RO9I3 STORY

Protégez votre enfant de la dépendance aux médias sociaux

2020-12-12T13:33:00.004-08:00

Protégez votre enfant de la dépendance aux médias sociaux

Les sites Web de réseautage social nous ont grandement facilité la vie lorsqu'il s'agit de rester en contact avec ceux qui nous tiennent à cœur, même s'ils vivent à travers le monde grâce à nous. Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter et une douzaine d'autres applications et sites Web avec des éléments d'interaction sociale sont utilisés chaque jour par les enfants et les parents. Cependant, lorsque l'utilisation de ces sites de réseautage social interfère avec la perception d'une personne de la réalité et son attitude à l'égard des activités quotidiennes et de la communication réelle, il est temps d'aborder le problème. Bien que la dépendance aux réseaux sociaux puisse arriver à n'importe qui, il ne fait aucun doute que les enfants sont particulièrement enclins à développer ce problème.

Il n'y a rien de fondamentalement mauvais à interagir avec des amis en ligne ou à échanger des photos, mais pour beaucoup d'enfants, la frontière entre le monde virtuel et la réalité hors ligne peut devenir assez floue. Le rôle des parents en cette ère de réseautage social est d'être conscient des dangers et de ne pas laisser l'enfant échapper à la réalité en se plongeant complètement dans l'illusion créée par les médias sociaux.

Quelques chiffres liés à la dépendance aux réseaux sociaux

Selon l'enquête menée par l'organisation chargée de la toxicomanie et de la toxicomanie CASA Columbia, 70% des adolescents âgés de 12 à 17 ans admettent passer du temps sur les sites de réseaux sociaux chaque jour. Les représentants de CASA Columbia ont également analysé la situation concernant l'exposition des enfants aux informations et images non appropriées à leur tranche d'âge. Selon les réponses, plus de 90% des utilisateurs actifs de Facebook ont vu les photos de personnes en état d'ébriété, de tabac et de consommation de drogues à l'âge de 15 ans et moins.

Les recherches approfondies menées par l'Université d'Amsterdam montrent qu'environ 5% des jeunes adolescents appartiennent au groupe des accros aux médias sociaux. L'analyse du comportement des enfants était basée sur les mêmes critères que ceux utilisés pour déterminer si une personne souffre de dépendance au jeu. Le professeur Valkenburg de l'Université d'Amsterdam affirme qu'un adolescent moyen aux Pays-Bas utilise activement les sites Web de médias sociaux pendant 3 heures par jour. On peut dire avec certitude que la situation est similaire à celle d’autres pays qui ont un accès facile à Internet.

L'étude menée par le UK National Citizen Service montre que la plupart des jeunes filles à l'ère numérique préfèrent ne pas discuter de leurs problèmes avec leurs parents, mais se tournent plutôt vers les médias sociaux pour se réconforter et se distraire. Les plus grandes sources de stress à cet âge sont les résultats des examens, les décisions concernant l'avenir et les problèmes de relations avec des amis.

Qu'est-ce qui peut contribuer au développement de la dépendance aux médias sociaux chez les enfants?

Au cours de leurs années de formation, les enfants sont particulièrement impressionnables, et ils absorbent toutes les informations qui les entourent comme des éponges, ce qui en fait une cible facile. Les sites Web de médias sociaux sont créés pour jouer sur les émotions humaines, et l'un des plus gros boutons sur lesquels ils poussent est la peur de passer à côté. Aucun être humain ne veut se sentir isolé du reste de la société, et les sites de réseautage social veillent à ce que cela n'arrive pas. Ils créent l'illusion d'être constamment présents et reconnus par les pairs, ce qui permet à une personne de se sentir en sécurité et adéquate.

Beaucoup d'enfants et d'adolescents souffrent de problèmes d'estime de soi, recherchant ainsi l'approbation et l'attention des médias sociaux. C'est particulièrement pertinent dans les situations où les enfants ne reçoivent pas suffisamment de soutien et de communication de la part de leurs parents ou d'amis hors ligne. L'article «Pourquoi les médias sociaux sont si addictifs» de Tom Lowery indique que plus de 80% des publications sur les sites de réseaux sociaux concernent l'affiche. De cette manière, ces types de sites Web sont les grandes sources de validation sociale pour les enfants et les adultes. Cependant, il s'agit d'un cercle vicieux car les interactions en ligne sont généralement assez superficielles et éloignent encore l'enfant des personnes dans sa vraie vie.

