第 十 章 · The Best That the Galoshes Gave（5）

All the other houses in the street were so new and so neat, with large

window panes and smooth walls, one could easily see that they would have

nothing to do with the old house: they certainly thought, “How long is

that old decayed thing to stand here as a spectacle in the street? And

then the projecting windows stand so far out, that no one can see from

our windows what happens in that direction! The steps are as broad as

those of a palace, and as high as to a church tower. The iron railings

look just like the door to an old family vault, and then they have brass

tops--that's so stupid!”

On the other side of the street were also new and neat houses, and they

thought just as the others did; but at the window opposite the old house

there sat a little boy with fresh rosy cheeks and bright beaming eyes:

he certainly liked the old house best, and that both in sunshine and

moonshine. And when he looked across at the wall where the mortar

had fallen out, he could sit and find out there the strangest figures

imaginable; exactly as the street had appeared before, with steps,

projecting windows, and pointed gables; he could see soldiers with

halberds, and spouts where the water ran, like dragons and serpents.

That was a house to look at; and there lived an old man, who wore plush

breeches; and he had a coat with large brass buttons, and a wig that one

could see was a real wig. Every morning there came an old fellow to him

who put his rooms in order, and went on errands; otherwise, the old man

in the plush breeches was quite alone in the old house. Now and then he

came to the window and looked out, and the little boy nodded to him,

and the old man nodded again, and so they became acquaintances, and then

they were friends, although they had never spoken to each other--but

that made no difference. The little boy heard his parents say, “The old

man opposite is very well off, but he is so very, very lonely!”

The Sunday following, the little boy took something, and wrapped it up

in a piece of paper, went downstairs, and stood in the doorway; and when

the man who went on errands came past, he said to him--

“I say, master! will you give this to the old man over the way from me?

I have two pewter soldiers--this is one of them, and he shall have it,

for I know he is so very, very lonely.”

And the old errand man looked quite pleased, nodded, and took the pewter

soldier over to the old house. Afterwards there came a message; it was

to ask if the little boy himself had not a wish to come over and pay a

visit; and so he got permission of his parents, and then went over to

the old house.

And the brass balls on the iron railings shone much brighter than ever;

one would have thought they were polished on account of the visit; and

it was as if the carved-out trumpeters--for there were trumpeters, who

stood in tulips, carved out on the door--blew with all their

might, their cheeks appeared so much rounder than before. Yes, they

blew--“Trateratra! The little boy comes! Trateratra!”--and then the door

opened.

The whole passage was hung with portraits of knights in armor, and

ladies in silken gowns; and the armor rattled, and the silken gowns

rustled! And then there was a flight of stairs which went a good way

upwards, and a little way downwards, and then one came on a balcony

which was in a very dilapidated state, sure enough, with large holes and

long crevices, but grass grew there and leaves out of them altogether,

for the whole balcony outside, the yard, and the walls, were overgrown

with so much green stuff, that it looked like a garden; only a balcony.

Here stood old flower-pots with faces and asses' ears, and the flowers

grew just as they liked. One of the pots was quite overrun on all sides

with pinks, that is to say, with the green part; shoot stood by shoot,

and it said quite distinctly, “The air has cherished me, the sun has

kissed me, and promised me a little flower on Sunday! a little flower on

Sunday!”

And then they entered a chamber where the walls were covered with hog's

leather, and printed with gold flowers.

“The gilding decays,

But hog's leather stays!”

said the walls.

And there stood easy-chairs, with such high backs, and so carved out,

and with arms on both sides. “Sit down! sit down!” said they. “Ugh! how

I creak; now I shall certainly get the gout, like the old clothespress,

ugh!”

And then the little boy came into the room where the projecting windows

were, and where the old man sat.

“I thank you for the pewter soldier, my little friend!” said the old

man. “And I thank you because you come over to me.”

“Thankee! thankee!” or “cranky! cranky!” sounded from all the furniture;

there was so much of it, that each article stood in the other's way, to

get a look at the little boy.

In the middle of the wall hung a picture representing a beautiful lady,

so young, so glad, but dressed quite as in former times, with clothes

that stood quite stiff, and with powder in her hair; she neither said

“thankee, thankee!” nor “cranky, cranky!” but looked with her mild eyes

at the little boy, who directly asked the old man, “Where did you get

her?”

