Page:Hans Andersen's Fairy Tales (1888).djvu/466

 forward. I place them before the little ones, who cry over them as papa and mamma used to cry thirty years ago. But I make them shorter, for the youngsters don’t like long speeches; and if they have anything mournful, they like it to be over quickly.”

 

little dwelling in which we lived was of clay, but the doorposts were columns of fluted marble, found near the spot on which it stood. The roof sloped nearly to the ground. It was at this time dark, brown, and ugly, but had originally been formed of blooming olive and laurel branches, brought from beyond the mountains. The house was situated in a narrow gorge, whose rocky walls rose to a perpendicular height, naked and black, while round their summits clouds often hung, looking like white living figures. Not a singing bird was ever heard there, neither did men dance to the sound of the pipe. The spot was one sacred to olden times; even its name recalled amemory of the days when it was called “Delphi.” Then the summits of the dark, sacred mountains were covered with snow, and the highest, mount Parnassus, glowed longest in the red evening light. The brook which rolled from it near our house, was also sacred. How well I can remember every spot in that deep, sacred solitude! A fire had been kindled in the midst of the hut, and while the hot ashes lay there red and glowing, the bread was baked in them. At times the snow would be piled so high around her hut as almost to hide it, and then my mother appeared most cheerful. She would hold my head between her hands, and sing the songs she never sang at other times, for the Turks, our masters, would not allow it. She sang,—

“On the summit of mount Olympus, in a forest of dwarf firs, lay an old stag. His eyes were heavy with tears, and glittering with colours like dew drops; and there came by a roebuck, and said, ‘What ailest thee, that thou weepest blue and red tears?’ And the stag answered, ‘The Turk has come to our city; he has wild dogs for the chase, a goodly pack.’ ‘I will drive them away across the islands!’ cried the young roebuck; ‘I will drive them away across the islands into the deep sea.’ But before evening the roebuck was slain, and before night the hunted stag was dead.”

And when my mother sang thus, her eyes would become moist; and on the long eyelashes were tears, but she concealed them and watched the