“Your name won’t be Thumbelina any more,” the flowers’ angel told her. “That’s an ugly name, and you’re so beautiful. We’ll call you Maja!”
“Good bye, good bye,” called the little swallow and flew away from the warm countries again, far away back to Denmark. There he had a little nest over the window of a man who can tell fairy tales, and for him he sang, “tweet, tweet.” That’s how we know the whole story.
THE NAUGHTY BOY
ONCE UPON A TIME there was an old poet—a really kind old poet. One evening when he was sitting at home, a terrible storm arose. The rain poured down, but the old poet sat cozy and warm by his wood burning stove, where the fire was crackling, and the apples cooking on the stove were sizzling.
“There won’t be a dry thread on the poor people who are out in this weather,” he said because he was such a kind poet.
“Oh, let me in! I’m freezing, and I’m so wet,” called a little child standing outside. The child cried and knocked on the door, while the rain poured down and the wind rattled all the windows.
“Oh, poor little thing!” said the old poet and went over to open the door. There was a little boy standing there. He was completely naked, and the water was dripping off his long, yellow hair. He was shivering from the cold, and if he couldn’t come inside, he would surely die in that terrible weather.
“Oh, you poor thing,” said the old poet and took his hand. “Come in here, and I’ll get you warmed up! You shall have wine and an apple, for you’re a sweet little fellow.”
And he was, too. His eyes looked like two clear stars, and even if water was running from his yellow hair, it curled beautifully. He looked like a little angel, but was pale from the cold, and his body was trembling all over. In his hand he held a lovely bow, but the rain had ruined it, and all the colors on the fine arrows were running into each other from the wet weather.
The old poet sat down by the stove and took the little boy in his lap, wrung the water out of his hair, warmed the little hands in his, heated wine for him, and then the little boy felt better. His cheeks turned pink, and he hopped down on the floor and danced around the old poet.
“You’re a cheerful fellow,” said the old man. “What’s your name?”
“I’m Cupid,” he said. “Don’t you recognize me? There’s my bow, and I can shoot with it, let me tell you! Look, it’s nice out now. The moon is shining.”
“But your bow is ruined,” said the old poet.
“That’s too bad,” said the little boy, and picked up the bow and looked at it. “But it’s dry already, and it’s not ruined! The string is completely taut. Now I’ll try it!” So he drew the bow, inserted an arrow, aimed, and shot the kindly old poet right in the heart. “You can see that my bow isn’t ruined,” he said and laughed loudly and ran off. That naughty boy—to think that he shot the old poet who had let him into the warm room, been kind to him, and had given him good wine and the best apple!
The old poet lay on the floor crying. He really had been shot right in the heart. Then he said, “Oh, what a bad boy that Cupid is! I’m going to tell all the children this so they can watch out and never play with him, for he’ll only hurt them.”
And all the good children he told about Cupid, both girls and boys, watched out for him, but Cupid fooled them anyway because he’s so cunning. When the students leave their lectures, he runs along side them with a book under his arm and dressed in a black cloak. They don’t recognize him then, and take him by the arm, and think that he’s also a student, but then he shoots the arrow into their chests. When the girls have been studying with the minister, and when they go for Confirmation, he’s after them there, too. He’s always after people! He sits in the big chandelier in the theater among the flames so people think it’s a lamp, but afterwards they notice something else! He runs around in the king’s garden and on the embankment. Indeed, at one time he shot your father and mother right in their hearts! Just ask them, and you’ll hear what they say. Yes, that Cupid is a naughty boy, and you must never have anything to do with him! He’s out to get all people. Just think, once he even shot an arrow at old grandmother, but that was long ago, so it’s worn off. But something like that she’ll never forget. Oh, how naughty Cupid is! But now you know him. You know what a bad boy he is.
THE GALOSHES OF FORTUNE
1. A BEGINNING
ON EAST STREET IN Copenhagen in one of the houses not far from King’s New Market, there was a big party. Sometimes you have to throw a big party, and then it’s done, and you’re invited in return. Half of the guests were already at the card tables, and the other half were waiting to see what would come from the hostess’s “now we’ll have to think of something!” That’s as far as they had gotten, and the conversation went here and there. Among other things, they talked about the Middle Ages. Some declared it a better time than our own. In fact, Justice Councilman Knap defended this view so eagerly that the hostess soon agreed with him. Then they both started in on rsted’s words in the almanac1 about former and present eras, in which our own time is in most respects considered superior. The councilman considered the age of King Hans2 to be the best and happiest time.
There was a great deal of talk pro and con, and it was only interrupted for a moment when the newspaper came, but there was nothing worth reading in that, so let’s go out to the foyer where the coats and walking sticks, umbrellas, and galoshes have their place. Two maids were sitting there: one young and one old. You might think they had come to escort their mistresses home, one or another old maid or widow. But if you looked a little closer at them, you soon noticed that these were not ordinary servants—their hands were too fine, and their bearing and movements too regal for that. Their clothing also had a quite distinctly daring cut. They were two fairies. The youngest surely wasn’t Good Fortune herself, but rather one of her attendant’s chambermaids, who pass around the lesser of Fortune’s gifts. The elder looked extremely grave. This was Sorrow, who always does her errands in her own distinguished person so that she knows that they are properly carried out.