“Yonder, at the broker's,” said the old man, “where there are so many

pictures hanging. No one knows or cares about them, for they are all of

them buried; but I knew her in by-gone days, and now she has been dead

and gone these fifty years!”

Under the picture, in a glazed frame, there hung a bouquet of withered

flowers; they were almost fifty years old; they looked so very old!

The pendulum of the great clock went to and fro, and the hands turned,

and everything in the room became still older; but they did not observe

it.

“They say at home,” said the little boy, “that you are so very, very

lonely!”

“Oh!” said he. “The old thoughts, with what they may bring with them,

come and visit me, and now you also come! I am very well off!”

Then he took a book with pictures in it down from the shelf; there were

whole long processions and pageants, with the strangest characters,

which one never sees now-a-days; soldiers like the knave of clubs,

and citizens with waving flags: the tailors had theirs, with a pair of

shears held by two lions--and the shoemakers theirs, without boots,

but with an eagle that had two heads, for the shoemakers must have

everything so that they can say, it is a pair! Yes, that was a picture

book!

The old man now went into the other room to fetch preserves, apples, and

nuts--yes, it was delightful over there in the old house.

“I cannot bear it any longer!” said the pewter soldier, who sat on the

drawers. “It is so lonely and melancholy here! But when one has been in

a family circle one cannot accustom oneself to this life! I cannot bear

it any longer! The whole day is so long, and the evenings are still

longer! Here it is not at all as it is over the way at your home, where

your father and mother spoke so pleasantly, and where you and all your

sweet children made such a delightful noise. Nay, how lonely the old man

is--do you think that he gets kisses? Do you think he gets mild eyes,

or a Christmas tree? He will get nothing but a grave! I can bear it no

longer!”

“You must not let it grieve you so much,” said the little boy. “I find

it so very delightful here, and then all the old thoughts, with what

they may bring with them, they come and visit here.”

“Yes, it's all very well, but I see nothing of them, and I don't know

them!” said the pewter soldier. “I cannot bear it!”

“But you must!” said the little boy.

Then in came the old man with the most pleased and happy face, the most

delicious preserves, apples, and nuts, and so the little boy thought no

more about the pewter soldier.

The little boy returned home happy and pleased, and weeks and days

passed away, and nods were made to the old house, and from the old

house, and then the little boy went over there again.

The carved trumpeters blew, “Trateratra! There is the little boy!

Trateratra!” and the swords and armor on the knights' portraits rattled,

and the silk gowns rustled; the hog's leather spoke, and the old chairs

had the gout in their legs and rheumatism in their backs: Ugh! it was

exactly like the first time, for over there one day and hour was just

like another.

“I cannot bear it!” said the pewter soldier. “I have shed pewter tears!

It is too melancholy! Rather let me go to the wars and lose arms and

legs! It would at least be a change. I cannot bear it longer! Now, I

know what it is to have a visit from one's old thoughts, with what they

may bring with them! I have had a visit from mine, and you may be sure

it is no pleasant thing in the end; I was at last about to jump down

from the drawers.

“I saw you all over there at home so distinctly, as if you really were

here; it was again that Sunday morning; all you children stood before

the table and sung your Psalms, as you do every morning. You stood

devoutly with folded hands; and father and mother were just as pious;

and then the door was opened, and little sister Mary, who is not two

years old yet, and who always dances when she hears music or singing, of

whatever kind it may be, was put into the room--though she ought not to

have been there--and then she began to dance, but could not keep time,

because the tones were so long; and then she stood, first on the one

leg, and bent her head forwards, and then on the other leg, and bent

her head forwards--but all would not do. You stood very seriously all

together, although it was difficult enough; but I laughed to myself, and

then I fell off the table, and got a bump, which I have still--for it

was not right of me to laugh. But the whole now passes before me again

in thought, and everything that I have lived to see; and these are the

old thoughts, with what they may bring with them.

“Tell me if you still sing on Sundays? Tell me something about little

Mary! And how my comrade, the other pewter soldier, lives! Yes, he is

happy enough, that's sure! I cannot bear it any longer!”

“You are given away as a present!” said the little boy. “You must

remain. Can you not understand that?”

