took up the doll, but it looked so cross, and did not say a single word; for it was angry that it must be turned out of its bed.

So Ida laid the flowers in the doll's bed, tucked them in very nicely, and said, that now they must lie quite still, and she would go and get tea ready for them, and they should get quite well again by to-morrow morning; and then she drew the little curtains close round the bed, that the sun might not blind them.

All the evening long she could not help thinking about what the student had told her; and then when she went to bed herself, she drew back the curtains from the windows where her mother's beautiful flowers stood, both hyacinths and tulips, and she whispered quite softly to them, "I know that you will go to the ball to-night!" but the flowers looked as if they did not understand a word which she said, and did not move a leaf--but little Ida knew what she knew.

When she was in bed, she lay for a long time thinking how delightful it would be to see the beautiful flowers dancing in the king's castle.

"Can my flowers actually have been there?" and with these words she fell asleep. In the night she woke; she had been dreaming about the flowers, and the student, who the chancellor said stuffed her head with nonsense. It was quite silent in the chamber where Ida lay; the night lamp was burning on the table, and her father and her mother were asleep.

"Are my flowers now lying in Sophie's bed?" said she to herself; "how I should like to know!" She lifted herself up a little in bed, and looked through the door, which stood ajar, and in that room lay the flowers, and all her playthings. She listened, and it seemed to her as if some one was playing on the piano, which stood in that room, but so softly and so sweetly as she had never heard before.

"Now, certainly, all the flowers are dancing in there," said she; "O, how I should like to go and see!" but she did not dare to get up, lest she should wake her father and mother. "If they would only just come in here!" said she; but the flowers did not come, and the music continued to play so sweetly. She could not resist it any longer, for it was so delightful; so she crept out of her little bed, and went, quite softly, to the door, and peeped into the room. Nay! what a charming sight she beheld!

There was not any night lamp in that room, and yet it was quite light; the moon shone through the window into the middle of the floor, and it was almost as light as day. All the hyacinths and tulips stood in two long rows along the floor; they were not any longer in the window, where stood the empty pots. All the flowers were dancing so beautifully, one round another, on the floor; they made a regular chain, and took hold of one another's green leaves when they swung round. But there sat at the piano a great yellow lily, which little Ida had certainly seen in the summer, for she remembered very well that the student had said, "Nay, how like Miss Lina it is!" and they had all laughed at him. But now it seemed really to Ida as if the tall yellow lily resembled the young lady, and that she, also, really did just as if she were playing; now she laid her long yellow face on one side, now on the other, and nodded the time to the charming music. Not one of them observed little Ida.

She now saw a large blue crocus spring upon the middle of the table where the playthings lay, go straight to the doll's bed, and draw aside the curtains, where lay the sick flowers; but they raised themselves up immediately, and nodded one to another, as much as to say, that they also would go with them and dance. The old snapdragon, whose under lip was broken off, stood up and bowed to the pretty flowers, which did not look poorly at all, and they hopped down among the others, and were very merry.

All at once it seemed as if something had fallen down from the table. Ida looked towards it; it was the Easter-wand, which had heard the flowers. It was also very pretty; upon the top of it was set a little wax-doll, which had just such a broad hat upon its head as that which the chancellor wore. The Easter-wand hopped about upon its three wooden legs, and stamped quite loud, for it danced the mazurka; and there was not one of the flowers which could dance that dance, because they were so light and could not stamp.

The wax-doll upon the Easter-wand seemed to become taller and stouter, and whirled itself round above the paper flowers on the wand, and exclaimed, quite loud, "Is that the nonsense to stuff a child's mind with! It is stupid fancy!"--And the wax-doll was precisely like the cross old chancellor with the broad hat, and looked just as yellow and ill-tempered as he did; but the paper flowers knocked him on the thin legs, and with that he shrunk together again, and became a little tiny wax-doll. It was charming to see it! little Ida could hardly help laughing. The Easter-wand continued to dance, and the chancellor was obliged to dance too; it mattered not whether he made himself so tall and big, or whether he were the little yellow wax-doll, with the great black hat. Then came up the other flowers, especially those which had lain in Sophie's bed, and so the Easter-rod left off dancing.