Dans ces situations, il est beaucoup plus facile de gérer les problèmes à un stade précoce que lorsque vos enfants ne peuvent pas imaginer leur vie sans Facebook ou d'autres sites Web de médias sociaux. Teentor, le vaste logiciel d'espionnage pour téléphones portables, est fortement recommandé à tous les parents qui souhaitent protéger leurs enfants de tout dommage causé par les réseaux sociaux. Le logiciel vous permet de surveiller et de restreindre l'activité de votre enfant lorsqu'il s'agit de sites Web de médias sociaux.

Quels sont les symptômes associés à la dépendance aux réseaux sociaux?

Selon le rapport fourni par Lawrence Wilson, MD, pour le Centre de développement, il existe un certain nombre de symptômes qui peuvent vous donner des indices pour savoir si une personne peut souffrir de dépendance aux médias sociaux. Il convient de noter que dans certains cas, les symptômes de la dépendance peuvent être assez subtils, mais cela ne signifie pas que le problème n'est pas là. Les signes suivants peuvent servir de lignes directrices générales pour déterminer la dépendance aux médias sociaux chez les enfants:

Vérifier les sites Web aussi souvent que possible. Si vous remarquez que votre enfant essaie de terminer le repas ou les devoirs le plus rapidement possible pour naviguer sur un site Web de médias sociaux, cela peut être un premier symptôme de comportement addictif.
Retrait. Semblables à toute autre dépendance, les symptômes de sevrage inconfortables sont associés à la dépendance aux médias sociaux.
Recherche compétitive d'amis. Il est tout à fait naturel que les enfants veuillent se sentir nécessaires et intégrés dans leurs cercles sociaux. Cependant, pour beaucoup d'enfants, le nombre d'amis qu'ils ont sur Facebook influence la façon dont ils se perçoivent et le niveau de popularité qu'ils ont.
Partager trop d'informations. Le partage excessif de détails privés et de photos par des enfants sur les plateformes de médias sociaux peut être lié au besoin d'approbation sociale et à un moyen d'être reconnu par les amis.
Influence négative sur l'éducation. L'un des grands signes de dépendance est qu'un enfant n'est plus en mesure de se concentrer sur son éducation en raison des distractions constantes fournies par les sites de réseaux sociaux.
Interférence avec les communications réelles. Personne ne sait que la communication en ligne est plus facile pour un certain nombre de raisons. Vous pouvez prendre autant de temps que nécessaire pour répondre et vos expressions faciales ne dévoileront pas vos vraies émotions. Si votre enfant préfère passer son temps sur Facebook plutôt que de sortir avec des amis dans la vraie vie, vous devez absolument prendre des mesures.
Irritabilité et fatigue. Passer des heures devant l'écran de l'ordinateur, surtout la nuit, aura certainement une influence sur le bien-être émotionnel et physique de l'enfant. La fatigue et l'irritabilité peuvent être parmi les signes que les interactions sur les réseaux sociaux deviennent incontrôlables.

Cyberintimidation - le vrai danger des médias sociaux

S'il n'est jamais bon d'être obsédé par la publication de photos et l'envoi de SMS à des amis sur les réseaux sociaux, il existe un certain nombre d'autres dangers qui peuvent être associés aux réseaux sociaux. L'article sur la cyberintimidation de Stephanie Pappas sur Livescience.com relie ce phénomène aux dépressions vécues par les adolescents. Beaucoup d'adolescents qui ont des problèmes d'estime de soi ont recours à l'intimidation des autres, et les sites de réseautage social offrent une opportunité pratique et souvent anonyme de le faire. Selon les études mentionnées dans l'article, environ 23% des adolescents admettent avoir été victimes d'intimidation en ligne, tandis qu'environ 15% des enfants ont déclaré avoir déjà harcelé d'autres enfants sur les réseaux sociaux. Les chiffres peuvent être encore plus élevés parce que tous les adolescents ne sont pas prêts à partager ces informations avec les autres, soit par peur ou par culpabilité.