The old man now came with a drawer, in which there was much to be seen,

both “tin boxes” and “balsam boxes,” old cards, so large and so gilded,

such as one never sees them now. And several drawers were opened, and

the piano was opened; it had landscapes on the inside of the lid, and it

was so hoarse when the old man played on it! and then he hummed a song.

“Yes, she could sing that!” said he, and nodded to the portrait, which

he had bought at the broker's, and the old man's eyes shone so bright!

“I will go to the wars! I will go to the wars!” shouted the pewter

soldier as loud as he could, and threw himself off the drawers right

down on the floor. What became of him? The old man sought, and the

little boy sought; he was away, and he stayed away.

“I shall find him!” said the old man; but he never found him. The floor

was too open--the pewter soldier had fallen through a crevice, and there

he lay as in an open tomb.

That day passed, and the little boy went home, and that week passed,

and several weeks too. The windows were quite frozen, the little boy was

obliged to sit and breathe on them to get a peep-hole over to the old

house, and there the snow had been blown into all the carved work and

inscriptions; it lay quite up over the steps, just as if there was no

one at home--nor was there any one at home--the old man was dead!

In the evening there was a hearse seen before the door, and he was borne

into it in his coffin: he was now to go out into the country, to lie in

his grave. He was driven out there, but no one followed; all his friends

were dead, and the little boy kissed his hand to the coffin as it was

driven away.

Some days afterwards there was an auction at the old house, and the

little boy saw from his window how they carried the old knights and the

old ladies away, the flower-pots with the long ears, the old chairs, and

the old clothes-presses. Something came here, and something came there;

the portrait of her who had been found at the broker's came to the

broker's again; and there it hung, for no one knew her more--no one

cared about the old picture.

In the spring they pulled the house down, for, as people said, it was

a ruin. One could see from the street right into the room with the

hog's-leather hanging, which was slashed and torn; and the green grass

and leaves about the balcony hung quite wild about the falling beams.

And then it was put to rights.

“That was a relief,” said the neighboring houses.

A fine house was built there, with large windows, and smooth white

walls; but before it, where the old house had in fact stood, was a

little garden laid out, and a wild grapevine ran up the wall of the

neighboring house. Before the garden there was a large iron railing

with an iron door, it looked quite splendid, and people stood still and

peeped in, and the sparrows hung by scores in the vine, and chattered

away at each other as well as they could, but it was not about the old

house, for they could not remember it, so many years had passed--so many

that the little boy had grown up to a whole man, yes, a clever man, and

a pleasure to his parents; and he had just been married, and, together

with his little wife, had come to live in the house here, where the

garden was; and he stood by her there whilst she planted a field-flower

that she found so pretty; she planted it with her little hand, and

pressed the earth around it with her fingers. Oh! what was that? She

had stuck herself. There sat something pointed, straight out of the soft

mould.

It was--yes, guess! It was the pewter soldier, he that was lost up at

the old man's, and had tumbled and turned about amongst the timber and

the rubbish, and had at last laid for many years in the ground.

The young wife wiped the dirt off the soldier, first with a green leaf,

and then with her fine handkerchief--it had such a delightful smell,

that it was to the pewter soldier just as if he had awaked from a

trance.

“Let me see him,” said the young man. He laughed, and then shook his

head. “Nay, it cannot be he; but he reminds me of a story about a pewter

soldier which I had when I was a little boy!” And then he told his wife

about the old house, and the old man, and about the pewter soldier that

he sent over to him because he was so very, very lonely; and he told it

as correctly as it had really been, so that the tears came into the eyes

of his young wife, on account of the old house and the old man.

“It may possibly be, however, that it is the same pewter soldier!” said

she. “I will take care of it, and remember all that you have told me;

but you must show me the old man's grave!”

“But I do not know it,” said he, “and no one knows it! All his friends

were dead, no one took care of it, and I was then a little boy!”

“How very, very lonely he must have been!” said she.

“Very, very lonely!” said the pewter soldier. “But it is delightful not

to be forgotten!”

“Delightful!” shouted something close by; but no one, except the pewter

soldier, saw that it was a piece of the hog's-leather hangings; it had

lost all its gilding, it looked like a piece of wet clay, but it had an

opinion, and it gave it:

“The gilding decays,

But hog's leather stays!”