At that very moment a great noise was heard within the drawer where Ida's doll, Sophie, lay, with so many of her playthings; and with this the snapdragon ran up to the corner of the table, lay down upon his stomach, and opened the drawer a little bit. With this Sophie raised herself up, and looked round her in astonishment.

"There is a ball here!" said she, "and why has not anybody told me of it?"

"Wilt thou dance with me?" said the snapdragon.

"Yes, thou art a fine one to dance with!" said she, and turned her back upon him. So she seated herself upon the drawer, and thought that to be sure some one of the flowers would come and engage her, but not one came; so she coughed a little, hem! hem! hem! but for all that not one came. The snapdragon danced alone, and that was not so very bad either!

As now none of the flowers seemed to see Sophie, she let herself drop heavily out of the drawer down upon the floor,--and that gave a great alarum; all the flowers at once came running up and gathered around her, inquiring if she had hurt herself; and they were all so exceedingly kind to her, especially those which had lain in her bed. But she had not hurt herself at all, and all Ida's flowers thanked her for the beautiful bed, and they paid her so much attention, and took her into the middle of the floor, where the moon shone, and danced with her, while all the other flowers made a circle around them. Sophie was now very much delighted; and she said they would be very welcome to her bed, for that she had not the least objection to lie in the drawer.

But the flowers said, "Thou shalt have as many thanks as if we used it, but we cannot live so long! To-morrow we shall be quite dead; but now tell little Ida," said they, "that she must bury us down in the garden, where the canary-bird lies, and so we shall grow up again next summer, and be much prettier than ever!"

"No, you shall not die," said Sophie, and the flowers kissed her. At that very moment the room door opened, and a great crowd of beautiful flowers came dancing in. Ida could not conceive where they came from; they must certainly have been all the flowers out of the king's castle. First of all went two most magnificent roses, and they had little gold crowns on; they were a king and a queen; then came the most lovely gilliflowers and carnations, and they bowed first on this side and then on that. They had brought music with them; great big poppies and pionies blew upon peapods till they were red in the face. The blue-bells and the little white convolvuluses rung as if they were musical bells. It was charming music. Then there came in a many other flowers, and they danced all together; the blue violets and the red daisies, the anemones and the lilies of the valley; and all the flowers kissed one another: it was delightful to see it!

At last they all bade one another good-night, and little Ida also went to her bed, where she dreamed about every thing that she had seen.

The next morning, when she got up, she went as quickly as she could to her little table, to see whether the flowers were there still; she drew aside the curtains from the little bed;--yes, there they all lay together, but they were quite withered, much more than yesterday. Sophie lay in the drawer, where she had put her; she looked very sleepy.

"Canst thou remember what thou hast to tell me?" said little Ida; but Sophie looked quite stupid, and did not say one single word.

"Thou art not at all good," said Ida, "and yet they all danced with thee."

So she took a little paper box, on which were painted beautiful birds, and this she opened, and laid in it the dead flowers.

"This shall be your pretty coffin," said she, "and when my Norwegian cousins come, they shall go with me and bury you, down in the garden, that next summer you may grow up again, and be lovelier than ever!"

The Norwegian cousins were two lively boys, who were called Jonas and Adolph; their father had given them two new cross-bows, and these they brought with them to show to Ida. She told them about the poor flowers which were dead, and so they got leave to bury them. The two boys went first, with their cross-bows on their shoulders; and little Ida came after, with the dead flowers in the pretty little box. Down in the garden they dug a little grave. Ida kissed the flowers, and then put them in their box, down into the earth, and Jonas and Adolph stood with their cross-bows above the grave, for they had neither arms nor cannon.

THE CONSTANT TIN SOLDIER.

