bell-flower. “I have opened some of the shutters in my head and I
should like to have my seed sent a good distance out into the world.
But you must be sure not to tell the others, or they might think of
doing the same thing.”
“Lord preserve us!” said the wind and laughed. “I shall be mute as a
fish.”
And then he gave the flower a thorough good shaking and went on.
“Dear wind, dear wind!” cried the dandelion. “Where are you off to so
fast?”
“Is there anything the matter with you too?” asked the wind.
“Not a bit,” said the dandelion. “I only wanted a word with you.”
“Then be quick about it,” said the wind, “for I am thinking seriously
of going down.”
“You see,” said the dandelion, “it’s very difficult for us this year
to get all our seed settled; and yet one would like to do the best one
can for one’s children. How the bell-flower and the poppy and the poor
burdock will manage I do not know, upon my word. But the thistle and I
have combined and have hit upon an expedient. You shall help us.”
“That makes four in all,” thought the wind and could not help laughing
aloud.
“What are you laughing at?” asked the dandelion. “I saw you whispering
with the bell-flower and the poppy just now; but, if you tell them a
thing, then you will simply get nothing out of me.”
“What do you take me for?” said the wind. “Mum’s the word! What is it
you want?”
“We’ve put out a nice little umbrella right up at the top of our seed.
It’s the sweetest little toy you can think of. If you only just blow on
me, it will fly up in the air and fall down wherever you please. Will
you?”
“Certainly,” said the wind.
And, whoosh! he blew over the thistle and the dandelion and took all
their seeds with him across the fields.
3
The burdock still stood pondering. She was thick-headed and that was
why she took so long. But, in the evening, a hare jumped over the
hedge.
“Hide me! Save me!” he cried. “Farmer’s Trust is after me.”
“Creep round behind the hedge,” said the burdock; “then I’ll hide you.”
“You don’t look to me as if you were cut out for the job,” said the
hare; “but beggars can’t be choosers.”
And then he hid behind the hedge.
“Now, in return, you might take some of my seeds to the fields with
you,” said the burdock and she broke off some of her many burs and
scattered them over the hare.
Soon after, Trust came running along the hedge.
“Here’s the dog!” whispered the burdock and, with a bound, the hare
leapt the hedge into the rye.
“Have you seen the hare?” asked Trust. “I can see that I’m getting
too old for hunting. One of my eyes is quite blind and my nose can no
longer find the scent.”
“I have seen him,” replied the burdock, “and, if you will do me a
service, I will show you where he is.”
Trust agreed and the burdock stuck some of her burs on to his back and
said:
“Would you just rub yourself against the stile here, inside the field?
But that’s not where you’re to look for the hare, for I saw him run
into the wood a little while ago.”
Trust carried the burs to the field and ran off to the wood.
“So now I’ve got my seeds settled,” said the burdock and laughed to
herself contentedly. “But goodness knows how the thistle is going to
manage and the dandelion and the bell-flower and the poppy!”
4
Next spring, already the rye stood quite high.
“We are well off, considering all things,” said the rye-stalks. “Here
we are in a great company that contains none but our own good family.
And we don’t hamper one another in the very least. It’s really an
excellent thing to be in the service of men.”
But, one fine day, a number of little poppies and thistles and
dandelions and burdocks and bell-flowers stuck their heads up above the
ground in the midst of the luxuriant rye.
“What’s the meaning of this now?” asked the rye. “How in the world did
_you_ get here?”
And the poppy looked at the bell-flower and asked:
“How did _you_ get here?”
And the thistle looked at the burdock and asked:
“How on earth did _you_ get here?”
They were all equally surprised and it was some time before they had
done explaining. But the rye was the angriest and, when she had heard
all about Trust and the hare and the wind, she was quite furious.
“Thank goodness that the farmer shot the hare in the autumn,” said
she. “And Trust, luckily, is dead too, the old scamp! So I have no
further quarrel with _them_. But how dare the wind carry the seed of
the weeds on to the farmer’s land!”
“Softly, softly, you green rye!” said the wind, who had been lying
behind the hedge and had heard all this. “I ask no one’s leave, but do
as I please; and now I shall compel you to bow before me.”
Then he blew over the young rye, so that the thin stalks swayed to and
fro.
“You see,” he then said, “the farmer looks after his rye, for that’s
_his_ business. But the rain and the sun and I: we interest ourselves
in all of you alike, without distinction of persons. For us the poor
weeds are quite as attractive as the rich corn.”
