“I can’t bear it!” she said. “We must get out of here.”
By the time they were back down on the floor again, the old Chinese mandarin was awake. He was nodding his head and rocking back and forth with his whole body, which was rounded at the bottom, for he had no legs.
“Here comes the old mandarin!” screamed the little shepherdess, and fell down on her porcelain knees because she was so upset.
“I have an idea,” said the chimney sweep. We could climb down into the potpourri jar, over there in the corner. There we shall be among roses and lavender and we can throw salt in the eyes of anyone who comes.”
“It won’t do!” cried the shepherdess. “The potpourri jar and the mandarin were once engaged. It’s a long time ago but a certain amount of affection always remains for the lovers of one’s youth.… No, we have no choice, we must go out into the wide world.”
“But do you realize what that means?” asked the chimney sweep. “Have you thought about how wide the world is and that we can never come back?”
“I have!” she said determinedly.
The chimney sweep looked steadfastly into her eyes. “The only way I know how to get out is through the chimney. Have you the courage to climb into the belly of the stove and up through the flue into the chimney? From there on, it’s upward, ever upward, where no one can reach us, till we come to the opening; and then we shall be out in the wide world.”
He led her over to the stove and opened the door. “Oh, how dark it looks,” she said. But she followed him into the belly of the stove and crawled with him up the flue, though it was pitch-dark.
“Now we are in the chimney. Look up and you will see a star!”
It was true, there was a star shining through the darkness, as if it wished to guide them on their way. They climbed, they crawled; it was a terrible journey: up, up they went. The chimney sweep hoisted and held onto the shepherdess, showing her where to put her little porcelain feet. Finally they reached the top of the chimney and sat down on the edge of it. They were exhausted and they had every right to be.
The star-filled sky was above them and all the roofs of the city were below them. They could see far and wide, out into the world. The poor little shepherdess had never imagined that the wide world would be so big. She leaned her head on the chimney sweep’s shoulder and cried so hard that the gold in her waistband began to chip.
“It’s far too much!” she sobbed. “I cannot bear it! The world is much too big. I wish I were back on the table beneath the mirror. I shall never be happy again until I am! I followed you out into the wide world; now you must take me home, if you care for me at all.”
The chimney sweep tried to reason with her. He talked about the Chinese mandarin and Mr. Goat-legged Commanding-General-Private-War-Sergeant; but that just made her cry all the more. Finally she kissed him, and then he could only obey her.
And they climbed back down the chimney with great difficulty, crawled through the flue, and entered the belly of the stove; there they peeped out through the door to see what was going on in the parlor.
Not a sound came from the room. In the middle of the floor lay the old Chinese mandarin. He had fallen off the table when he tried to follow them. Now he was in three pieces and his head had rolled over in a corner. Mr. Goat-legged Commanding-General-Private-War-Sergeant stood where he always had been, deep in thought
“How horrible!” exclaimed the little shepherdess. “Old Grandfather is broken and it’s all our fault! I shan’t live through it!”
“He can be glued,” said the chimney sweep. “He can be put together again.… Don’t carry on so! … All he needs is to be glued and have a rivet put in his neck, and hell be able to say as many nasty things as he ever did.”
“Do you think so?” she asked. They climbed up onto the table and stood where they had before.
“Well, this is as far as we got!” the chimney sweep said. “We could have saved ourselves a whole lot of trouble.”
“Do you think it will be expensive to have Grandfather put together again?” asked the shepherdess. “Oh, how I wish it were already done!”
And Grandfather was glued and a rivet was put in his neck; and then he was as good as new, except for one thing: he couldn’t nod any more.
“You seem to think so much more highly of yourself since you have been broken,” said Mr. Goat-legged Commanding-General-Private-War-Sergeant. “I can’t understand why anyone should be proud of being glued. Am I to have her or not?”
The chimney sweep and the little shepherdess looked pitifully at the Chinese mandarin; they were so terrified that he would nod. But he couldn’t nod; and he didn’t want to admit to a stranger that he had a rivet in his neck and would never be able to nod again. So the two young porcelain lovers stayed together. They blessed the rivet in Grandfather’s neck and loved each other until they broke.
38
Holger the Dane
In Denmark there lies an old castle. It is called Kronborg; foreigners know it as Elsinore. It is built right on the edge of the Sound, that narrow strait between Denmark and Sweden. Hundreds of ships sail through it: Russian, English, and Prussian; and every one fires a salute as it sails by the old castle. From Elsinore a cannon answers, “Boom!” And that, in the language of cannons in peacetime, means, “Good day and thank you!”
In the winter no ships can sail there, for then ice covers the Sound all the way over to Sweden. You can walk or even drive to the opposite shore, where the blue and yellow flag of Sweden flies. The Danish and the Swedish people meet and say, “Good day and thank you,” to each other; not with cannons but with a handclasp. They go shopping in each other’s towns, for foreign food tastes best.