There were, once upon a time, five-and-twenty tin soldiers; they were all brothers, for they were born of an old tin spoon. They held their arms in their hands, and their faces were all alike; their uniform was red and blue, and very beautiful. The very first word which they heard in this world, when the lid was taken off the box in which they lay, was, "Tin soldiers!" This was the exclamation of a little boy, who clapped his hands as he said it. They had been given to him, for it was his birthday, and he now set them out on the table. The one soldier was just exactly like another; there was only one of them that was a little different; he had only one leg, for he had been the last that was made, and there was not quite tin enough; yet he stood just as firmly upon his one leg as they did upon their two, and he was exactly the one who became remarkable.

Upon the table on which he had set them out, there stood many other playthings; but that which was most attractive to the eye, was a pretty little castle of pasteboard. One could look through the little windows as if into the rooms. Outside stood little trees, and round about it a little mirror, which was to look like a lake; swans of wax swam upon this, and were reflected in it. It was altogether very pretty; but the prettiest thing of all was the little young lady who stood at the open castle door, for she was a dancer; and she lifted one of her legs so high in the air, that the tin soldier might almost have fancied that she had only one leg, like himself.

"That is a wife for me!" thought he, "but she is a great lady; she lives in a castle, I in nothing but a box; and then we are five-and-twenty of us, there is no room for her! Yet I must make her acquaintance!"

And so he set himself behind a snuff-box, which stood on the table, and from thence he could very plainly see the pretty little lady, which remained standing upon one leg, without ever losing her balance.

That continued all the evening, and then the other tin soldiers were put into their box, and the people of the house went to bed. The playthings now began to amuse themselves; they played at company coming, at fighting, and at having a ball. The tin soldiers rattled about in their box, for they wanted to be with the rest of the things, but they could not get the box lid off. The nutcrackers knocked about the gingerbread nuts, and the slate-pencil laughed with the slate; it was so entertaining that the canary-bird awoke, and began to chatter with them also, but she chattered in verse. The only two which did not move from their place were the tin soldier and the little dancing lady. She kept herself so upright, standing on the point of her toe, with both her arms extended; and he stood just as steadily upon his one leg, and his eyes did not move from her for one moment.

It now struck twelve o'clock, and crash! up sprang the lid of the snuff-box, but there was no snuff in it; no, there was a little black imp--it was a jack-in-the-box.

"Tin soldier!" said the imp, "keep thy eyes to thyself!"

But the tin soldier pretended that he did not hear.

"Yes, we shall see in the morning!" said the imp.

And now it was the next morning, and the children got up, and they set the tin soldier in the window,--and either it was the imp, or else it was a sudden gust of wind, but the casement burst open, and out went the tin soldier, head foremost, down from the third story! It was a horrible fall, he turned head over heels, and remained standing with his one leg up in the air, and with his bayonet down among the stones of a sink.

The maid-servant and the little boy went down directly to seek for him, but although they almost trod upon him, still they could not see him. If the tin soldier had only shouted out, "Here I am!" they would have found him; but he did not think it would be becoming in him to shout out when he had his uniform on.

It now began to rain; one drop fell heavier than another; it was a regular shower. When it was over there came up two street boys.

"Look here!" said one of them, "here lies a tin soldier. He shall have a sail!"

So they made a boat of a newspaper, and set the tin soldier in it, and now he sailed down the kennel; the two lads ran, one on each side, and clapped their hands. Dear me! what billows there were in the uneven kennel, and what a torrent there was, for it had poured down with rain! The paper boat rocked up and down, and whirled round so fast! The tin soldier must have trembled, but he showed no fear at all, he never changed his countenance, and stood holding his weapon in his hand.

Just then the boat was driven under a large arch of the kennel, and it was as dark to the tin soldier as if he had been in his box.

"Where am I now come to?" thought he; "yes, yes, it is all that imp's doing! Ah! if the little dancing lady were only in the boat, I would not mind if it were twice as dark!"

At that moment up came a great big water-rat, which lived under the kennel's archway.

"Have you a passport?" asked the rat. "Out with your passport!"

But the tin soldier said not a word, and stood stock still, shouldering his arms. The boat shot past, and the rat came after. Ha! how he set his teeth, and cried to the sticks and the straws,--

"Stop him! stop him! he has not paid the toll! He has not shown his passport!"