This the pewter soldier did not believe.

THE HAPPY FAMILY

Really, the largest green leaf in this country is a dock-leaf; if one

holds it before one, it is like a whole apron, and if one holds it over

one's head in rainy weather, it is almost as good as an umbrella, for

it is so immensely large. The burdock never grows alone, but where there

grows one there always grow several: it is a great delight, and all this

delightfulness is snails' food. The great white snails which persons of

quality in former times made fricassees of, ate, and said, “Hem,

hem! how delicious!” for they thought it tasted so delicate--lived on

dock-leaves, and therefore burdock seeds were sown.

Now, there was an old manor-house, where they no longer ate snails, they

were quite extinct; but the burdocks were not extinct, they grew and

grew all over the walks and all the beds; they could not get the mastery

over them--it was a whole forest of burdocks. Here and there stood an

apple and a plum-tree, or else one never would have thought that it was

a garden; all was burdocks, and there lived the two last venerable old

snails.

They themselves knew not how old they were, but they could remember

very well that there had been many more; that they were of a family

from foreign lands, and that for them and theirs the whole forest was

planted. They had never been outside it, but they knew that there was

still something more in the world, which was called the manor-house, and

that there they were boiled, and then they became black, and were then

placed on a silver dish; but what happened further they knew not; or, in

fact, what it was to be boiled, and to lie on a silver dish, they could

not possibly imagine; but it was said to be delightful, and particularly

genteel. Neither the chafers, the toads, nor the earth-worms, whom they

asked about it could give them any information--none of them had been

boiled or laid on a silver dish.

The old white snails were the first persons of distinction in the

world, that they knew; the forest was planted for their sake, and the

manor-house was there that they might be boiled and laid on a silver

dish.

Now they lived a very lonely and happy life; and as they had no children

themselves, they had adopted a little common snail, which they brought

up as their own; but the little one would not grow, for he was of a

common family; but the old ones, especially Dame Mother Snail, thought

they could observe how he increased in size, and she begged father,

if he could not see it, that he would at least feel the little snail's

shell; and then he felt it, and found the good dame was right.

One day there was a heavy storm of rain.

“Hear how it beats like a drum on the dock-leaves!” said Father Snail.

“There are also rain-drops!” said Mother Snail. “And now the rain pours

right down the stalk! You will see that it will be wet here! I am very

happy to think that we have our good house, and the little one has

his also! There is more done for us than for all other creatures, sure

enough; but can you not see that we are folks of quality in the world?

We are provided with a house from our birth, and the burdock forest is

planted for our sakes! I should like to know how far it extends, and

what there is outside!”

“There is nothing at all,” said Father Snail. “No place can be better

than ours, and I have nothing to wish for!”

“Yes,” said the dame. “I would willingly go to the manorhouse, be

boiled, and laid on a silver dish; all our forefathers have been treated

so; there is something extraordinary in it, you may be sure!”

“The manor-house has most likely fallen to ruin!” said Father Snail. “Or

the burdocks have grown up over it, so that they cannot come out. There

need not, however, be any haste about that; but you are always in such a

tremendous hurry, and the little one is beginning to be the same. Has he

not been creeping up that stalk these three days? It gives me a headache

when I look up to him!”

“You must not scold him,” said Mother Snail. “He creeps so carefully; he

will afford us much pleasure--and we have nothing but him to live for!

But have you not thought of it? Where shall we get a wife for him? Do

you not think that there are some of our species at a great distance in

the interior of the burdock forest?”

“Black snails, I dare say, there are enough of,” said the old one.

“Black snails without a house--but they are so common, and so conceited.

But we might give the ants a commission to look out for us; they run

to and fro as if they had something to do, and they certainly know of a

wife for our little snail!”

“I know one, sure enough--the most charming one!” said one of the ants.

“But I am afraid we shall hardly succeed, for she is a queen!”

“That is nothing!” said the old folks. “Has she a house?”

“She has a palace!” said the ant. “The finest ant's palace, with seven

hundred passages!”

“I thank you!” said Mother Snail. “Our son shall not go into an

ant-hill; if you know nothing better than that, we shall give the

commission to the white gnats. They fly far and wide, in rain and

sunshine; they know the whole forest here, both within and without.”

