“We are mothers,” replied the little animals, “and we have come out to
look for a place for our children.”
“Well, that’s right and proper enough,” said the caterpillar, who was
thinking of what the ant had said. “But I don’t like you, for all that.”
“That’s very sad,” said the animalcules, “for we just happen to be so
awfully fond of you.”
And, at that moment, a number of them settled on the caterpillar’s back.
“Oh! Oh!” he screamed. “Murder! Help! Police!”
The little animals flew up again, but remained hovering in the air
above the caterpillar.
“But who are you?” he asked and writhed with pain. “What have I done to
you that you should ill-treat me so?”
“Every one provides for himself and his,” replied the animalcules,
“and we have now provided for our children. We are parasitic flies and
our name is Ichneumon: it is not a pretty one, but it happens to be the
best we have. For the rest, we are relations of the ants, if you happen
to know them.”
“It’s a good enough family,” said the caterpillar and sighed. “But I
don’t know why everybody should scold at me and sting me and scoff at
me. What is this that you have done to me now?”
“You’ll know soon enough,” said the ichneumons. “Good-bye for the
present and thank you.”
Then they soared up aloft and became little black dots again and, at
last, disappeared altogether.
But the caterpillar heaved long and deep sighs and ate twice as much
cabbage to console himself. Nevertheless, he could not keep from
thinking of the uncomfortable visit he had had:
“I have a suspicion,” he said to himself. “An awkward suspicion. If
only I could make something of it!”
3
But, when some time had passed, he began to make something of it.
He simply could not satisfy his appetite any longer. The more he ate,
the hungrier he became. He munched one piece of cabbage-leaf after
another and, nevertheless, he felt quite faint with hunger.
“What is the meaning of _this_ now?” he said, despondently.
“It’s we!” answered something inside him.
“Eh? What?” said the caterpillar and rolled round with terror. “Am I
haunted inside, or have I gone mad?”
“It’s we, it’s the ichneumon-flies’ young,” came the sound again from
deep down in his stomach.
The caterpillar’s head was in a whirl. But, when he had collected
himself a little, he began to understand:
“So the ichneumons laid their eggs in my body!” he cried, in despair.
“And have I now to feed all their voracious young?”
“That’s it!” said the young ones. “You’ve hit it to a T. Bestir
yourself now, you stupid, lazy caterpillar, and eat till you burst, or
we’ll eat you!”
So saying, they took a good nip at his flesh.
“Oh, oh!” yelled the caterpillar. “I will, I will, indeed I will.”
“Yes, but hurry up!” said the young ones. “We are so hungry, so
hungry!”
And the caterpillar ate ever so much more than before, but it was not
the slightest use. He could never eat enough and the ichneumon-flies’
young kept on crying for more. The ant and the swallow and the
nightingale mocked at him every day and the gardener beat the cabbage
with his rake, so angry was he at all this consumption.
But the caterpillar swallowed it all and reflected that there was not
on earth a lot so distressing as his.
“Jeer away!” he thought. “You’re quick at that. If only you knew that I
don’t get the food myself which I procure: the benefit of it all goes
to the ichneumon-flies’ young.”
He ate and ate desperately. At last, he could bear it no longer. All
day long, he noticed how the ichneumons were rummaging about inside
him. He rolled round on the cabbage-leaf in despair and turned and
twisted and screamed for help.
“Rather eat me up altogether while you’re about it!” he cried. “Rather
let me die at once: I can’t endure this life!”
“Tut, tut!” said the young ones inside him and cackled with laughter.
“It’s not so easy as that. You’ll be eaten right enough, when the time
comes, never fear! But, for the present, all you have to do is to hold
your tongue and eat.”
4
Every day, the young ones grew bigger and wanted more food. When they
could no longer satisfy themselves with what the caterpillar ate, they
began to devour two large lumps of fat which he had saved up in the
happy days before the ichneumons came. They were meant to be used for
wings and legs, once he had become a butterfly. And, when he noticed
that they were gone, he shed bitter tears:
“Alas for my beautiful dreams!” he said. “Now I shall never be a
butterfly, never flit in the sun all over the garden.”
“I told you all the time that that was nonsense about the butterfly,”
said the ant, who passed at that moment.
“Listen,” said the caterpillar. “If you have a heart beating in your
body, then help me, Ant.”