But the stream got stronger and stronger. The tin soldier could already see daylight at the end of the tunnel, but at the same time he heard a roaring sound, which might well have made a bolder man than he tremble. Only think! where the tunnel ended, the water of the kennel was poured down into a great canal; which would be, for him, just as dangerous as for us to sail down a great waterfall!

He was now come so near to it that he could no longer stand upright. The boat drove on; the tin soldier held himself as stiff as he could; nobody could have said of him that he winked with an eye. The boat whirled round three times, and filled with water to the very edge--it must sink! The tin soldier stood up to his neck in water! Deeper and deeper sank the boat, the paper grew softer and softer! Now went the water above the soldier's head!--he thought of the little dancing lady, whom he should never see more, and it rung in the tin soldier's ear,--

"Fare thee well, thou man of war!
Death with thee is dealing!"

The paper now went in two, and the tin soldier fell through; and at that moment was swallowed by a large fish!

Nay, how dark it was now in there! It was darker than in the kennel archway, and much narrower. But the tin soldier was steadfast to his duty; and he lay there, shouldering his arms. The fish twisted about, and made the most horrible sort of movements; at last it became quite still; a flash of lightning seemed to go through it. Light shone quite bright, and some one shouted aloud, "Tin soldier!"

The fish had been caught, taken to market, sold, and brought into the kitchen, where the servant-girl cut it up with a great knife. She took the soldier, who was as alive as ever, between her two fingers, and carried it into the parlor, where she showed them all what a remarkable little man had been travelling about in the stomach of the fish! But the tin soldier was not proud. They set him upon the table, and there--Nay, how wonderfully things happen in this world!--the tin soldier was in the self-same room he had been in before; he saw the self-same child, and the self-same playthings on the table; the grand castle, with the pretty little dancing lady standing at the door. She was standing still upon one leg, with the other raised; she also was constant. It quite affected the tin soldier, he was ready to shed tin tears, only that would not have been becoming in him. He looked at her, and she looked at him, but neither of them said a word.

At that very moment one of the little boys took up the tin soldier, and threw it into the stove. There was no reason for his doing so; it must certainly have been the jack-in-the-box that was the cause of it.

The tin soldier stood amid the flames, and felt a great heat, but whether it was actual fire, or love, he knew not. All color was quite gone out of him; whether from his long journeying, or whether from care, there is no saying. He looked at the little dancing lady, and she looked at him; he felt that he was melting away, but for all that, he stood shouldering his arms. With that the door of the room suddenly opened, and a draught of wind carried away the dancer. Like a sylph she flew into the stove to the tin soldier; became, all at once, flame, and was gone! The tin soldier melted to a little lump; and when the servant, the next day, was carrying out the ashes, she found him like a little tin heart: of the dancing lady, on the contrary, there was nothing but the ground on which she had stood, and that was burned as black as a coal.

THE STORKS.

Upon the last house in a little town there stood a stork's nest. The stork-mother sat in the nest, with her four young ones, which stuck out their heads, with their little black beaks, for their beaks had not yet become red. Not far off, upon the ridge of the house roof, stood the stork-father, as stiffly and proudly as possible; he had tucked up one leg under him, for though that was rather inconvenient, still he was standing as sentinel. One might have fancied that he was carved out of wood, he stood so stock still.

"It looks, certainly, very consequential," thought he to himself, "that my wife should have a sentinel to her nest! Nobody need know that I am her husband; they will think, of course, that I commanded the sentinel to stand here. It looks so very proper!" And having thus thought, he continued to stand on one leg.

A troop of little boys were playing down in the street below, and when they saw the storks, the boldest lad amongst them began to sing, and at last they all sang together, that old rhyme about the storks, which the children in Denmark sing; but they sang it now, because it had just come into their heads:--

"Stork, stork on one leg,
Fly home to thy egg;
Mrs. Stork she sits at home,
With four great, big young ones;
The eldest shall be hung,
The second have its neck wrung;
The third shall be burned to death,
The fourth shall be murdered!"

"Only hear what those lads sing!" said the little storks; "they sing that we shall be hanged and burned!"

