The Wonder Clock

by Howard Pyle

  The WONDER CLOCK OR four and twenty marvellous Tales, being one for each hour of the day; written & illustrated

  By Howard Pyle.

  Embellished with Verses by Katharine Pyle. Harper & Row Publishers New York, Evanston, and London Copyright, 1887, by HARPER & BROTHERS

  Copyright, 1915, by ANNE POOLE PYLE

  Printed in the United States of America

  BOOKS BY

  HOWARD PYLE

  MEN OF IRON. Illustrated. Post 8vo

  A MODERN ALADDIN. Illustrated. Post 8vo

  PEPPER AND SALT. Illustrated. 8vo

  REJECTED OF MEN. Post 8vo

  THE ROSE OF PARADISE. Illustrated. 12mo

  THE RUBY OF KISHMOOR. Illustrated. 8vo

  STOLEN TREASURE. Illustrated. 12mo

  TWILIGHT LAND. Illustrated. Post 8vo

  THE WONDER CLOCK. Illustrated. Square 8vo

  PREFACE.

  I PUT on my dream-cap one day and stepped into Wonderland.

  Along the road I jogged and never dusted my shoes, and all the time the pleasant sun shone and never burned my back, and the little white clouds floated across the blue sky and never let fall a drop of rain to wet my jacket. And by and by I came to a steep hill.

  I climbed the hill, though I had more than one tumble in doing it, and there, on the tip-top, I found a house as old as the world itself.

  That was where Father Time lived; and who should sit in the sun at the door, spinning away for dear life, but Time's Grandmother herself; and if you would like to know how old she is you will have to climb to the top of the church steeple and ask the wind as he sits upon the weather-cock, humming the tune of Over-yonder song to himself.

  "Good-morning," says Time's Grandmother to me.

  "Good-morning," says I to her.

  "And what do you seek here?" says she to me.

  "I come to look for odds and ends," says I to her.

  "Very well," says she; "just climb the stairs to the garret, and there you will find more than ten men can think about."

  "Thank you," says I, and up the stairs I went. There I found all manner of queer forgotten things which had been laid away, nobody but Time and his Grandmother could tell where.

  Over in the corner was a great, tall clock, that had stood there silently with never a tick or a ting since men began to grow too wise for toys and trinkets.

  But I knew very well that the old clock was the

  Wonder Clock;

  so down I took the key and wound it--gurr! gurr! gurr!

  Click! buzz! went the wheels, and then--tick-tock! tick-tock! for the Wonder Clock is of that kind that it will never wear out, no matter how long it may stand in Time's garret.

  Down I sat and watched it, for every time it struck it played a pretty song, and when the song was ended--click! click!--out stepped the drollest little puppet-figures and went through with a dance, and I saw it all (with my dream-cap upon my head).

  But the Wonder Clock had grown rusty from long standing, and though now and then the puppet-figures danced a dance that I knew as well as I know my bread-and-butter, at other times they jigged a step I had never seen before, and it came into my head that maybe a dozen or more puppet-plays had become jumbled together among the wheels back of the clock-face.

  So there I sat in the dust watching the Wonder Clock, and when it had run down and the tunes and the puppet-show had come to an end, I took off my dream-cap, and--whisk!--there I was back home again among my books, with nothing brought away with me from that country but a little dust which I found sticking to my coat, and which I have never brushed away to this day.

  Now if you also would like to go into Wonderland, you have only to hunt up your dream-cap (for everybody has one somewhere about the house), and to come to me, and I will show you the way to Time's garret.

  That is right! Pull the cap well down about your ears.

  * * * * * * *

  Here we are! And now I will wind the clock. Gurr! gurr! gurr!

  Tick-tock! tick-tock!

  CONTENTS

  I. Bearskin. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

  II. The Water of Life. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

  III. How One Turned his Trouble to Some Account. . . . . . . . 27

  IV. How Three Went out into the Wide World . . . . . . . . . . 39

  V. The Clever Student and the Master of Black Arts . . . . . . 49

  VI. The Princess Golden Hair and the Great Black Raven . . . . 63

  VII. Cousin Greylegs, the Great Red Fox, and Grandfather Mole. 77

  VIII. One Good Turn Deserves Another . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

  IX. The White Bird . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

  X. How the Good Gifts were Used by Two . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

  XI. How Boots Befooled the King. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

  XII. The Step-mother . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

  XIII. Master Jacob . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

  XIV. Peterkin and the Little Grey Hare . . . . . . . . . . . . 175

  XV. Mother Hildegarde. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189

  XVI. Which is Best . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203

  XVII. The Simpleton and his Little Black Hen . . . . . . . . . 217

  XVIII. The Swan Maiden . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

  XIX. The Three Little Pigs and the Ogre. . . . . . . . . . . . 241

  XX. The Staff and the Fiddle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253

  XXI. How the Princess's Pride was Broken . . . . . . . . . . . 267

  XXII. How Two Went into Partnership. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279

  XXIII. King Stork. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291

  XXIV. The Best that Life has to Give . . . . . . . . . . . . . 305

  List of Illustrations.

