Page:Hans Andersen's Fairy Tales (1888).djvu/57

 sparrow perished with it, while the young couple fortunately escaped with their lives. When the sun rose again, and all nature looked refreshed as after a quiet sleep, nothing remained of the cottage but a few blackened charred beams, leaning against the chimney that now was the only master of the place. Thick smoke still rose from the ruins, but outside on the wall the rose-bush still remained unhurt, blooming and fresh as ever, while each flower and each spray was mirrored in the clear water beneath.

“How beautifully the roses are blooming on the walls of that ruined cottage,” said a passer-by. “A more lovely picture could scarcely be imagined. I must have it.”

And the speaker took out of his pocket a little book, full of white leaves of paper, for he was an artist, and with a pencil he took a sketch of the smoking ruins, the blackened rafters, and the chimney that overhung them, and which seemed more and more to totter; and quite in the foreground stood the large, blooming rose-bush, which added beauty to the picture, and indeed, for the sake of the roses the sketch had been made. Later in the day two of the sparrows who had been born there, came by.

“Where is the house?” they asked. “Where is the nest? ‘tweet, tweet;’ all is burnt down, and our strong brother with it. That is all that he has got by keeping the nest. The roses have escaped famously; they look as well as ever, with their rosy cheeks: they do not trouble themselves about their neighbour’s misfortunes. I won’t speak to them: and really, in my opinion, the place looks very ugly;” so he flew away.

On a fine, bright sunny day in autumn, so bright that any one might have supposed it was still the middle of summer, a number of pigeons were hopping about in the nicely kept courtyard of the nobleman’s house, in front of the great steps. Some were black, others white, and some of various colours, and their plumage glittered in the sunshine. An old mother pigeon said to her young ones, “Place yourselves in groups! place yourselves in groups! it has a much better appearance.”

“What are those little grey creatures which are running about behind us?” asked an old pigeon, with red and green round her eyes. “Little grey ones, little grey ones,” she cried.

“They are sparrows; good little creatures enough. We have always had the character of being very good-natured, so we allow them to pick up some corn with us; and they do not interrupt our conversation, and they draw back their left foot so prettily.”

Sure enough so they did, three times each, and with the left foot too, and said “tweet,” by which we recognise them as the sparrows that were brought up in the nest on the house that was burnt down.

“The food here is very good,” said the sparrows; while the pigeons strutted round each other, puffed out their throats, and formed their own opinions on what they observed.

“Do you see the pouter pigeon?” said one of another. “Do you see how he swallows the peas? He takes too much, and always chooses the best of everything. Coo-oo, coo-oo. How the ugly, spiteful creature erects his crest.” And all their eyes sparkled with malice. “Place yourselves in