They talked about their day. The one who was Good Fortune’s attendant’s chambermaid had just taken care of a few minor errands. She said she had saved a new hat from a rain-shower, obtained a greeting for a decent man from a distinguished nonentity, and things like that. But what she had left to do was something quite extraordinary.
“I have to tell you,” she said, “that today is my birthday, and in honor of this I have been entrusted with a pair of galoshes that I am going to give human beings. These galoshes have the characteristic that whoever puts them on is immediately carried to the place or time where he most wants to be. Any wish with respect to time or place is fulfilled at once, and now people will finally find happiness down here!”
“Don’t you believe it,” said Sorrow. “People will be dreadfully unhappy and bless the moment they get rid of those galoshes!”
“How can you say that?” said the other. “I’ll set them here by the door. Someone will mistake them for his own and become the lucky one!”
That was their conversation.
2. WHAT HAPPENED TO THE COUNCILMAN
It was late, and Councilman Knap, absorbed in the time of King Hans, wanted to go home. It so happened that he put on Good Fortune’s galoshes instead of his own and walked out onto East Street, but the power of the galoshes’ magic had taken him back to the time of King Hans, and so he stepped straight out into ooze and mud since at that time there was no sidewalk.
“It’s dreadful how muddy it is here!” the judge said. “The sidewalk is gone, and all the street lights are out.”
The moon hadn’t risen high enough yet, and the air was quite foggy so everything disappeared in the dark. At the closest corner a lantern was shining in front of a picture of a Madonna, but it gave off almost no light. He first noticed it when he was standing right under it, and his eyes fell on the painting of the mother and child.
“This must be an art gallery,” he thought, “and
they’ve forgotten to take in the sign.”
A couple of people dressed in the clothes of the time walked by him. “What weird outfits! They must have come from a costume party.”
Then he heard drums and flutes, and big torches flared in the dark. The councilman watched an odd procession pass by. A whole troop of drummers marched first, skillfully handling their instruments. They were followed by henchmen with bows and crossbows. The most distinguished person in the parade was a clergyman. The councilman was surprised and asked what this meant and who the man was.
“This must be an art gallery, ” he thought, “and they’ve forgotten to take in the sign. ”
“It’s the Bishop of Zealand,”3 he was told.
“My God, what’s the matter with him?” the judge sighed and shook his head. It certainly couldn’t be the Bishop. Brooding over this and without looking to left or right he walked along East Street and over High Bridge Place. He couldn’t find the bridge to the Palace Plaza, but he glimpsed an expanse of the river, and he finally came across two fellows there in a boat.
“Do you want to be rowed over to Holmen?” they asked him.
“Over to Holmen?” asked the judge, who didn’t know what age he was wandering in. “I want to get over to Christian’s Harbor, to Little Market Street.”
The men just looked at him.
“Just tell me where the bridge is,” he said. ”It’s a disgrace that there aren’t any streetlamps lit here, and it’s as muddy as if you’re walking in a bog.”
The longer he spoke with the boatmen, the more incomprehensible they became to him.
“I don’t understand your Bornholm dialect,”4 he finally said angrily and turned his back on them. He absolutely couldn’t find the bridge, and there were no guard rails either. “It’s a scandal, the way things look here!” he said. He had never thought his own age was as miserable as on this evening. “I think I’ll take a cab,” he thought, but where were the cabs? There were none in sight. “I’d better walk back to King’s New Market; there will be some there. Otherwise I’ll never get out to Christian’s Harbor!”
So he walked back to East Street and had nearly walked the length of it when the moon came out.
“Dear God, what kind of scaffolding have they put up here?” he said when he saw the East Gate, which at that time was at the end of East Street.
He finally found a gate and by going through it, he came out on our New Market, but at that time it was just a big meadow. There was a bush here and there and through the middle of the meadow was a wide channel or creek. On the opposite bank there were some wretched wooden shacks where the Dutch seamen lived, and so the place was called Holland Meadow.
“Either I am seeing fata morgana, a mirage, as it’s called, or I’m drunk,” groaned the councilman. “What is this? What’s going on?”
He turned around again in the firm belief that he was sick. As he came back to the street, he looked a little closer at the houses: most of them were of half-timbered construction, and many had only straw roofs.
“No, I am not at all well,” he sighed. “I only drank one glass of punch, but I can’t tolerate it. It was also very wrong of them to serve punch with poached salmon! I am going to tell the representative’s wife that, too. Should I go back and tell them I’m sick? But it’s so embarrassing. And maybe they’ve already gone to bed.”
He looked for the house, but couldn’t find it.