“We have a wife for him,” said the gnats. “At a hundred human paces from

here there sits a little snail in her house, on a gooseberry bush; she

is quite lonely, and old enough to be married. It is only a hundred

human paces!”

“Well, then, let her come to him!” said the old ones. “He has a whole

forest of burdocks, she has only a bush!”

And so they went and fetched little Miss Snail. It was a whole week

before she arrived; but therein was just the very best of it, for one

could thus see that she was of the same species.

And then the marriage was celebrated. Six earth-worms shone as well as

they could. In other respects the whole went off very quietly, for the

old folks could not bear noise and merriment; but old Dame Snail made

a brilliant speech. Father Snail could not speak, he was too much

affected; and so they gave them as a dowry and inheritance, the whole

forest of burdocks, and said--what they had always said--that it was

the best in the world; and if they lived honestly and decently, and

increased and multiplied, they and their children would once in the

course of time come to the manor-house, be boiled black, and laid on

silver dishes. After this speech was made, the old ones crept into their

shells, and never more came out. They slept; the young couple governed

in the forest, and had a numerous progeny, but they were never boiled,

and never came on the silver dishes; so from this they concluded that

the manor-house had fallen to ruins, and that all the men in the world

were extinct; and as no one contradicted them, so, of course it was so.

And the rain beat on the dock-leaves to make drum-music for their sake,

and the sun shone in order to give the burdock forest a color for their

sakes; and they were very happy, and the whole family was happy; for

they, indeed were so.

THE STORY OF A MOTHER

A mother sat there with her little child. She was so downcast, so

afraid that it should die! It was so pale, the small eyes had closed

themselves, and it drew its breath so softly, now and then, with a

deep respiration, as if it sighed; and the mother looked still more

sorrowfully on the little creature.

Then a knocking was heard at the door, and in came a poor old man

wrapped up as in a large horse-cloth, for it warms one, and he needed

it, as it was the cold winter season! Everything out-of-doors was

covered with ice and snow, and the wind blew so that it cut the face.

As the old man trembled with cold, and the little child slept a moment,

the mother went and poured some ale into a pot and set it on the stove,

that it might be warm for him; the old man sat and rocked the cradle,

and the mother sat down on a chair close by him, and looked at her

little sick child that drew its breath so deep, and raised its little

hand.

“Do you not think that I shall save him?” said she. “Our Lord will not

take him from me!”

And the old man--it was Death himself--he nodded so strangely, it could

just as well signify yes as no. And the mother looked down in her lap,

and the tears ran down over her cheeks; her head became so heavy--she

had not closed her eyes for three days and nights; and now she slept,

but only for a minute, when she started up and trembled with cold.

“What is that?” said she, and looked on all sides; but the old man was

gone, and her little child was gone--he had taken it with him; and the

old clock in the corner burred, and burred, the great leaden weight ran

down to the floor, bump! and then the clock also stood still.

But the poor mother ran out of the house and cried aloud for her child.

Out there, in the midst of the snow, there sat a woman in long, black

clothes; and she said, “Death has been in thy chamber, and I saw him

hasten away with thy little child; he goes faster than the wind, and he

never brings back what he takes!”

“Oh, only tell me which way he went!” said the mother. “Tell me the way,

and I shall find him!”

“I know it!” said the woman in the black clothes. “But before I tell it,

thou must first sing for me all the songs thou hast sung for thy child!

I am fond of them. I have heard them before; I am Night; I saw thy tears

whilst thou sang'st them!”

“I will sing them all, all!” said the mother. “But do not stop me now--I

may overtake him--I may find my child!”

But Night stood still and mute. Then the mother wrung her hands, sang

and wept, and there were many songs, but yet many more tears; and then

Night said, “Go to the right, into the dark pine forest; thither I saw

Death take his way with thy little child!”

The roads crossed each other in the depths of the forest, and she no

longer knew whither she should go! then there stood a thorn-bush;

there was neither leaf nor flower on it, it was also in the cold winter

season, and ice-flakes hung on the branches.

“Hast thou not seen Death go past with my little child?” said the

mother.