"Do not vex yourselves about that," said the stork-mother; "don't listen to them, and then it does not matter."

But the boys continued to sing, and they pointed with their fingers to the stork; there was one boy, however, among them, and his name was Peter, and he said that it was a sin to make fun of the storks, and he would not do it.

The stork-mother consoled her young ones thus: "Don't annoy yourselves about that. Look how funnily your father stands on one leg!"

"We are so frightened!" said the young ones, and buried their heads down in the nest.

The next day, when the children assembled again to play, they saw the storks, and they began their verse:--

"The second have its neck wrung;
The third shall be burned to death!"

"Shall we be hanged and burned?" asked the young storks.

"No, certainly not!" said the mother. "You will learn to fly; I will exercise you; and so we shall take you out into the meadows, and go a visiting to the frogs, that make courtesies to us in the water; they sing--'koax! koax!' and so we eat them up; that is a delight!"

"And how so?" asked the young storks.

"All the storks which are in the whole country assemble," said the mother, "and so the autumn manoeuvres begin; every one must be clever at flying; that is of great importance, for those that cannot fly are pecked to death by the general, with his beak; and, therefore, it is well to learn something before the exercise begins."

"And so we really may be murdered! as the boys said; and hark! now they are singing it again."

"Listen to me, and not to them!" said the stork-mother. "After the great manoeuvre, we fly away to the warm countries--O, such a long way off, over mountains and woods! We fly to Egypt, where there are three-cornered stone houses, which go up in a point above the clouds; they are called pyramids, and are older than any stork can tell. There is a river which overflows its banks, and so the country becomes all mud. One goes in the mud, and eats frogs."

"O!" said all the young ones.

"Yes, that is so delightful! One does nothing at all but eat, all day long; and whilst we are so well off, in this country there is not a single green leaf upon the trees; here it is, then, so cold; and the very clouds freeze into pieces, and fall down in little white rags!"

That was the snow which she meant, but she could not explain it more intelligibly.

"Will it freeze the naughty boys into bits?" asked the young ones.

"No, it will not freeze them into bits, but it will pretty nearly do so; and they will be obliged to sit in dark rooms and cough. You, on the contrary, all that time, can be flying about in the warm countries, where there are flowers and warm sunshine!"

Some time had now passed, and the young ones were so large that they could stand up in the nest and look about them, and the stork-father came flying every day with nice little frogs and snails, and all the stork-delicacies which he could find. O, it was extraordinary what delicious morsels he got for them. He stretched out his head, clattered with his beak, as if it had been a little rattle, and thus he told them tales about the marshes.

"Listen to me; now you must learn to fly," said the stork-mother, one day; and so all the four young ones were obliged to get out of the nest upon the ridge of the house; and how dizzy they were; how they balanced themselves with their wings, and for all that were very near falling!

"Look at me," said the mother, "you must hold your heads thus! and thus must you set your wings! Now! one, two! one, two! This it is which must help you out into the world!"

With this she flew a little way, and the young ones made a little clumsy hop--bump!--there lay they, for their bodies were heavy.

"I cannot fly!" said one of the young ones; "it's no use my trying!" and crept up to the nest again.

"Wilt thou be frozen to death here, when winter comes?" asked the mother. "Shall the boys come and hang thee, and burn thee, and wring thy neck? Shall I go and call them?"

"O, no!" said the young stork; and so hopped again on the roof, like the others.

On the third day after that it could regularly fly a little, and so they thought that they could now rest awhile in the air. They tried to do so, but--bump!--there they tumbled, and so they were obliged to flutter their wings again.

The boys were now down in the street once more, and sung their rhyme:--

"Stork, stork, fly."

"Shall not we fly down and peck their eyes out?" said the young ones.

"No, let them be," said the mother, "and listen to me, that is far wiser. One, two, three! Now we fly round, higher than ever! One, two, three! Now to the left of the chimney!--see, that was very well done! and the last stroke of the wings was so beautiful and correct, that I will give you leave to go down to the marsh with me, to-morrow! There will come a great number of pleasant stork-families there, with their children; let me have the happiness of seeing that mine are the nicest, and that they can make a bow and courtesy; that looks so well, and gains respect!"