Bien qu'il soit presque impossible et pas très bénéfique d'interdire complètement votre enfant des médias sociaux, vous devez toujours être conscient de son activité en ligne pour le protéger. L'un des meilleurs moyens d'y parvenir consiste à utiliser une application de suivi, telle que Teentor, qui vous permet de contrôler l'activité des médias sociaux de votre enfant. À l'aide de la fonction d'espionnage des messages texte, vous pouvez afficher les textes reçus par votre enfant et ainsi réagir immédiatement en cas d'incident de cyberintimidation. Il est essentiel de prévenir de telles situations nocives avant qu'elles ne deviennent incontrôlables.

Effets physiques néfastes de la dépendance aux réseaux sociaux

L'influence de trop de temps passé devant l'écran de l'ordinateur ne peut être sous-estimée. Selon l'American Academy of Pediatrics, le temps d'écran maximal, y compris les téléviseurs et les ordinateurs, ne doit pas dépasser 2 heures par jour. Un certain nombre de problèmes physiques peuvent se développer à la suite d'une activité en ligne constante. Les principaux problèmes comprennent:

Mauvaise alimentation et obésité. Être en ligne tout le temps demande beaucoup de temps, c'est pourquoi beaucoup d'enfants préfèrent grignoter plutôt que de laisser un ordinateur pendant 20 minutes pour prendre un repas complet. Le manque d'activité physique n'aide pas non plus la situation. Une telle approche peut conduire à un certain nombre de problèmes gastro-entérologiques et même à l'obésité chez certains enfants.
Problèmes de vision. Quelle que soit la qualité du moniteur de votre enfant, regarder l'écran pendant des heures peut entraîner le développement de problèmes de vision. C'est particulièrement pertinent lorsqu'un enfant regarde l'écran la nuit, ce qui est souvent le cas lorsque l'on parle de dépendance aux réseaux sociaux.
Trouble du sommeil. Le fait de regarder l'écran lumineux juste avant d'aller au lit entraîne une réduction de la mélanine, ce qui rend plus difficile l'endormissement d'un enfant. En conséquence, votre enfant ne dort pas suffisamment et ne peut pas se concentrer sur son éducation.
Maux de dos et cervicalgie. Il peut sembler que ces problèmes ne devraient pas déranger les enfants, mais c'est bien le contraire. Être constamment en position de navigation entraîne le développement d'une mauvaise posture et de douleurs au cou, qui à leur tour peuvent causer des maux de tête et des problèmes de vision.

L'influence de la dépendance aux médias sociaux sur la santé mentale

Outre le développement de problèmes physiques, la surexposition aux médias sociaux peut avoir une influence négative sur l'état mental de l'enfant et provoquer:

Problèmes d'estime de soi. Lorsque les enfants sont toujours sur les sites Web de médias sociaux, il est inévitable qu'ils comparent leur vie et leur apparence à d'autres personnes. Si un enfant manque déjà de confiance, cela peut le rendre plus misérable, affectant ainsi son attitude envers la vie.
La dépression. Dans les cas extrêmes, les incidents de cyberintimidation combinés à l'absence de communication hors ligne suffisante peuvent conduire au développement de la dépression.
TDAH et anxiété. Il peut devenir difficile pour un enfant de se concentrer sur un sujet ou de rester calme avec toutes les distractions fournies par les médias sociaux. Les enfants accros aux sites de réseautage social peuvent passer leur temps à anticiper la prochaine opportunité d'aller en ligne plutôt que de se concentrer sur la tâche qui les attend. Les chercheurs de l'Université de Glasgow suggèrent que la peur de passer à côté cultivée par les médias sociaux peut facilement conduire à l'anxiété chez les enfants.
Manque de compétences sociales hors ligne. Être capable de communiquer et de transmettre ses pensées de manière claire est un atout incroyablement précieux qui peut aider à réussir dans une carrière choisie et faciliter la compréhension dans les relations. Malheureusement, les interactions sur les réseaux sociaux ne contribuent pas au développement de ces compétences importantes et rendent un enfant absolument désemparé en ce qui concerne la communication réelle.

Comment aborder correctement le comportement addictif

Lorsqu'il s'agit de gérer le comportement addictif de vos enfants, interdire l'utilisation d'Internet n'est certainement pas une attente réaliste. Après tout, c'est toujours un excellent moyen de rester en contact avec des amis. La chose la plus importante pour prévenir le développement de la dépendance aux médias sociaux est de prêter attention au comportement de votre enfant. Il est important de s'assurer que votre enfant a beaucoup de choses en ligne pour le garder intéressé. Il comprend divers passe-temps, événements, rencontres entre amis et sorties en famille. Dans certains cas, consulter un professionnel peut être extrêmement bénéfique si la dépendance aux médias sociaux est déjà présente.