  I

  One O'clock.

  One O'clock.

  One of the Clock, and silence deep

  Then up the Stairway, black and steep

  The old House-Cat comes creepy-creep

  With soft feet goes from room to room

  Her green eyes shining through the gloom,

  And finds all fast asleep.

  Bearskin.

  I.

  THERE was a king travelling through the country, and he and those with him were so far away from home that darkness caught them by the heels, and they had to stop at a stone mill for the night, because there was no other place handy.

  While they sat at supper they heard a sound in the next room, and it was a baby crying.

  The miller stood in the corner, back of the stove, with his hat in his hand. "What is that noise?" said the king to him.

  "Oh! it is nothing but another baby that the good storks have brought into the house to-day," said the miller.

  Now there was a wise man travelling along with the king, who could read the stars and everything that they told as easily as one can read one's A B C's in a book after one knows them, and the king, for a bit of a jest, would have him find out what the stars had to foretell of the miller's baby. So the wise man went out and took a peep up in the sky, and by and by he came in again.

  "Well," said the king, "and what did the stars tell you?"

  "The stars tell me," said the wise man, "that you shall have a daughter, and that the miller's baby, in the room yonder, shall marry her when they are old enough to think of such things."

  "What!" said the king, "and is a miller's baby to marry the princess that is to come! We will see about that." So the next day he took the miller aside and talked and bargained, and bargained and talked, until the upshot of the matter was that the miller was paid two hundred dollars, and the k
ing rode off with the baby.

  As soon as he came home to the castle he called his chief forester to him. "Here," says he, "take this baby and do thus and so with it, and when you have killed it bring its heart to me, that I may know that you have really done as you have been told."

  So off marched the forester with the baby, but on his way he stopped at home, and there was his good wife working about the house.

  "Well, Henry," said she, "what do you do with the baby?"

  "Oh!" said he, "I am just taking it off to the forest to do thus and so with it."

  "Come," said she, "it would be a pity to harm the little innocent, and to have its blood on your hands. Yonder hangs the rabbit that you shot this morning, and its heart will please the king just as well as the other."

  Thus the wife talked, and the end of the business was that she and the man smeared a basket all over with pitch and set the baby adrift in it on the river, and the king was just as well satisfied with the rabbit's heart as he would have been with the baby's.

  But the basket with the baby in it drifted on and on down the river, until it lodged at last among the high reeds that stood along the bank. By and by there came a great she-bear to the water to drink, and there she found it.

  Now the huntsmen in the forest had robbed the she-bear of her cubs, so that her heart yearned over the little baby, and she carried it home with her to fill the place of her own young ones. There the baby throve until he grew to a great strong lad, and as he had fed upon nothing but bear's milk for all that time, he was ten times stronger than the strongest man in the land.

  One day, as he was walking through the forest, he came across a woodman chopping the trees into billets of wood, and that was the first time he had ever seen a body like himself. Back he went to the bear as fast as he could travel, and told her what he had seen. "That," said the bear, "is the most wicked and most cruel of all the beasts."

  "Yes," says the lad, "that may be so, all the same I love beasts like that as I love the food I eat, and I long for nothing so much as to go out into the wide world, where I may find others of the same kind."

  At this the bear saw very well how the geese flew, and that the lad would soon be flitting.

  "See," said she, "if you must go out into the wide world you must. But you will be wanting help before long; for the ways of the world are not peaceful and simple as they are here in the woods, and before you have lived there long you will have more needs than there are flies in summer. See, here is a little crooked horn, and when your wants grow many, just come to the forest and blow a blast on it, and I will not be too far away to help you."

  So off went the lad away from the forest, and all the coat he had upon his back was the skin of a bear dressed with the hair on it, and that was why folk called him "Bearskin."

  He trudged along the high road, until he came to the king's castle, and it was the same king who thought he had put Bearskin safe out of the way years and years ago.

  Now, the king's swineherd was in want of a lad, and as there was nothing better to do in that town, Bearskin took the place and went every morning to help drive the pigs into the forest, where they might eat the acorns and grow fat.

  One day there was a mighty stir throughout the town; folk crying, and making a great hubbub. "What is it all about?" says Bearskin to the swineherd.

  What! and did he not know what the trouble was? Where had he been for all of his life, that he had heard nothing of what was going on in the world? Had he never heard of the great fiery dragon with three heads that had threatened to lay waste all of that land, unless the pretty princess were given up to him? This was the very day that the dragon was to come for her, and she was to be sent up on the hill back of the town; that was why all the folk were crying and making such a stir.

  "So!" says Bearskin, "and is there never a lad in the whole country that is man enough to face the beast? Then I will go myself if nobody better is to be found." And off he went, though the swineherd laughed and laughed, and thought it all a bit of a jest. By and by Bearskin came to the forest, and there he blew a blast upon the little crooked horn that the bear had given him.

