|There was once a rich merchant who had six children, three sons and
three daughters. He loved them more than he loved all his riches, so
that he was always seeking to make them happy and wise.
The daughters were very pretty; but the youngest was more than
pretty--she was beautiful. As every one called her Little Beauty when
she was a child, and she became more lovely every year, the name grew up
with her, so that she had no other than just--Beauty.
Now Beauty was as good as she was beautiful. But her elder sisters were
ill-natured and jealous of her, and could not bear to hear her called
Beauty. They were very proud, too, of their father’s riches, and put on
great airs. They would not visit the daughters of other merchants, but
were always following persons who had titles, Lady This and Duchess
That. They laughed at Beauty, who lived quietly at home with their
father.
The father was so rich that many great merchants wished to marry his
daughters. But the two eldest always said that they could never think of
marrying anybody below a duke, or at the least an earl. As for Beauty,
she thanked her lovers for thinking so well of her, but as she was still
very young, she wished to live a few years longer with her father.
Now it happened that the merchant all at once lost his great wealth.
Nothing was left but one small house in the country, and there the poor
man told his children they must now go, and earn their daily bread.
The two eldest daughters said they need not go, for they had plenty of
lovers who would be glad enough to marry them, even though they had lost
their fortune. But they were wrong, for their lovers would not look at
them now, and jeered at them in their trouble, because they had been so
proud before.
Yet every one felt sorry for Beauty. Several gentlemen who loved her
begged her still to let them marry her, though she had not a penny.
Beauty refused, and said she could not leave her father now that trouble
had come upon him.
So the family went to live in the small house in the country. There the
merchant and his three sons ploughed and sowed the fields, and worked
hard all day. Beauty rose at four o’clock every morning, put the house
in order, and got breakfast for the whole family. It was very hard at
first, for no one helped her. But every day it grew easier to work, and
Beauty grew stronger and rosier. When her work was done, she could read,
or play on her harp, or sit at her spinning-wheel, singing as she spun.
As for her two sisters, they were idle and unhappy, and became quite
helpless. They never got up till ten o’clock. They spent the day moping
and fretting, because they no longer had fine clothes to wear, and could
not go to fine parties. They jeered at Beauty, and said that she was
nothing but a servant-girl after all, to like that kind of living. But
Beauty did not mind them, and lived on cheerfully.
They had been in the country a year, when one morning the merchant had a
letter. It brought the news that a ship laden with rich goods belonging
to him had not been lost after all, and had just come into port. The
two sisters were half wild with joy, for now they could soon leave the
farm-house, and go back to the gay city.
When their father was about to go to the port to settle his business
there, they begged him to bring back all manner of fine things for them.