Lorsque nous parlons d'assurer la sécurité de vos enfants en ligne, cela peut être fait à l'aide du logiciel créé spécifiquement dans le but de gérer l'activité Internet de vos enfants. Teentor est le logiciel espion efficace conçu pour être installé sur l'appareil de votre enfant et vous donner la possibilité de réguler ses interactions sur les réseaux sociaux. Ce logiciel espion pour téléphone portable vous permet de limiter l'utilisation de certains sites Web et de choisir le contenu qui convient à un enfant d'un certain groupe d'âge. Vous ne devez jamais prendre les dangers des réseaux sociaux à la légère et vous assurer d'être prêt avant que tout comportement addictif ait une chance de se développer.

Story The Cat in the Ghat! Author: Ambika Rao

2020-03-06T08:03:00.000-08:00

Story The Cat in the Ghat!

Author: Ambika Rao

This story is about an uncle named Sandy, Who likes his camera so much,

he always keeps it handy.

Let's rewind to when Uncle Sandy was a little boy,

Unlike his friends,

he never dreamt of a fancy toy.

Lost in books that spoke of magical creatures,

Even in class, he never listened to his teachers.

As time passed by,

Uncle Sandy became a wildlife photographer,

While his friends became doctors,

engineers and dance choreographers.

Uncle Sandy didn't want to work in big offices,

He wanted to take pictures of snakes,

crocodiles and tortoises.

So he decided to leave

his family and friends behind,

And took off to the jungles with freedom in mind.

On his first expedition to the Western Ghats,

He had his first encounter with a mysterious cat.

Uncle Sandy has been on its trail ever since,

Hoping to click a picture of it, for evidence.

So he decided to revisit the Western Ghats,

Through its spiraling path in search of the cat.

The cat in the ghat!

The plan was to speak to animals along the way,

To get clues about this cat

whose colour he knew was grey.

He began his journey at the foothills of the Ghats,

With the summer sun so hot,

Uncle Sandy needed a hat.

“Let’s look for waterholes,”

he said to himself,

He knew that’s where the animals would tread.

And guess who he got to meet,

The top cat himself,

Mr. Tiger to greet.

“Oh mighty tiger,”

he said,

“would you have seen a cat?

It is tall, swift and the colour of my hat.”

The tiger didn’t have much to say,

He roared and looked the other way.

Phew! That was close,

he thought,

Just as he was drenched by giant rain drops.

Along with the shower came a swarm of termites,

Who were sadly eaten by ants,

at first sight.

Rains in the Western Ghats come down as waterfalls, Waterfalls become rivers and that's how there's water for all.

So, if we need water to drink,

Protecting the Western Ghats is the link.

What Uncle Sandy saw next filled him with glee,

A family of elephants bathing in a pond, yippee!

They were making the most of the pre-monsoon showers,

Some were kicking grass,

others showing off their powers.

“Excuse me you all,”

said Uncle Sandy, waving his hat,

“Would you have seen a big grey cat?”

“No, no, no,” they all went in chorus,

“We haven’t seen him around here, we promise.”

Uncle Sandy found himself in the rainforest soon,

“The second level of the Western Ghats,”

he crooned.

“Bark!”

came a reply through the forest dense.

“Oh that’s a Barking Deer I hear,

it means no offence.”

Up in the trees chomping through a jackfruit,

He saw a lion-faced monkey, brute.

A Lion-tailed Macaque is what it is,

he knew,

He’d looked through an encyclopedia of animals,

woohoo!

“Help me find a grey cat, will you?”

said Uncle Sandy.

“Okay,”

said the feasting monkey.

“Walk straight through the tall green trees Till you find one with a giant hive of bees.”

“Under that tree lives a frog so rare It lives underground, hiding from the sun’s glare.”

“He’s a clever frog I’m told,

Knows the whole jungle inside out and two-fold.”

Uncle Sandy was so eager to look for the froggy He left without saying thank you to the monkey.

Left, right, left, right, Uncle Sandy marched,

Walking through a row of trees that were arched.

Then he saw a tree very tall

With a big beehive that was just about to fall.

“Ribbit ribbit,” said a frog,

But Uncle Sandy could not see it through the fog.

“Oh you’re the man who comes in search of a cat,

I heard about you from a clever little bat.”