Then he told her of his misfortune. The swallow and the nightingale
came and listened and the caterpillar implored them for advice and
assistance.
“After all, I’m of your race,” he ended by saying. “Believe me, I feel
it. If I get time and leisure, I shall turn into something pretty, a
butterfly. I have felt that inside myself since the time when I was
quite little.”
The swallow and the nightingale looked at each other and shook their
heads. But the ant, who was the cleverest of the three, nodded
thoughtfully and then said:
“What you say about the relationship may have something in it. To a
certain extent. For we are all poor mortals, as the gardener says. But
that bit about the butterfly is positively nothing but imagination. I
am sorry for you, goodness knows I am, but I can’t help you. You must
bear your lot with patience.”
“I _can’t_ bear it!” cried the caterpillar. “It is killing me. Think
of the butterflies: are they not beautiful? Don’t you like looking at
them? Help me, do you hear! If I die, a butterfly dies. Only think, if
one day there were no butterflies!”
“Well,” said the ant, “as for that, the world would go on, even if
you are right. There are caterpillars enough in the garden and, if you
really _are_ butterflies’ children, there would be plenty left, even
though a few did get lost. However, I have no time to speculate on this
folly. If you wish to have my opinion in a nutshell, here it is, that
your mother must have looked after you foolishly, for you to fall into
the ichneumons’ power like this. And now I must go home and look after
_my_ children. Good-bye and bless you!”
Then the ant went away. The nightingale flew up into the bush and sang
in the warm evening so that all had to listen and admire him and the
swallow soared high into the air and prophesied fine weather for the
morrow.
But the caterpillar crouched humbly over his cabbage-leaf and ate.
5
“I think there are too many of us in here,” said one of the
ichneumon-grubs the next morning. “I can’t breathe.”
“There’s a way out of that,” said one of the others. “Let’s bite a hole
in the creature’s air-ducts; then we’ll get air enough. But see that he
has one or two left, or we shall risk his going and suffocating before
his time.”
It was no sooner said than done. But the caterpillar screamed louder
than ever.
“Air! Air! I shall die of suffocation!”
“No, you won’t,” replied the young ones. “But you had better accustom
yourself to be content with little. Hurry back to the cabbage.”
“Now it’s all up with me,” said the caterpillar, one morning.
“You may be right, this time,” replied the ichneumon-grubs.
That evening, they ate the last remnant of their host. Only the skin
was left of the dead caterpillar. It lay dry and shrivelled up outside
the grubs, who nestled in it as in a warm fur.
One fine day, they flew out. Pretty little animals they were, with
light, bright wings, like their parents.
“Hurrah!” they cried. “Now it’s only a question of finding a
caterpillar for our young. Each for himself and the devil take the
hindmost: such is nature’s law. We are nature’s police: we see to it
that things keep their balance. It would be a hideous world indeed, if
it were full of caterpillars!”
“Or of ichneumon-flies!” piped the swallow and gulped down a mouthful
of them as he spoke.
THE BEECH AND THE OAK
THE BEECH AND THE OAK
1
It was in the old days.
There were no towns with houses and streets and towering
church-steeples. There were no schools. For there were not many boys
and those there were learnt from their fathers to shoot with a bow and
arrow, to hunt the deer in his hiding-place, to kill bears in order to
make clothes of their hides and to get fire by rubbing two pieces of
wood together. When they knew all this thoroughly, their education was
completed.
Nor were there any railways, or tilled fields, or ships on the sea, or
books, for there was nobody who would read them.
There was hardly anything but trees.
But then of trees there were plenty. They stood everywhere, from coast
to coast, mirrored themselves in every river and sea and stretched
their mighty branches up into the sky. They stooped out over the
sea-shore, dipped their branches in the black water of the marshes and
looked out haughtily over the land from the tall hills.
They all knew one another, for they belonged to one big family and they
were proud of it.
“We are all oak-trees,” they said and drew themselves up. “We own the
land and we govern it.”
And they were quite right, for there were only very few people at that
time. Otherwise there was nothing but wild animals. Bears, wolves and
foxes went hunting, while the deer grazed by the edge of the marsh. The
wood-mouse sat outside her hole eating acorns and the beaver built his
ingenious house on the river-bank.
2
Then, one day, the bear came trudging along and lay down at full length
under a great oak-tree.