The old castle dominates the scene and deep down in its cellar, in a dark room where no one ever comes, sits Holger the Dane. He is clad in iron, his head is resting in his hands. He is sleeping and dreaming, his long beard hangs down over the marble table. In his dreams he sees everything that is happening in all of Denmark; and once a year, on Christmas Eve, God sends an angel down to reassure him that what he has dreamed is true and that Denmark is not in danger, therefore he can sleep on. Should Denmark ever be in danger, then he will rise, grab his sword, and fight so that all the world will hear it.
This legend about Holger the Dane an old grandfather was telling his little grandson; and the little boy believed every word of it, for he knew that his grandfather never lied.
The old man, who was a wood carver, was making the figurehead for a new ship, which would have the name of Holger the Dane. It was a tall wooden statue that stood proudly, with a long beard; in one hand he held a sword, while the other leaned on a shield, on which the coat of arms was yet to be carved.
Grandfather told stories about Danish men and women who had performed mighty deeds; and his little grandson thought that soon he would know as much as Holger the Dane had ever dreamed. When the boy was put to bed that night he dreamed that he had grown a large white beard.
His grandfather worked late, for he had only one thing left to do, and that was to finish the shield with the coat of arms of Denmark on it.
The statue was finished, his work was done. He looked at it and thought about all the tales he had told his grandson, the stories he, himself, had heard and all the books he had read. He nodded, took off his glasses and polished them; then he put them back on and said to himself, “In my time, Holger the Dane will never wake, but it might happen during the lifetime of the boy sleeping over there.” He looked again at his work and the more he looked at the statue the better he liked it. It had not yet been painted; but in the old man’s mind it took on color; the suit of armor shone and was steel-blue, the hearts in the coat of arms were scarlet, and the lions had golden crowns on their heads.
“No country in the world has a finer coat of arms than ours,” he said. “The lions for strength and the hearts to symbolize gentleness and love.” As he looked at the first of the lions he thought of King Canute, who had conquered E
ngland; as he looked at the second one, he remembered Valdemar, who had freed Denmark and taught the Hanseatic towns to fear us; the third lion was Margaret, the queen who had united Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. The old man looked at the red hearts and they seemed as red as burning flames, they moved and danced, and his thoughts followed them.
The first of the flames took him to a dark prison; there sat a woman. She was Eleanora Ulfeldt, daughter of King Christian IV; the flame jumped to her chest and became one with her heart, the most noble of all Danish women.
“Yes, that is true; she is one of the hearts in the shield of Denmark,” mumbled old Grandfather.
The next flame took him out on the sea. Cannons were firing. A great naval battle was being fought. The flame was a decoration on Hvitfeldt’s bedraggled uniform as he stood on the deck of a burning ship until it exploded, in order to save the Danish fleet.
The third flame led him to Greenland, to the poverty-stricken hovels where Hans Egede preached the message of love.
Quicker than the fourth flame could fly, Grandfather’s thoughts flew. In a poor peasant’s hut King Frederik VI stood; he wrote his name with chalk on the beam in the living room. Here in a poor man’s house his heart became one with Denmark’s. The wood carver dried a tear from the corner of his eye, for King Frederik had reigned during his own lifetime: the king with the silver hair and the honest, pale blue eyes. At that moment his son’s wife came to call him to the table to have a bite to eat.
“It is a beautiful sculpture you have made, Grandfather,” she said. “Holger the Dane and the coat of arms of Denmark. It seems to me I have seen his face before; who is he?”
“No, you cannot ever have met him,” said the old man, “but I have once. From memory, I have tried to reconstruct his features. It was during the Battle of Copenhagen, when we suddenly learned that we were Danes. I was serving aboard the frigate Denmark; our ship was part of Steen Bille’s fleet. There was a man beside me; it was as if the bullets were afraid of him. While he fought he sang all sorts of old songs; his valor was unbelievable. I recall his face well, although where he came from—or, for that matter, where he went when the battle was over—no one knows. I have often thought that he was Holger the Dane and that he had swum out to the ship from Elsinore to help us when we were in peril; since I believe that, the features on the sculpture are his.”
The wooden figure cast a giant shadow on the wall and the ceiling of the room; the shadow moved as if it belonged to a real person, but that was because the tallow candle was flickering.
The girl kissed her father-in-law, took his hand, and the two of them went over to the table where his son already was seated. The wood carver sat in the big chair at the head of the table and during the meal he talked about the coat of arms of Denmark, in which love, mildness, and strength were mixed. He emphasized that there were other forms of strength than the one symbolized by the sword. He pointed to his bookcase where there were many old books and among them the works of Holberg. They had often been taken down and read, for his comedies are, indeed, amusing and all his characters seem to be people one knows.
“He was good at carving too,” said Grandfather. “Holberg tried to file the rough edges off his fellow men, but that is difficult!” Grandfather laughed and nodded toward the almanac that hung on the wall and had a picture of the Round Tower on it. That was where Tycho Brahe had had his observatory. “Now Tycho Brahe was another one who used his strength, not to chop other people’s flesh and bones to pieces, but to cut a road through the stars. And Thorvaldsen, whose father was a simple wood carver like myself; he can carve in marble so the whole world takes notice. Yes, Holger the Dane appears not only dressed in armor; and strength can be shown in other ways than with the sword. Let us drink a toast to Bertel Thorvaldsen.”
