The Complete Fairy Tales

by Hans Christian Andersen

  “A Danish rag would never think of speaking in such a manner,” began the Danish rag. “It would be against our nature. I know myself and, as I am, all other Danish rags are. We are good-natured and modest; we undervalue ourselves. Naturally, there’s nothing to be gained by it, but I like being that way, it is so utterly charming. Just because I don’t talk about it doesn’t mean that I don’t know how valuable I am: I do! But no one shall accuse me of bragging. I am soft and flexible and can endure anything. I envy no one and speak well of everyone, though hardly anyone deserves it—but that’s their problem, not mine. I like to poke fun at everything, even myself, which proves my superior intelligence.”

  “Don’t talk to me in that insipid, guttural, gluelike dialect from that pancake that you call a country. It makes me sick to my stomach.” And with these words the Norwegian rag allowed the wind to carry it to another place in the rag pile.

  Both rags were made into paper. By chance, the Norwegian rag became a piece of stationery on which a young Norwegian wrote a love letter to a Danish girl. And the Danish rag fared just as strangely. It became a sheet of paper on which a Danish poet composed an ode in praise of the loveliness and strength of Norway.

  This shows that something good can come out of rags, as long as they end up in the rag pile and are made into paper, on which truth and beauty are written. Anything that helps our understanding is a blessing.

  That was the story of the rags, and only rags need be offended by it.

  134

  The Two Islands

  Off the coast of Zealand, near the Castle of Holstein, there once lay two islands: Vaeno and Glaeno. There were forests, farms, and fields on both; and each had a village with a church. They lay close together and close to the coast of Zealand. Now there is only one island.

  One night a horrible storm swept over the country. The waters rose so high that no one could remember ever having seen anything like it. It was weather fit for the end of the world. It sounded as if the earth were cracking; and the church bells started ringing, though no one pulled the ropes.

  That night Vaeno disappeared into the sea. The following morning there was nothing on the surface of the water to prove that it had ever existed. But on a still summer night many a fisherman claimed that he had seen the island’s white church tower down below, in the water, and that he had heard the bells ring. But the fishermen must have been wrong. What they probably heard were the many swans that often swim nearby; their calling and groaning can sound, in the distance, like church bells.

  “Vaeno is lying at the bottom of the sea, waiting for Glaeno!” is what the legend says.

  There was a time when some of the old people on Glaeno still remembered that frightful night of the storm. When they were children they had driven across in wagons at low tide to Vaeno, just as we today drive, from a point near the Castle Holstein, over to Glaeno—the water never reaches more than halfway up the wheels.

  When there is a storm, many of the children of Glaeno listen terrified for the sound of rushing water. “Is it tonight that Vaeno will come and take our island?” They are so afraid that they say their evening prayers once more before they fall asleep. And the next morning Glaeno is still there with its forests and fields of grain, its picturesque little houses with gardens filled with hops. The birds are still singing, the deer jumping in the thicket, and the mole does not taste salt water no matter where he digs.

  Yet Glaeno is doomed. How long it will still be there I cannot say, but one day it will be gone.

  Maybe you have seen it yourself, only yesterday stood on the beach and watched the swans swimming in the narrow Sound or a sailboat gliding by. You may even have driven across to the island, the horses splashing in the water, and the cart almost sailing behind.

  Now if you leave for a while to see a little of the great wide world and return in a decade or so, then you will find the forest surrounded by meadows, and your nostrils will be filled with the sweet smell of hay. There may even be some new houses you have never seen before, and you will ask yourself where you are. Holstein Castle with its gold spire will still be there as showy as ever, but it will seem as if the castle has moved a mile inland. You will walk through the forest and across the fields, and then you are at the sea, but where is the island? In front of you is the open sea. “Did Vaeno finally come to get Glaeno?” you will ask yourself. “Was there really a terrible storm one night that shook the earth and moved Holstein Castle a mile inland?”

  No, no storm will have come. This will have been work done by the light of day. Human beings will have built a dam across to Glaeno and have drained the Sound. The skill of man will bind Glaeno to Zealand and make rich meadows where once there was water. Glaeno will attach itself to Zealand, and all its old farms will still be where they have always been. It will not be Vaeno that has come to take Glaeno, but Zealand, with two dikes as arms, that will grab it.

  As the legend foretold, Glaeno will disappear; but Zealand will become many acres larger. Go there in a few years and you will see it for yourself: Glaeno will be no more visible than Vaeno.

  135

  Who Was the Happiest?

  “What beautiful roses,” said the sunshine. “And all the little buds will soon become as beautiful as they are. They are all my children, I gave them life by kissing them.”

  “They are my children,” said the dew. “Didn’t I suckle them with my tears?”

  “I should think they are mine,” interrupted the rosebush. “You may call yourself godparents. As for your presents, I consider them christening gifts, for which I say thank you.”

  “My sweet little rose-child!” they all three said at the same time, and wished each rose the greatest happiness in the world. But that was not really possible. Only one rose could be the happiest, as one would also have to be the least happy of all the roses on the bush. But what we want to know is, which would be the happiest?