Now the farmer came out to look at his rye and, when he saw the weeds
that stood in the fields, he was vexed and scratched his head and began
to scold in his turn.
“That’s that dirty wind,” he said to Jens and Ole, who stood beside him
with their hands in the pockets of their new trousers.
But the wind dashed up and blew off the hats of all three of them and
trundled them ever so far away. The farmer and his boys ran after them,
but the wind was the quicker. At last, he rolled the hats out into the
pond and the farmer and his boys had to stand ever so long and fish for
them before they got them out.
THE WATER-LILY AND THE DRAGON-FLY
THE WATER-LILY AND THE DRAGON-FLY
1
A little stream ran between trees and bushes. Along the banks stood
tall, slender reeds and whispered to the wind. In the middle of the
water floated the water-lily, with her white flower and her broad,
green leaves.
Generally the water was very still, but when, as sometimes happened,
the wind went for a trip over the surface of the stream, then the reeds
rustled and the water-lilies dived right down under the water and the
leaves flew up or to either side, so that the thick green stalks,
which came all the way from the bottom, found it difficult to hold
them tight.
All day long, a dragon-fly grub crept up and down the water-lily’s stem.
“What a terrible bore it must be,” said the grub, looking up at the
flowers, “to be a water-lily!”
“You speak of things which you don’t understand,” replied the
water-lily. “It is just the pleasantest thing in the world.”
“Well, I can’t understand that,” said the grub. “I should always want
to be tearing myself free and flying round like a great, splendid
dragon-fly.”
“Nonsense!” said the water-lily. “A fine pleasure that would be! No,
to lie peacefully on the water and dream and to drink sunshine and now
and again to rock upon the waves: there’s some sense in that.”
The grub reflected for a moment and then said:
“I have higher aspirations. If I could have my way, I should be a
dragon-fly. I should skim over the water on great stiff wings, kiss the
white flowers, rest for a second on your leaves and then fly on again.”
“You are ambitious,” said the water-lily, “and that is silly. Wise
people know when they are well off. May I make so free as to ask you
what you would propose to do to turn into a dragon-fly? You don’t look
as if you were made for one. In any case, you must see that you grow up
prettier; you’re very gray and ugly now.”
“Yes, that’s the pity of it,” said the grub, a little disheartened. “I
myself don’t know how it is to happen; but I still hope that it will.
That’s why I crawl around here and eat all the little insects I can
catch.”
“Ah, so you think you can eat yourself into something big!” said the
water-lily, mockingly. “That would be a pleasant way of improving one’s
condition.”
“Yes, but I believe it’s the right way for me!” cried the dragon-fly
grub. “I shall eat and eat all day, till I grow stout and fat, and
then, one fine morning, I hope my fat will change into wings with gold
on them and all the rest that a real dragon-fly wants.”
The water-lily shook her wise white head:
“Let those foolish thoughts be,” she said, “and learn to be contented
with your lot. You can now live in peace and quiet among my leaves and
creep up and down my stalk as much as ever you like. You have plenty of
food and no cares nor worries: what more can you want?”
“You have an inferior nature,” answered the grub, “and therefore you
have no sense of higher things. I want to become a dragon-fly!”
And then she crept down to the bottom to catch lots of little insects
and eat herself fatter than ever.
The water-lily lay quietly on the water and reflected:
“I can’t understand animals!” she said to herself. “They do nothing
but dance about from morn till night, hunt and eat one another and know
no moment’s peace. We flowers are more sensible. We grow up calmly and
placidly, side by side, drink sunshine and rain and take everything
as it comes. And I am the luckiest of them all. How often have I not
floated contentedly here on the water, while the other flowers were
suffering from the drought on land! We flowers are by far the happier;
but that is what those stupid animals fail to see.”
2
When the sun set in the evening, the dragon-fly grub lay very still on
the stalk with her legs drawn up under her. She had eaten a heap of
insects and was so fat that she felt as though she would burst. And
yet she was not glad: she pondered on what the water-lily had said
and could not sleep all night for restless thinking. And all that
reflecting made her head ache, for it was a labour to which she was not
used. And she felt pains in her back too and in her chest. It was as
though she were going to be pulled to pieces and die on the spot.
When morning began to break, she could bear it no longer:
“I don’t know what it is,” she cried in despair. “These pains hurt so
that I can’t think what is to become of me. Perhaps the water-lily
is right and I shall never be more than a poor, wretched grub. But
the thought of that is too terrible! I should so love to turn into a
dragon-fly and fly about in the sun. Oh, my back, my back! I _must_ be
dying!”