"But shall we not have revenge on the naughty boys?" inquired the young storks.

"Let them sing what they like!" said the mother; "you will fly amid the clouds, go to the land of the pyramids, when they must freeze, and neither have a green leaf left, nor a sweet apple!"

"Yes, but we will be revenged!" whispered they one to another, and then went out again to exercise.

Of all the boys in the street there was not one who sung the jeering rhymes about the storks so much as he who first began it; and he was a very little one, and was not more than six years old. The young storks thought to be sure that he must be a hundred years old, for he was so much larger than either their mother or their father; and they, poor things, knew nothing about how old children and great men might be. All their revenge, they determined, should be taken upon this boy; he was the first to begin, and he it was who always sang. The young storks were very much irritated, and the more they were determined on revenge, the less they said of it to their mother. Their mother, they thought, would at last grant their wishes, but they would leave it till the last day they were in the country.

"We must see how you conduct yourselves in the great manoeuvre," said the mother; "if you fail in that, then the general will run you through with his beak, and then the boys will be right in one way, at least. Now let us see."

"Yes, thou shalt see!" said the young ones; and so they took great pains and practised every day, and flew so beautifully and so lightly that it was charming to see them.

Now came the autumn; and all the storks began to assemble to fly away into the warm countries, while we have winter. That was a manoeuvre! Over wood and town went they, just to see how they could fly. The young storks performed so expertly that they could discern very well both frogs and snakes. That was the very best test of skill. "Frogs and snakes, therefore, they should eat;" and they did so.

"Now let us have revenge," said they.

"Leave off talking of revenge," said the mother. "Listen to me, which is a great deal better. Do not you remember the good little boy who said, when the others sung, 'that it was a sin to make fun of the storks?' let us reward him, that is better than having revenge."

"Yes, let us reward him," said the young storks.

"He shall have, next summer, a nice little sister, such a beautiful little sister as never was seen!--Will not that be a reward for him?" said the mother.

"It will," said the young ones; "a sweet little sister he shall have!"

"And as he is called Peter," continued the mother, "so shall you also be called Peter altogether."

And that which she said was done. The little boy had the loveliest of little sisters next year; and, from that time, all the storks in Denmark were called Peter; and so are they to this day.

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES

Obvious spelling, typographical and punctuation errors have been corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within the text and consultation of external sources.

Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
The oe ligature has been expanded (phoenix; manoeuvre).

Archaic spelling retained:
Pg 29 et al. 'pionies' for peonies.
Pg 45 et al. 'courtesied' for curtsied.
Pg 88. 'good-by' for goodbye.
Pg 120. 'alarum' for alarm.
Spacing retained in all occurrences of 'any thing',
'every thing', 'every where' and 'every one'.

Changes for consistency:
Pg 10. 'green wood' changed to 'green-wood'.
Pg 16 et al. Changed 'tin-soldier' to 'tin soldier'.
Pg 48. 'rose-leaf' changed to 'rose leaf'.
Pg 50. 'field-mouse' changed to 'fieldmouse'.
Pg 116. 'night-lamp' changed to 'night lamp'.
Pg 130. 'servant girl' changed to 'servant-girl'.

Other notes and changes:
TITLE. Author's name is misspelled 'ANDERSON'; changed to 'ANDERSEN'.
TOC. Accents added for consistency (OLÉ LUCKOIÈ).
TOC. Removed comma, 'AT NIGHT,' to 'AT NIGHT'.
Pg 14. Single quote ' changed to "; 'do thou ask!'' to 'do thou ask!"'.
Pg 25. 'is caled' changed to 'is called'.
Pg 25. 'Huzzar' changed to 'Hussar'.
Pg 54. 'crysanthemum' changed to 'chrysanthemum'.
Pg 95. German form of yodelled 'jodelled' retained.
Pg 95. 'Hecla' retained, but probably meant to be 'Hekla'.
Pg 110. Single quote ' changed to "; ''Thou seest' to '"Thou seest'.
Pg 121. 'anemonies' changed to 'anemones'.