“Yes,” said the thorn-bush; “but I will not tell thee which way he took,

unless thou wilt first warm me up at thy heart. I am freezing to death;

I shall become a lump of ice!”

And she pressed the thorn-bush to her breast, so firmly, that it might

be thoroughly warmed, and the thorns went right into her flesh, and her

blood flowed in large drops, but the thornbush shot forth fresh green

leaves, and there came flowers on it in the cold winter night, the heart

of the afflicted mother was so warm; and the thorn-bush told her the way

she should go.

She then came to a large lake, where there was neither ship nor boat.

The lake was not frozen sufficiently to bear her; neither was it open,

nor low enough that she could wade through it; and across it she must go

if she would find her child! Then she lay down to drink up the lake, and

that was an impossibility for a human being, but the afflicted mother

thought that a miracle might happen nevertheless.

“Oh, what would I not give to come to my child!” said the weeping

mother; and she wept still more, and her eyes sunk down in the depths of

the waters, and became two precious pearls; but the water bore her up,

as if she sat in a swing, and she flew in the rocking waves to the shore

on the opposite side, where there stood a mile-broad, strange house, one

knew not if it were a mountain with forests and caverns, or if it were

built up; but the poor mother could not see it; she had wept her eyes

out.

“Where shall I find Death, who took away my little child?” said she.

“He has not come here yet!” said the old grave woman, who was appointed

to look after Death's great greenhouse! “How have you been able to find

the way hither? And who has helped you?”

“OUR LORD has helped me,” said she. “He is merciful, and you will also

be so! Where shall I find my little child?”

“Nay, I know not,” said the woman, “and you cannot see! Many flowers and

trees have withered this night; Death will soon come and plant them over

again! You certainly know that every person has his or her life's tree

or flower, just as everyone happens to be settled; they look like other

plants, but they have pulsations of the heart. Children's hearts can

also beat; go after yours, perhaps you may know your child's; but what

will you give me if I tell you what you shall do more?”

“I have nothing to give,” said the afflicted mother, “but I will go to

the world's end for you!”

“Nay, I have nothing to do there!” said the woman. “But you can give

me your long black hair; you know yourself that it is fine, and that

I like! You shall have my white hair instead, and that's always

something!”

“Do you demand nothing else?” said she. “That I will gladly give you!”

And she gave her her fine black hair, and got the old woman's snow-white

hair instead.

So they went into Death's great greenhouse, where flowers and trees

grew strangely into one another. There stood fine hyacinths under glass

bells, and there stood strong-stemmed peonies; there grew water plants,

some so fresh, others half sick, the water-snakes lay down on them,

and black crabs pinched their stalks. There stood beautiful palm-trees,

oaks, and plantains; there stood parsley and flowering thyme: every tree

and every flower had its name; each of them was a human life, the human

frame still lived--one in China, and another in Greenland--round about

in the world. There were large trees in small pots, so that they stood

so stunted in growth, and ready to burst the pots; in other places,

there was a little dull flower in rich mould, with moss round about it,

and it was so petted and nursed. But the distressed mother bent down

over all the smallest plants, and heard within them how the human heart

beat; and amongst millions she knew her child's.

“There it is!” cried she, and stretched her hands out over a little blue

crocus, that hung quite sickly on one side.

“Don't touch the flower!” said the old woman. “But place yourself here,

and when Death comes--I expect him every moment--do not let him pluck

the flower up, but threaten him that you will do the same with the

others. Then he will be afraid! He is responsible for them to OUR LORD,

and no one dares to pluck them up before HE gives leave.”

All at once an icy cold rushed through the great hall, and the blind

mother could feel that it was Death that came.

“How hast thou been able to find thy way hither?” he asked. “How couldst

thou come quicker than I?”

“I am a mother,” said she.

And Death stretched out his long hand towards the fine little flower,

but she held her hands fast around his, so tight, and yet afraid that

she should touch one of the leaves. Then Death blew on her hands, and

she felt that it was colder than the cold wind, and her hands fell down

powerless.

“Thou canst not do anything against me!” said Death.

“But OUR LORD can!” said she.

“I only do His bidding!” said Death. “I am His gardener, I take all His

flowers and trees, and plant them out in the great garden of Paradise,

in the unknown land; but how they grow there, and how it is there I dare

not tell thee.”