Again she felt as if her back was bursting and she screamed for pain.
At the same moment, the reeds on the bank began to rustle.
“That is the morning-wind,” thought the grub. “At least, let me see the
sun once more before I die.”
And, with a great effort, she crawled to one of the leaves of the
water-lily, stretched out her legs and prepared for death.
But, when the sun had risen and stood red and motionless in the east,
suddenly there came an opening right in the middle of the grub’s back,
accompanied by a frightful itching. Oh, the pain of it, the anguish!
It was a terrible feeling. Almost swooning, she closed her eyes,
but the agony and the itching grew no less. And then, suddenly, she
perceived that the pain was gone; and, when she opened her eyes, she
was hovering through the air on stiff, glittering wings, a brilliant
dragon-fly! Beneath her, on the leaf of the water-lily, lay the ugly
gray covering which she had worn as a grub.
“Hurrah!” cried the new dragon-fly. “Now the wish of my heart is
fulfilled.”
And she flew through the air as swiftly as though she meant to fly to
the end of the earth.
“The hussy has got her way after all!” thought the water-lily. “Now we
shall see if she is more contented than before.”
3
Two days later, the dragon-fly came flying up and settled on the
flowers of the water-lily.
“Good-morning,” said the water-lily. “So you’ve come at last. I was
beginning to think that you had grown too grand to come and see your
old friends.”
“Good-morning,” said the dragon-fly. “Where shall I lay my eggs?”
“Oh, you’ll find a place somewhere,” replied the flower. “Sit down
first and tell me if you are happier now than when you were an ugly
little grub crawling up and down my stalk.”
“Where can I lay my eggs? Oh, wherever can I lay my eggs?” cried the
dragon-fly and flew buzzing from leaf to leaf, laying one here and one
there, and at last sat down, tired and exhausted, on a leaf.
“Well?” said the water-lily.
“Oh, I was much better off then,” sighed the dragon-fly. “The sunshine
is glorious and it is a great delight to fly over the water, but I
never have time to enjoy it. I tell you, I’m awfully busy. In the old
days, I had nothing to think of. And now I have to fly about all day
long to lay these silly eggs. I haven’t a moment to myself and have
hardly time to eat.”
“What did I tell you?” cried the water-lily, triumphantly. “Didn’t I
prophesy that your happiness would be no greater?”
“Good-bye,” said the dragon-fly, with a sigh. “I have no time to listen
to you: I must go and lay more eggs.”
But, just as she was about to fly away, the starling came:
“I say, I say, what a dear little dragon-fly!” he said. “Just a nice
little mouthful for my youngsters!”
And with a whizz! he snapped up the dragon-fly in his beak and flew
away with her.
“There they go!” cried the water-lily, shaking her leaves with anger.
“Those animals, those animals! What extraordinary creatures they are. I
must say I prefer my own quiet life. I hurt nobody and no one injures
me. I am so hap....”
She got no further, for a boat glided close past her.
“Oh, what a lovely water-lily!” said Ellen, who sat in the stern. “I
must have it.”
She bent over the side and tore the flower away. When she got home, she
put it into a glass of water, where it stood for three days with a lot
of other flowers.
“I don’t know what to think,” said the water-lily, on the fourth day.
“I have not fared a whit better than that poor dragon-fly.”
“The flowers are faded,” said Ellen and threw them out of the window.
And the water-lily lay with her fair white petals on the dirty ground.
AUNT EIDER-DUCK
AUNT EIDER-DUCK
1
It was winter.
The leaves were gone from the trees and the flowers from the hedge. The
birds too were gone, that is to say the more important ones; they had
all departed for the South.
But some, of course, had remained behind.
There was the everlasting sparrow, for instance, and the nimble little
titmouse, besides the crow and the raven, who looked twice as black and
hungry against the snow. There were also a few birds who preferred to
take the rough with the smooth rather than travel so far afield.
Down on the beach there was more life than in summer.
There were the gulls who plunged about, in great flocks, wherever a
hole had been made in the ice. And there were the wild-duck, who swam
in the open water and quacked and dived and flew up whenever a shot was
heard from the fishermen’s guns.
“What a crowd!” said the sparrow.