  Presently came the bear through the bushes, so fast that the little twigs flew behind her. "And what is it that you want?" said she.

  "I should like," said Bearskin, "to have a horse, a suit or gold and silver armor that nothing can pierce, and a sword that shall cut through iron and steel; for I would like to go up on the hill to fight the dragon and free the pretty princess at the king's town over yonder."

  "Very well," said the bear, "look back of the tree yonder, and you will find just what you want."

  Yes; sure enough, there they were back of the tree: a grand white horse that champed his bit and pawed the ground till the gravel flew, and a suit of gold and silver armor such as a king might wear. Bearskin put on the armor and mounted the horse, and off he rode to the high hill back of the town.

  By and by came the princess and the steward of the castle, for it was he that was to bring her to the dragon. But the steward stayed at the bottom of the hill, for he was afraid, and the princess had to climb it alone, though she could hardly see the road before her for the tears that fell from her eyes. But when she reached the top of the hill she found instead of the dragon a fine tall fellow dressed all in gold and silver armor. And it did not take Bearskin long to comfort the princess, I can tell you. "Come, come," says he, "dry your eyes and cry no more; all the cakes in the oven are not burned yet; just go back of the bushes yonder, and leave it with me to talk the matter over with Master Dragon."

  The princess was glad enough to do that. Back of the bushes she went and Bearskin waited for the dragon to come. He had not long to wait either; for presently it came flying through the air, so that the wind rattled under his wings.

  Dear, dear! if one could but have been there to see that fight between Bearskin and the dragon, for it was well worth the seeing, and that you may believe. The dragon spit out flames and smoke like a house afire. But he could do no hurt to Bearskin, for the gold and silver armor sheltered him so well that not so much as one single hair of his head was singed. So Bearskin just rattled away the blows at the dragon--slish, slash, snip, clip--until all three heads were off, and there was an end of it.

  After that he cut out the tongues from the three heads of the dragon, and tied them up in his pocket-handkerchief.

  Then the princess came out from behind the bushes where she had lain hidden, and begged Bearskin to go back with her to the king's castle, for the king had said that if any one killed the dragon he should have her for his wife. But no; Bearskin would not go to the castle just now, for the time was not yet ripe; but, if the princess would give them to him, he would like to have the ring from her finger, the kerchief from her bosom, and the necklace of golden beads from her neck.

  The princess gave him what he asked for, and a sweet kiss into the bargain, and then Bearskin mounted upon his grand white horse and rode away to the forest. "Here are your horse and armor," said he to the bear, "and they have done good service to-day, I can tell you." Then he tramped back again to the king's castle with the old bear's skin over his shoulders.

  "Well," says the swineherd, "and did you kill the dragon?"

  "Oh, yes," says Bearskin, "I did that, but it was no such great thing to do after all."

  At that the swineherd laughed and laughed, for he did not believe a word of it.

  And now listen to what happened to the princess after Bearskin had left her. The steward came sneaking up to see how matters had turned out, and there he found her safe and sound, and the dragon dead. "Whoever did this left his luck behind him," said he, and he drew his sword and told the princess that he would kill her if she did not swear to say nothing of what had happened. Then he gathered up the dragon's three heads, and he and the princess went back to the castle again.

  "There!" said he, when they had come before the king, and he flung down the three heads upon the floor, "I have killed the dragon and
I have brought back the princess, and now if anything is to be had for the labor I would like to have it." As for the princess, she wept and wept, but she could say nothing, and so it was fixed that she was to marry the steward, for that was what the king had promised.

  At last came the wedding-day, and the smoke went up from the chimneys in clouds, for there was to be a grand wedding-feast, and there was no end of good things cooking for those who were to come.

  "See now," says Bearskin to the swineherd where they were feeding their pigs together, out in the woods, "as I killed the dragon over yonder, I ought at least to have some of the good things from the king's kitchen; you shall go and ask for some of the fine white bread and meat, such as the king and princess are to eat to-day."

  Dear, dear, but you should have seen how the swineherd stared at this and how he laughed, for he thought the other must have gone out of his wits; but as for going to the castle--no, he would not go a step, and that was the long and the short of it.

  "So! well, we will see about that," says Bearskin, and he stepped to a thicket and cut a good stout stick, and without another word caught the swineherd by the collar, and began dusting his jacket for him until it smoked again.

  "Stop, stop!" bawled the swineherd.

  "Very well," says Bearskin; "and now will you go over to the castle for me, and ask for some of the same bread and meat that the king and princess are to have for their dinner?"

  Yes, yes: the swineherd would do anything that Bearskin wanted him.

  "So! good," says Bearskin; "then just take this ring and see that the princess gets it; and say that the lad who sent it would like to have some of the bread and meat that she is to have for her dinner."

  So the swineherd took the ring, and off he started to do as he had been told. Rap! tap! tap! he knocked at the door. Well, and what did he want?

  Oh! there was a lad over in the woods yonder who had sent him to ask for some of the same bread and meat that the king and princess were to have for their dinner, and he had brought this ring to the princess as a token.