“Are you there again, you robber?” said the oak and shook a heap of
withered leaves over him.
“You really ought not to be so wasteful with your leaves, old friend,”
said the bear, licking his paws. “They are the only thing you have to
keep off the sun with.”
“If you don’t like me, you can go away,” replied the oak, proudly. “I
am lord of the land and, look where you may, you will find none but my
brothers.”
“True enough,” growled the bear. “That’s just the tiresome part of
it. I’ve been for a little trip abroad, you see, and have been a bit
spoilt. That was in a country down south. I there took a nap under the
beech-trees. Those are tall, slender trees, not crooked old fellows
like you. And their tops are so close that the sunbeams can’t pierce
through them at all. It was a real delight to sleep there of an
afternoon, believe me.”
“Beech-trees?” asked the oak, curiously. “What are they?”
“You might wish that you were half as handsome as a beech-tree,” said
the bear. “But now I’m not going to gossip with you any more. I’ve had
to trot over a mile in front of a confounded hunter, who caught me on
one of my hind-legs with an arrow. Now I want to sleep; and perhaps you
will be so kind as to provide me with rest, since you can’t provide me
with shade.”
The bear lay down and closed his eyes, but there was no sleep for him
this time. For the other trees had heard what he had said and there
came such a chattering and a jabbering and a rustling of leaves as had
never been known in the forest.
“Heaven knows what sort of trees those are!” said the one. “Of course,
it’s a story which the bear wants us to swallow,” said another.
“What can trees be like whose leaves are so close together that the
sunbeams can’t pierce through them?” asked a little oak who had been
listening to what the big ones were saying.
But next to him stood an old, gnarled tree, who slapped the little oak
on the head with one of his lower branches.
“Hold your tongue,” he said, “and don’t talk till you’ve got something
to say. And you others need not believe a word of the bear’s nonsense.
I am much taller than you and I can see a long way over the forest. But
as far away as I can see there is nothing but oak-trees.”
The little oak remained sheepish and silent and the other big trees
whispered softly to one another, for they had a great respect for the
old one.
But the bear got up and rubbed his eyes.
“Now you have disturbed my afternoon nap,” he growled, angrily, “and
I shall have my revenge on you, never fear. When I come back, I shall
bring some beech-seed with me and I’ll answer for it that you will all
turn yellow with envy when you see how handsome the new trees are.”
Then he trotted away. But the oaks talked to one another for days at a
time of the queer trees which he had told them of.
“If they come, we’ll do for them!” said the little oak-tree.
But the old oak gave him one on the head:
“If they come, you shall be civil to them, you puppy,” he said. “But
they won’t come.”
3
Now this was where the old oak was wrong, for they did come.
In the autumn, the bear returned and lay down under the old oak.
“I am to give you the kind regards of the people down below there,” he
said and picked some funny little things off his shaggy hide. “Just
look what I’ve got for you.”
“What’s that?” asked the oak.
“That’s beech,” replied the bear. “Beech-seed, as I promised you.”
Then he trampled them into the earth and prepared to leave again:
“It’s a pity that I can’t stay to see how annoyed you will be,” he
said, “but those confounded human beings have become so offensive. They
killed my wife and one of my brothers the other day and I must look out
for a place where I can dwell in peace. There is hardly a spot left for
an honest bear to live in. Good-bye, you gnarled old oak-trees.”
When the bear had jogged off, the trees looked at one another seriously.
“Let us now see what happens,” said the old oak.
And thereupon they betook themselves to rest. The winter came and tore
all their leaves from them. The snow lay high over all the land and
every tree stood plunged in his own thoughts and dreamt of spring.
And, when the spring came, the grass was green and the birds began to
sing where they last left off. The flowers swarmed up out of the ground
and everything looked fresh and vigorous.
The oaks alone still stood with leafless branches:
“It is very distinguished to come last,” they said to one another.
“The king of the forest does not arrive before the whole company is
assembled.”
But at last they did arrive. All the leaves burst forth from the fat
buds and the trees looked at one another and complimented one another
on their good appearance. The little oak had grown a decent bit. This
made him feel important and think that he now had the right to join in
the conversation:
“There’s not much coming of the bear’s beech-trees,” he said,
mockingly, but at the same time glanced up anxiously at the old oak who
used to slap his head.