“They come from the North,” said the gull. “From Norway and the Faroe
Islands, where it is a hundred times colder than here. As soon as there
is the least bit of a change in the temperature, they fly back again.
Do you know those two who are coming this way over the ice?”
“How should I know them?” said the sparrow. “I was born last summer
and I only wish I were back in the nest!”
“They are eider-ducks,” said the gull. “Look, there’s one more coming.”
So there was. And he was a very handsome bird. He had a green neck, a
white throat and a white breast, with a pink sheen on it, and lovely
yellow legs.
“That is the drake,” said the gull. “The other two are females and not
so smart, although they don’t look bad either.”
The three eider-ducks had now come so near that the sparrow and the
gull could hear what they were talking about.
“Dear lady,” said the drake, “I cannot understand why you stay on the
ice. Do come to the open water and let us all enjoy ourselves.”
“I must stay with my niece,” said the elder eider-duck. “She is my
sister’s child.”
“And why should not Miss Eider-Duck come too?” said the drake. “In the
summer, she was the gayest of us all in the Faroes.”
“That was then,” said Miss Eider-Duck. “But now I have begun to think
of other and more serious things.”
The drake tried just a little longer to persuade them, but to no
purpose. Then he flew back across the ice.
“Are there no cliffs here, auntie?” asked the young eider-duck. “I am
dying to get married and to build a nest.”
“If I may venture to make a remark,” said the sparrow, “I should say
that it is still a little too cold. And there are no cliffs in this
country.”
“But you can brood in the sand,” said the gull.
“Thank you for the information, my good women,” said Aunt Eider-Duck.
“But it is only a fancy of my niece’s. She is three years old now and
marriageable.”
“Lord!” said the sparrow. “I was born last summer and, if it was only a
little warmer, I could get married at once.”
“It’s easier for one than for another,” said the aunt.
“Let us fly home to the Faroes and get married, auntie,” said the young
duck.
“In a month’s time, my child,” said auntie. “But I must decline the
honour for myself. I have now been married seven times and have had
enough of it. Still, I will gladly chat about it with you. That is so
awfully interesting.”
“The trees will not be green yet in a month,” said the sparrow. “This
is only January.”
“We have no trees in the Faroes, my girl,” said auntie, “and we don’t
want them either.”
“Has the young lady a sweetheart?” asked the gull.
“Not yet,” said auntie. “But he’ll come. You can get sweethearts for
the asking. She has spent her three years dancing on the sea and having
a good time. One must see a little life first.”
“If only she hits upon the right one,” said the gull.
“All men are alike, my good woman,” said auntie. “They court you and
marry you and, perhaps, just lend a hand with the nest and then they go
off and leave the rest to us.”
“I can’t say that I agree with you, ma’am,” said the gull. “My husband
has always helped me faithfully.”
“And I got lots of flies from my father when I was in the nest,” said
the sparrow.
“Then you were luckier than we,” said auntie. “Not one of my seven
husbands so much as saw his young ones.”
“Lord!” said the sparrow.
“Shall we be going home to the Faroes soon?” asked Miss Eider-Duck.
“Dear, dear, how interesting youth is!” said auntie and flapped her
wings.
Then they flew into the water; but, the next day, they came again
and this happened every day until well into February. The young
eider-duck’s longing for home grew ever greater and her aunt never
tired of talking to her about it.
“Now it’s coming, now it’s coming!” said she. “It’s getting almost too
hot here to bear.”
“I don’t think so,” said the sparrow, shivering and longing for the
spring.
One day, a charming young eider-drake came and sat beside the two
ladies on the ice.
“If he proposes to you, accept him,” whispered auntie. “He has the
greenest neck I’ve seen for many a year.”
“If only he would!” said the young girl.
And he did.
After sitting for a while and talking of indifferent things, as long
as etiquette required--and etiquette does not demand half as much of
eider-duck as it does of men--he asked the young lady if she would be
his wife. He went on to talk of birds’-nests and cliffs and dear little
eggs and so on, but she stopped him:
“Yes,” she said; and so they were engaged.
He was awfully eloquent and swore to be faithful to her all his life
and to build a nest for her and to sit on the eggs for her and to feed
the children from morn till night. She nodded and could not speak for
sheer happiness.
“Every word that he says is a lie,” said auntie. “But, lord, how
charming it is!”
“It’s terrible!” said the sparrow and the gull. “Such a dear young
lady!”
“Fiddle!” said auntie. “We all have to go through it. My seven husbands
all said the same and not one of them kept his promise. But they were
charming, for all that. Only they had not such green necks as this one.