  “I will find that out for you,” said the wind. “I travel a great deal and am thin enough to get through the narrowest crack. I know everything inside and out.”

  Each rose had heard what had been said and every swelling bud sensed it.

  Just at that moment a woman dressed in the black clothes of sorrow came walking through the garden. She looked at the roses and then picked one that was not completely unfolded. Just because it was not fully in bloom, she considered it the most beautiful of them all. She carried the flower to the still silent room where only a few days ago her young daughter had played and laughed happily. Now she lay in a black coffin and looked like a marble sculpture of a sleeping figure. The poor mother kissed the dead child and then kissed the rose, before she placed it on the young girl’s chest, as if she hoped that the freshness of a rose and a mother’s kiss could make the girl’s heart beat again.

  The petals of the rose shook with happiness. It was as if the whole rose swelled and grew. “I have become more than a rose, for, like a child, I have received a mother’s kiss. I have been blessed and will travel into the unknown realm, dreaming on the dead girl’s breast. Truly, I am the happiest of us all.”

  In the garden where the rosebush grew, there worked an old woman; she did the weeding. She had also been admiring the rosebush, but she had especially been observing the only fully unfolded rose among the flowers. One more day of sunshine, one more drop of the pearly dew of night, and its life would be over. Now that it had bloomed for beauty, it might as well end its days being useful, thought the woman. She picked it and put it in an old newspaper with some other flowers she had collected that had, as she said, bloomed their time. When she got home she would mix the rose petals with lavender, sprinkle a little salt over them, and put them in a jar; that was call “making a potpourri.”

  “I am being embalmed,” thought the rose. “That is something that only happens to kings and roses. I have been the most honored. Certainly I am the happiest.”

  Two young men were out walking in the garden. One of them was an artist, the other a poet.
Each of them picked a rose—the one he thought was the most beautiful.

  The artist painted a picture of the rose that was so true to life that the rose almost mistook the canvas for a mirror.

  “In this way,” said the artist, “the rose will live through many, many years, while millions and millions of other roses will have bloomed and died.”

  The rose heard it and thought, “I am the most highly favored, the happiest.”

  The poet contemplated his flower and the rose inspired him. It was as if he could read a story on each petal. It was a work of love, a piece of immortal poetry.

  “I am immortal!” sighed the rose. “Oh, surely, I am the happiest.”

  Amid all this array of perfect roses there was one little flower that had a defect. It sat by chance—or maybe good luck—hidden behind the others. The petals on one side were not exactly like the petals on the opposite side, and in the middle of the flower a little green leaf grew. This sort of thing can happen among roses.

  “Poor child,” said the wind, and kissed the little rose on her cheek. The flower thought it was done in homage. She knew that she was a little different from the others and that she had a green leaf growing in the middle of her flower, but she had never considered it a flaw. On the contrary, she had always thought it a sign of distinction.

  A butterfly landed on the rose and kissed each of her petals; it was proposing, but the rose let it fly away without an answer. A grasshopper came; true, he landed on another flower, but it was one quite nearby. He rubbed his legs together and that is a sure sign of love among grasshoppers. The rose that the grasshopper had sat on didn’t understand this; but the little rose who had been singled out for special merit, she understood it very well. The grasshopper had looked at her and especially at her little green leaf and in his eyes had been written, “I love you so much that I could eat you up.” Greater love no one can show, because that means that truly the two become one. But the little rose did not want to be joined quite so firmly to the grasshopper.

  The nightingale sang in the star-filled night. “She sings for me, only for me,” whispered the rose with the defect or the badge of merit—all as you look at it. “Why is it always I who am singled out for recognition, and not my sisters? Why was I created so exceptional that I had to become happiest of all roses?”

  At that moment two gentlemen smoking cigars came walking past the rosebush. They had been discussing roses and tobacco. They had been told that the smoke from a cigar would turn a rose green, and now the experiment had to be tried. They did not want to take one of the more beautiful roses and that is why they decided on the little rose.

  “Again I am the chosen one,” she cried. “Oh, I am overwhelmed by the honor, I am the happiest!” The little rose turned quite green, both from the smoke and from being so very extraordinary.

  One rose was perhaps the loveliest of them all; she was still a bud when the gardener picked her. She was given the place of honor in the bouquet he made of all the most beautiful flowers in the garden. The bouquet was brought to the young gentleman who owned the house and the garden, and he took it along that evening in his carriage. The flower was the symbol of beauty amid beauty, for the young man took the bouquet along to the theater. The audience were dressed in their very best, thousands of lamps burned, and music played.

  When the ballet was almost finished and the ballerina, who was the most admired dancer at the theater, came out for her last great dance, bouquets fell down on the stage like a rain of flowers. Among them was the bouquet with the rose in it, and the flower felt an indescribable joy as it flew through the air. As it touched the wooden floor, the bouquet seemed to be dancing too. It jumped and then slid along the stage. But in its final fall the rose broke her stem. The ballerina for whom, as homage, it had been picked was never to hold the rose in her hand. A stagehand picked it up, for it had fallen behind the sets. He smelled it and acknowledged its beauty, but it had no stem so he could not put it in his buttonhole. He did not throw the rose away but slid it into his pocket. Later that night, when he returned home, he filled a little liqueur glass with water and put the flower in it.

