Page:Hans Andersen's Fairy Tales (1888).djvu/77

 rowing up. “Look, yonder is an old wooden shoe sailing along,” said one of the young girls.

“And there’s a poor little creature bound fast in it,” said another.

The boat now came close to our beetle’s ship, and the young girls fished it out of the water. One of them drew a small pair of scissors from her pocket, and cut the worsted without hurting the beetle, and when she stepped on shore she placed him on the grass. “There,” she said, “creep away, or fly, if thou canst. It is a splendid thing to have thy liberty.” Away flew the beetle, straight through the open window of a large building; there he sank down, tired and exhausted, exactly on the mane of the emperor’s favorite horse, who was standing in his stable; and the beetle found himself at home again. For some time he clung to the mane, that he might recover himself. “Well,” he said, “here I am, seated on the emperor’s favorite horse,—sitting upon him as if I were the emperor himself. But what was it the farrier asked me? Ah, I remember now,—that’s a good thought,—he asked me why the golden shoes were given to the horse. The answer is quite clear to me, now. They were given to the horse on my account.” And this reflection put the beetle into a good temper. The sun’s rays also came streaming into the stable, and shone upon him, and made the place lively and bright. “Travelling expands the mind very much,” said the beetle. “The world is not so bad after all, if you know how to take things as they come.”

 

was once a little boy who had taken cold by going out and getting his feet wet. No one could think how he had managed to do so, for the weather was quite dry. His mother undressed him and put him to bed, and then she brought in the teapot to make him a good cup of elder-tea, which is so warming. At the same time, the friendly old man, who lived all alone at the top of the house, came in at the door. He had neither wife nor child, but he was very fond of children, and knew so many fairy tales and stories that it was a pleasure to hear him talk. “Now, if you drink your tea,” said the mother, “very likely you will have a story in the meantime.”

“Yes, if I could think of a new one to tell,” said the old man. “But how did the little fellow get his feet wet?” asked he.