He’s splendid. I could fall in love with him myself.”
“When do we start?” asked Miss Eider-Duck.
“To-morrow early, my darling, if the wind is fair,” said her beau.
“I’ll go with you,” said auntie. “In the first place, it’s more
proper. And then it’s so charming to see young people so happy.”
They started the next morning.
It was not yet light when the birds began their passage. Thousands of
eider-duck flew along in successive flocks, while thousands more came
up from every side. The gull and the sparrow woke up when they heard
the screaming and singing in the air.
“Fancy going north in weather like this!” said the sparrow, shivering.
“Why, it’s colder than ever!”
“There’s spring in the air when one’s in love,” said the gull.
2
Day and night, the northward flight proceeded.
There were so many birds that they were quite bewildering to see and,
as time passed and they neared their destination, their longing
increased and they flew as though there were fire under their wings.
The aunt never left the young couple and was as light and swift as they
and as happy as if she herself were going to be married for the eighth
time.
At last they reached the Faroes, which were their home.
They screamed and quacked for joy when they saw the rocks rise from the
sea and their wings beat with renewed vigour, tired though they were
by the long journey. They fell upon the cliffs as upon a prey and soon
there was not a spot left but a happy bird sat in it and flapped her
wings and screamed.
“Now I’ll show you a good place for a nest,” said auntie to the young
pair, who sat exchanging loving looks. “Come with me to the other side
of the rock.”
They flew with her and reached the place where the man to whom the rock
belonged had put little wooden boxes for the birds. There was just one
empty one left and the bridegroom at once took possession.
“Here you will be able to sit on the eggs safely and comfortably, my
darling,” he said.
“Yes--and you too,” she answered. “Don’t you remember that you promised
to help me with my work?”
“I should think I did!” said he and kissed her.
“Lord, how charming!” said auntie.
“And I don’t want to live in that nasty box,” said the young duck. “I
was looking forward most awfully to collecting sea-weed and straw and
heather, as you told me you used to with your former wife. And that’s
what I want to do also.”
“Be easy, my dear little girl,” he said. “Of course, we will line
the box a bit, but let us be glad that there is something to start
on. Remember that we have a long life before us, full of work and
happiness, and don’t let us begin by doing more than we shall be able
to keep up.”
“Lord, how he lies!” said auntie and cast up her eyes to the sky. “But
how lovely it is to listen to!”
“What did you say?” asked the little duck.
“I was saying that your future husband has the loveliest green neck in
all the Faroes,” said auntie. “I should like to give it a little bite.
But now I will leave you to your happiness.”
Then she flew quacking over the rock and splashed into the water with
the others. The two young people began to line their box with what
they could find. Soon the wedding took place, with mirth and pomp, and
thousands of other young eider-duck were married on the same day.
“Lord, how beautiful it is to be young!” said auntie, who was paying
wedding-visits with a swarm of other old ladies.
3
And the young couple were comfortable and very happy. But, when she had
laid her first egg in the nest, they had a tiff.
He wanted her to go for a little trip with him over the rock, while
the egg lay in the nest, and she had no objection, but she did think
that he might have shown rather more pleasure at the sight of that fine
gray-green egg.
“I am saving up my emotions,” he said, “as befits a man. Come along.”
Then she said, however, that it was out of the question to leave the
egg lying like that, with nothing over it. They must cover it with
something. She plucked some fine down from under her wings and laid it
on the egg. But when she asked him to do the same, he shook his head
with decision.
“I am saving up my feathers,” he said. “You will lay four more eggs
and my turn will come when you’ve rim out of down. I shall pluck myself
bald if it’s for the good of our children.”
“Lord, how he’s romancing!” said auntie, who was standing near and
heard all they said. “He’s just like my own husbands. They don’t mean a
word of it, but still it does an old heart good to hear them.”
The young wife now accompanied her husband to the beach, where all was
life and jollity.
Scores of husbands were there with their wives and all the old
gentlemen and ladies who no longer had a nest. They dived and chatted
and told funny stories. But the young wife mostly sat apart or talked
to the other young wives, who also were in a rather solemn mood. And
soon she declared that she must positively lay another egg.
“Come, dear,” she said. “Come, let us go home. There’s a new egg
coming.”
“What a misfortune!” said her husband, who was in the midst of a
quadrille with a couple of young ducks of the summer before, who were
not yet thinking of marriage.