The old oak heard what he said and so did the others. But they said
nothing. None of them had forgotten what the bear had said and every
morning, when the sun shone, they peeped down secretly to see if the
beeches had come. At bottom they were a little anxious, but they were
too proud to talk about it.
And, one day, at last, the little sprouts shot up from the ground. The
sun shone upon them and the rain fell over them, so that it was not
long before they grew to a good height.
“I say, how pretty they are!” said the great oaks and twisted their
crooked branches still more, so as to see them better.
“You are welcome among us,” said the old oak and gave them a gracious
nod. “You shall be my foster-children and have just as good a time as
my own.”
“Thank you,” said the little beeches and not a word more.
But the little oak did not like the strange trees:
“It’s awful, the way you’re shooting up,” he said, in a vexed tone.
“You’re already half as tall as I am. May I beg you to remember that I
am much older than you and of a good family besides?”
The beeches laughed with their tiny little green leaves, but said
nothing.
“Shall I bend my branches a little to one side, so that the sun can
shine on you better?” asked the old tree, politely.
“Much obliged,” replied the beeches. “We can grow quite nicely in the
shade.”
4
And all that summer passed and another summer and still more. The
beeches went on growing steadily and at last grew right over the little
oak’s head.
“Keep your leaves to yourselves!” cried the oak. “You’re standing in my
light; and that I can’t endure. I must have proper sunshine. Take your
leaves away, else I shall die.”
The beeches only laughed and went on growing. At last, they met right
above the little oak’s head and then he died.
“That was ill done!” roared the big oaks and shook their branches in
anger.
But the old oak stood up for his foster-children.
“Serve him right!” he said. “That’s the reward of his bragging. I say
it, although he is my own flesh and blood. But you must be careful now,
you little beeches, for else I shall slap you on the head too.”
5
The years passed and the beeches kept on growing and gradually became
slim young trees that reached right up among the old oak’s branches.
“You’re beginning to be rather intrusive for my taste,” said the old
oak. “You had better try to grow a bit thicker and give up shooting
into the air like that. Just look how your branches stick out. Bend
them decently, as you see us do. How will you manage when a regular
storm comes? Take it from me, the wind shakes the tree-tops finely! He
has many a time come whistling through my old branches; and how do you
think that you’ll come off, with that meagre display which you stick up
in the air?”
“Every one grows in his own manner and we in ours,” replied the young
beeches. “This is the way it’s done where we come from; and we dare say
we are just as good as you.”
“That’s not a very polite remark to make to an old tree with moss on
his branches,” said the oak. “I am beginning to regret that I was so
good to you. If you have a scrap of honour in your composition, then
have the kindness to move your leaves a little to one side. Last year,
there were hardly any buds on my lower branches, all through your
standing in my light.”
“We can’t quite see what that has to do with us,” replied the beeches.
“Every one has enough to do to look after himself. If he is industrious
and successful, then things go well with him. If not, he must be
content to go to the wall. Such is the way of the world.”
And the oak’s lower branches died and he began to be terribly
frightened.
“You’re nice fellows, you are,” he said, “the way you reward me for
my hospitality! When you were little, I let you grow on my food and
protected you against the storm. I let the sun shine on you whenever he
wanted to and I treated you as if you were my own children. And now you
choke me by way of thanks.”
“Fudge!” said the beeches.
Then they blossomed and put forth fruit and, when the fruit was ripe,
the wind shook their branches and spread it all around.
“You are active people, like myself,” said the wind. “That’s why I like
you and will gladly give you a hand.”
And the fox rolled at the foot of the beech and filled his coat with
the prickly fruit and ran all over the country with it. The bear did
the same and moreover laughed at the old oak while he lay and rested
in the shadow of the beech. The wood-mouse was delighted with the new
food which he got and thought that beech-nuts tasted much better than
acorns.
New little beeches shot up round about and grew just as quickly as
their parents and looked as green and happy as if they did not know
what a bad conscience was.
But the old oak gazed out sadly over the forest. The light beech-leaves
peeped forth on every hand and the oaks sighed and told one another
their troubles.
“They are taking our power from us,” they said and shook themselves as
well as they could for the beeches. “The land is no longer ours.”
One branch died after the other and the storm broke them off and flung
them to the ground. The old oak had now only a few leaves left in his
top.