“This is terrible! I can’t even recognize East Street. Where are the shops? I only see old, miserable hovels as if I were in Roskilde or Ringsted! Oh, I’m sick. There’s no sense in being shy. But where in the world is the Representative’s house? It doesn’t look right, but there are clearly people up in there. Oh, I’m really awfully sick.”
Then he came across a half-opened door with light coming through the crack. It was an inn of that time, a kind of pub, quite country-like. The good folks inside were seamen, citizens of the town, and a few scholars who were in deep conversation over their cups and didn’t pay much attention to him when he came in.
“Excuse me,” the councilman said to the hostess who approached him. “I’m in bad shape. Can you get me a cab out to Christian’s Harbor?”
The woman looked at him, shook her head, and then spoke to him in German. The councilman thought that maybe she couldn’t speak Danish so he repeated his request in German. This, along with his clothing, confirmed for the woman that he was a foreigner. She soon realized that he was ill and gave him a glass of water, admittedly a little brackish since it came from the creek.
The councilman rested his head on his hand, took a deep breath, and pondered his strange surroundings.
“Is that this evening’s Daily?” he asked just to say something when he saw the woman move a big paper.
She didn’t understand what he meant, but handed him the paper. It was a woodcut that showed a vision in the sky above the city of Cologne.
“It’s very old,” the judge said. He was quite excited to run across such an old item. “Where in the world have you gotten this rare print? It’s very interesting, although it’s all a myth. These sky visions are explained by northern lights that people have seen. Most likely they come from electricity.”
Those who were sitting close by and heard him speak looked at him in wonder. One of them got up, took off his hat respectfully, and said, “You are evidently a very highly educated man, Monsieur!”
“Oh no!” The councilman answered. “I can discuss this and that, as one is expected to be able to do.”
“Modesty is a lovely virtue,” the man said, “for that matter, I’ll say that your remarks seem different to me, but I’ll suspend my judicium here!” He spoke mostly in Latin.
“May I ask with whom I have the pleasure of speaking?” asked the councilman.
“I have a Bachelor’s in Theology,” the man continued.
This answer was enough for the councilman. The title matched the outfit: “Must be an old country school teacher,” he thought, “an eccentric fellow, such as those you can still meet up in Jutland.”
“I guess it’s not the place for a lecture,” the man began in Latin, “but I would ask you to continue speaking since it’s clear that you have read a lot of the classics.”
“Yes, I certainly have,” said the judge. “I really like reading useful old writings, but I also enjoy the newer ones. Not Everyday Stories5 though. There are enough of those in reality.”
“Everyday Stories?” asked our scholar.
“Yes, I mean those new fangled novels.”
“Oh,” smiled the man, “but they are very entertaining, and they read them at court. The King is especially fond of the one about Sir Yvain and Sir Gawain. It’s about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. He was joking about it with his courtiers.”6
“I haven’t read that one yet,” said the councilman. “It must be a pretty new one put out by Heiberg.”7
“No,” the man answered. “It was not published by Heiberg, but by Godfred von Gehmen.”8
“So that’s the author,” the judge said. “That’s a very old name. The first printer in Denmark had that name.”
“Yes, he’s first among our book publishers,” the man said. So the conversation went pretty well. One of the citizens talked about the terrible pestilence that had raged a couple of years before, meaning the one in 1484. The councilman thought he was talking about the cholera epidemic9 so the discussion went swimmingly. The Freebooters War of 1490 was so recent that it had to be mentioned. The English buccaneers had taken ships right in the harbor, they said, and the councilman, who was well versed on the events of 1801, blasted the English with relish. But the rest of the conversation didn’t go as well. There was very often a mutual incomprehensibility. The good scholar was much too ignorant, and the councilman’s most simple utterances struck him as being too audacious and fantastic. They looked at each other, and if it got too bad, the scholar spoke Latin because he thought he would be better understood, but it didn
’t help at all.
“How are you doing?” asked the hostess, who pulled at the councilman’s arm. Then he came to his senses because, when he was talking, he had forgotten everything that had happened before.
“Dear God, where am I?” he said and felt dizzy at the thought.
“We’re going to drink claret! Mead and German beer!” yelled one of the men, “and you’ll drink with us!”
Two maids came in. One had two colors in her cap,10 and they poured and curtsied. The judge felt a shiver go down his spine.
“What is this? What is happening?!” he said, but he had to drink with them. They set to work on the poor man, and he was quite disconsolate. When one of them said that he was drunk, he didn’t doubt the man at all. He just asked them to call him a cab, a drosche, and then they thought that he was speaking Russian.
He had never been in such raw and simple company. You would think the country had fallen back into paganism. “This is the worst moment in my life!” he thought, but at the same time he got the idea that he could slip down under the table, crawl over to the door, and slip out. But when he reached the entrance, the others noticed what he was doing and grabbed him by the legs. Then, luckily for him, the galoshes slipped off, and with them, all the magic.
Fairy Tales Page 27