But the little boy who was sleeping in the bed thought that it all had been meant quite literally. He saw in his dreams the Sound and Elsinore Castle with old Holger the Dane sitting down in the dark cellar, where he dreamed about everything that happened in all of Denmark, even about the conversation that we have listened to in the wood carver’s house. Holger mumbled in his sleep, while he nodded his head: “Yes, do not forget me, Danes. Remember me! I will come when you are in need.”
It was a sunny day, the wind carried the sound of the hunters’ horn from Sweden across the Sound. The ships sailed by and greeted the castle, “Boom! boom!” And from Elsinore the answer came: “Boom, boom.” But that won’t wake Holger the Dane; after all, it only means “Good day and thank you.” There must be a different kind of shooting before he wakes, but if that should come, do not worry, he will open his eyes.
39
The Little Match Girl
It was dreadfully cold, snowing, and turning dark. It was the last evening of the year, New Year’s Eve. In this cold and darkness walked a little girl. She was poor and both her head and feet were bare. Oh, she had had a pair of slippers when she left home; but they had been too big for her—in truth, they had belonged to her mother. The little one had lost them while hurrying across the street to get out of the way of two carriages that had been driving along awfully fast. One of the slippers she could not find, and the other had been snatched by a boy who, laughingly, shouted that he would use it as a cradle when he had a child of his own.
Now the little girl walked barefoot through the streets. Her feet were swollen and red from the cold. She was carrying a little bundle of matches in her hand and had more in her apron pocket. No one had bought any all day, or given her so much as a penny. Cold and hungry, she walked through the city; cowed by life, the poor thing!
The snowflakes fell on her long yellow hair that curled so prettily at the neck, but to such things she never gave a thought. From every window of every house, light shone, and one could smell the geese roasting all the way out in the street. It was, after all, New Year’s Eve; and this she did think about.
In a little recess between two houses she sat down and tucked her feet under her. But now she was even colder. She didn’t dare go home because she had sold no matches and was frightened that her father might beat her. Besides, her home was almost as cold as the street. She lived in an attic, right under a tile roof. The wind whistled through it, even though they had tried to close the worst of the holes and cracks with straw and old rags.
Her little hands were numb from cold. If only she dared strike a match, she could warm them a little. She took one and struck it against the brick wall of the house; it lighted! Oh, how warm it was and how clearly it burned like a little candle. She held her hand around it. How strange! It seemed that the match had become a big iron stove with brass fixtures. Oh, how blessedly warm it was! She stretched out her legs so that they, too, could get warm, but at that moment the stove disappeared and she was sitting alone with a burned-out match in her hand.
She struck another match. Its flame illuminated the wall and it became as transparent as a veil: she could see right into the house. She saw the table spread with a damask cloth and set with the finest porcelain. In the center, on a dish, lay a roasted goose stuffed with apples and prunes! But what was even more wonderful: the goose—although a fork and knife were stuck in its back—had jumped off the table and was waddling toward her. The little girl stretched out her arms and the match burned out. Her hands touched the cold, solid walls of the house.
She lit a third match. The flame flared up and she was sitting under a Christmas tree that was much larger and more beautifully decorated than the one she had seen through the glass doors at the rich merchant’s on Christmas Eve. Thousands of candles burned on its green branches, and colorful pictures like the ones you can see in store windows were looking down at her. She smiled up at them; but then the match burned itself out, and the candles of the Christmas tree became the stars in the sky. A shooting star drew a line of fire across the dark heavens.
“Someone is dying,” whispered the little girl. Her grandmother, who was dead, was the only person who had ever loved or been kind
to the child; and she had told her that a shooting star was the soul of a human being traveling to God.
She struck yet another match against the wall and in its blaze she saw her grandmother, so sweet, so blessedly kind.
“Grandmother!” shouted the little one. “Take me with you! I know you will disappear when the match goes out, just like the warm stove, the goose, and the beautiful Christmas tree.” Quickly, she lighted all the matches she had left in her hand, so that her grandmother could not leave. And the matches burned with such a clear, strong flame that the night became as light as day. Never had her grandmother looked so beautiful. She lifted the little girl in her arms and flew with her to where there is neither cold nor hunger nor fear: up to God.
In the cold morning the little girl was found. Her cheeks were red and she was smiling. She was dead. She had frozen to death on the last evening of the old year. The sun on New Year’s Day shone down on the little corpse; her lap was filled with burned-out matches.
“She had been trying to warm herself,” people said. And no one knew the sweet visions she had seen, or in what glory she and her grandmother had passed into a truly new year.
40
From the Ramparts of the Citadel
It is autumn; we are standing on the ramparts of the citadel, looking out over the sea at the many ships in the Sound and beyond it to the coast of Sweden, which rises high and clear in the light of the evening sun. On the other side of the ramparts we see tall trees below us; they are shedding their leaves. They shield some gloomy-looking houses with high wooden fences around them. There sentries are walking back and forth. Inside the hovels it is dark and miserable; but even more wretched are the cells behind the barred holes in the walls. Here are kept the most dangerous criminals.
The Complete Fairy Tales and Stories Page 36