“The end is at hand,” he said, gravely.
But there were many more people in the land now than before and they
hastened to cut down the oaks while there were still some left:
“Oak makes better timber than beech,” they said.
“So at last we get a little appreciation,” said the old oak. “But we
shall have to pay for it with our lives.”
Then he said to the beech-trees:
“What was I thinking of, when I helped you on in your youth? What an
old fool I have been! We oak-trees used to be lords of the land and
now, year after year, I have had to see my brothers all around succumb
in the struggle against you. I myself am almost done for and not one
of my acorns has shot up, thanks to your shadow. But, before I die, I
should like to know what you call your behaviour.”
“That’s soon said, old friend!” replied the beeches. “We call it
competition and it’s no discovery of ours. It’s that which rules the
world.”
“I don’t know those foreign words of yours,” said the oak. “_I_ call it
rank ingratitude.”
Then he died.
THE WEEDS
THE WEEDS
1
It was a fine and fruitful year.
Rain and sunshine came turn and turn about, in just the way that was
best for the corn. No sooner did the farmer think that it was getting
rather dry, than he could be quite sure that it would rain the next
day. And, if he was of opinion that he had had rain enough, then the
clouds parted at once, just as though it were the farmer that was in
command.
The farmer, therefore, was in a good humour and did not complain, as
otherwise he always did. Glad and rejoicing, he walked over the land
with his two boys.
“It will be a splendid harvest this year,” he said. “I shall get my
barns full and make lots of money. Then Jens and Ole shall have a new
pair of trousers apiece and I will take them with me to market.”
“If you don’t cut me soon, farmer, I shall be lying down flat,” said
the rye and bowed her heavy ears right down to the ground.
Now the farmer could not hear this, but was quite able to see what the
rye was thinking of; and so he went home to fetch his sickle.
“It’s a good thing to be in the service of men,” said the rye. “I can
be sure now that all my grains will be well taken care of. Most of
them will go to the mill and that, certainly, is not very pleasant.
But afterwards they will turn into beautiful fresh bread; and one must
suffer something for honour’s sake. What remains the farmer will keep
and sow next year on his land.”
2
Along the hedge and beside the ditch stood the weeds. Thistle and
burdock, poppy and bell-flower and dandelion grew in thick clusters and
all had their heads full of seed. For them too it had been a fruitful
year, for the sun shines and the rain falls on the poor weeds just as
much as on the rich corn.
“There’s no one to cut us and cart us to the barn,” said the dandelion
and shook her head, but very carefully, lest the seed should fall out
too soon. “What is to become of our children?”
“It gives me a headache to think of it,” said the poppy. “Here I stand,
with many hundreds of seeds in my head, and I have no idea where to
dispose of them.”
“Let’s ask the rye’s advice,” said the burdock.
And then they asked the rye what they ought to do.
“It doesn’t do to mix in other people’s affairs when one’s well off,”
said the rye. “There is only one piece of advice that I will give you:
mind you don’t fling your silly seed over my field, or you’ll have me
to deal with!”
Now this advice was of no use to the wild flowers and they stood all
day pondering as to what they should do. When the sun went down, they
closed their petals to go to sleep, but they dreamt all night of their
seed and the next morning they had found a remedy.
The poppy was the first to wake.
She carefully opened some little shutters in the top of her head, so
that the sun could shine right in upon the seeds. Next, she called to
the morning-wind, who was running and playing along the hedge.
“Dear wind,” she said, pleasantly. “Will you do me a service?”
“Why not?” said the wind. “I don’t mind having something to do.”
“It’s a mere trifle,” said the poppy. “I will only ask you to give a
good shake to my stalk, so that my seeds can fly far away out of the
shutters.”
“Right you are,” said the wind.
And away flew the seeds to every side. The stalk certainly snapped; but
that the poppy did not bother about. For, when one has provided well
for one’s children, there’s really nothing left to do in this world.
“Good-bye,” said the wind and wanted to go on.
“Wait a bit,” said the poppy. “Promise me first that you won’t tell the
others. Else they might have the same idea and then there would be less
room for my seed.”
“I shall be silent as the grave,” said the wind and ran away.
“Pst! Pst!” said the bell-flower. “Have you a moment to do me a tiny
little service?”
“All right,” said the wind. “What is it?”