Page:Hans Andersen's Fairy Tales (1888).djvu/283

 On hearing this, the swineherd stepped behind a tree, washed of all the brown and black from his face and hair, threw aside his filthy clothes and presently showed himself in his princely dress, looking so refined and handsome, that the princess continued curtsying to him.

“You cannot be surprised at my scorning you,” he said; “you refused an honourable prince. The rose and the nightingale you did not understand, but yet for the sake of trifling toys you have allowed yourself to be lowered in the estimation of every one by the kisses of a swineherd.”

Thereupon the prince departed to take possession of his kingdom once more, leaving the princess to sing more truly than ever—

 

up in the clear, pure air flew an angel, with a flower plucked from the garden of heaven. As he was kissing the flower a very little leaf fell from it and sunk down into the soft earth in the middle of a wood. It immediately took root, sprouted, and sent out shoots among the other plants,

“What a ridiculous little shoot,” said one. “No one will recognise it; not even the thistle nor the stinging-nettle.”

“It must be a kind of garden plant,” said another; and so they sneered and despised the plant as a thing from a garden.

“Where are you coming?” said the tall thistles whose leaves were all armed with thorns. “It is stupid nonsense to allow yourself to shoot out in this way; we are not here to support you.”

Winter came, and the plant was covered with snow, but the snow glittered over it as if it had sunshine beneath as well as above.

When spring came, the plant appeared in full bloom: a more beautiful object than any other plant in the forest. And now the professor of botany presented himself, one who could explain his knowledge in black and white. He examined and tested the plant, but it did not belong to his system of botany, nor could he possibly find out to what class it did belong. “It must be some degenerate species,” said he; “I do not know it, and it is not mentioned in any system.”

“Not known in any system!” repeated the thistles and the nettles. The large trees which grew round it saw the plant and heard the remarks,