  In the morning it was placed on the little table that stood beside his grandmother’s chair. The old woman, too weak to get outside in the sunshine, looked at the beautiful rose and smelled its fragrance.

  “Poor rose, you were meant for the rich and famous young girl and instead you have come to a poor old woman. But to her you would only have been one more flower, to me you are as lovely as a whole rosebush,” the old woman said, and gazed at the flower with eyes as happy as a child’s. Maybe the freshness of the rose brought back to her memories of her own youth, long ago past.

  “The windowpane was broken, so it was easy for me to get in,” said the wind. “I noticed the old woman’s eyes and it is true they were like a child’s: expectant. I saw the rose too, in the liqueur glass on the table beside her. Who was the happiest of all the roses? I know, I could tell you!”

  Every rose on the bush had her own story and each of them believed herself to be the happiest; and such faith is a blessing in itself. The last rose left on the bush was certain that it was far happier than any of her sisters could have been.

  “I have survived them all. I am the last one, the only one left. I am my mother’s most beloved, her favorite child.”

  “I was their mother,” said the rosebush.

  “No, I was,” said the sunshine.

  “No, it was I who was their mother,” said the dew.

  “You all had part in them, and now I shall share the last rose among you.” And the wind blew and scattered the petals of the flower over the branches where the dewdrops hung in the morning and where the sun would shine during the day. “I had my part in it, for I collected the stories of the roses and I will tell them to the world. Which one of them was the happiest, can you tell? I won’t, I have said enough.”

  With those words the wind lay down behind the rosebush and the day was still.

  136

  The Wood Nymph

  We are going to Paris to see the great exhibition.

  Now we are there. The journey did not take long, and there was no witchcraft involved; we went by steam, across both the sea and the land. Our age is the age in which fairy tales come true.

  Now we are in the middle of Paris in a grand hotel. There are even potted plants along the staircases, and soft carpeting covers every step.

  Our room is comfortable. The doors to the balcony are open, and from it you can look down on the square. There spring came that day in the form of a young chestnut tree with new and tender leaves. The other trees on the square still have barren branches, and one of them no longer belongs to the living. It has gone out, and there it lies, outstretched on the ground, dug up by the roots. The young chestnut tree that is to take its place is still standing in the wagon which brought it this morning from the country.

  It is several decades old, which is young for a chestnut tree. It grew up close to an old oak tree, under which there was a bench. Here during the summer an old priest liked to sit and tell stories to the children of the village. The young chestnut tree listened too—or rather, the wood nymph or dryad, as they are called, liked to listen. Every tree, as you know, has a nymph within it. This dryad was still a child. She could remember the time when she had been younger and the chestnut tree was so small that it had hardly reached above the tallest grass, and had been shorter than the ferns. The grass and the ferns had been full grown, but the tree hadn’t. It had drunk of the air and sunshine, the rain and the dew; and each year it had grown. The wind had shaken it, but that had been necessary and only good for the tree: it was part of being brought up.

  The dryad had been happy, satisfied with her lot. She loved the sunshine and the songs of the birds, but best of all she liked to listen to a human voice. She understood human language as well as she understood the animals.

  Dragonflies, butterflies, even houseflies would come visiting—everything
that had wings. Gossip they all did. They told about the village, the vineyards, the school, and the old castle with its park, where there were canals and a lake. Down in the water there lived animals that flew under water. They were very intelligent and knew so much that they never said anything.

  The swallow had told the dryad about the beautiful goldfish, the fat tench, and the old algae-covered carp. The swallow was good at describing them, but—as she admitted herself—it wasn’t the same as seeing the fish with one’s own eyes. But how was the dryad ever to be able to do that? She was imprisoned in her tree and had to be satisfied with seeing the landscape from where she stood and trying to imagine all the human activity.

  Guests were welcome but, of all of them, she liked best the old priest who came to sit beneath the oak tree and told stories to the children about the history of France: tales about great deeds done in bygone days, about the men and women whose names are still mentioned with reverence. The dryad heard about Joan of Arc, Charlotte Corday, Henry IV, and Napoleon. She heard the stories of the lives of all those dead whose names still echo in living hearts. France is a great country. Here freedom was born, and skill and talent are nourished.

  The children listened with great attention to the old priest, and the dryad listened too. She was a schoolgirl like the others. She would look up at the sky. That was her picture book, and the ever changing shapes of the clouds were the illustrations for the stories she heard.

  She was happy living in the beautiful French countryside, yet she could not help feeling that the birds, and every other animal that could fly, were more fortunate than she was. Even the fly could travel and see much more than she could.

  France was so large and beautiful, as the dryad knew, and she could see only so small a part of it. The country was as wide as a world, with vineyards, forests, and great towns. The greatest of them all was Paris. The birds had been there; but she—the wood nymph—would never see it.