Said Uncle Sandy,

“Please will you tell me where he is?

I’ll give you an exotic flower, an Iris.”

The frog was purple in colour,

He’s the only one of his kind in India,

Nasika batracus.

The frog told him that he’d meet a tribesman,

Who’d know where the cat lived,

and would guide him.

Uncle Sandy nodded,

still in shock,

He had just seen the most extraordinary frog.

As he went further into the forests so thick,

He saw that the trees were getting fewer very quick.

“People cut trees,”

he said,

“to make products very cheap,

And the poor animals,

they have no place to sleep.”

“These jungles are their homes you see,

just like our houses back in the city.”

Sad and disheartened by the state of affairs,

Uncle Sandy decided to say a silent prayer.

“Protect these forests, oh dear God, please,

Save them so the animals can live in peace.”

Saying so he carried on,

the high altitude grasslands waiting,

And that’s where he’d find the cat from its hiding.

The remotest of places in the whole of the Western Ghats,

The grasslands so green,

Uncle Sandy just sat.

Staring at the miracle of creation and the beauty of this place,

This, he felt, was really his land of fairy tales.

Pat came a tap on his back,

He turned to see a face painted black.

“Who are you, Sir?”

Uncle Sandy questioned

“I am a tribesman who lives here unquestioned.”

“Oh but sir, will you be as kind

To answer one question I have on my mind? “

Where can I find the special cat I’m looking for?

I’ve seen it only once before.”

“Are you talking about Pogeyan?”

he said. Uncle Sandy wasn’t sure what he meant.

“The cat that comes and goes as the mist,

Are you referring to that elusive cat that exists?”

“Yes Sir, that’s the one,”

Uncle Sandy affirmed.

He was so happy he could’ve drummed and hummed.

“Aha!” said the tribesman,

pointing to the mountains higher up,

“I’ve seen the cat over there, all of three times in close-up.”

Uncle Sandy was feeling extremely blessed.

He did a somersault that left the tribesman perplexed.

Uncle Sandy was whistling to himself, and climbing

When he saw two male Nilgiri Tahrs head-butting.

Looking at how well they'd adapted to the terrain,

Uncle Sandy wished he too was born on the mountains.

Sure he’d find his cat somewhere around here,

Uncle Sandy decided to put camera traps all over.

Then he slept a good night’s sleep

Under an open twinkling sky, on a hillock steep.

When he woke up,

he ran to his camera traps and checked.

Yes, yes, yes, there were images of his cat!!

The cat in the ghat!

The cat looked the same as it did ten years ago,

Uncle Sandy was happy, ho, ho, ho!

That’s when he felt a tiny snake crawling over his feet.

He was startled,

and realised he’d been dreaming in his sleep.

Uncle Sandy prayed his dream would come true

Hope he finds his grey cat soon, don’t you?

The Cat in the Ghat is a whimsical tale of Uncle Sandy going in search of a mysterious cat in the Western Ghats.

It has been inspired by the real-life expedition by Sandesh Kadur, a National Geographic Emerging Explorer,

wildlife filmmaker and conservation photographer.

His goal is to inspire people to protect and appreciate what remains of our wilderness. He is still looking for the Pogeyan!

Video Story The Cat in the Ghat!

The-cat-in-the-ghat pdf

Read Online Fairy Tale A Leaf From The Sky - By Hans Christian Andersen

2020-02-16T20:29:00.000-08:00

Fairy Tale

A Leaf From The Sky

Hans Christian Andersen

Read Online Fairy Tale A Leaf From The Sky :

high up yonder, in the thin clear air, flew an

angel with a flower from the heavenly garden. As he was kissing the flower, a very little leaf fell down into the soft soil in the midst of the wood, and immediately took root, and sprouted, and sent forth shoots among the other plants.

“A funny kind of slip that,” said the plants.

And neither thistle nor stinging-nettle would recognize the stranger.

“That must be a kind of garden plant,” said they.

And they sneered; and the plant was despised by them as being a thing out of the garden.

“Where are you coming?” cried the lofty thistles, whose leaves are all armed with thorns.

“You give yourself a good deal of space. That’s all nonsense—we are not here to support you!” they grumbled.

And winter came, and snow covered the plant; but the plant imparted to the snowy covering a lustre as if the sun was shining upon it from below as from above.

When spring came, the plant appeared as a blooming object, more beautiful than any production of the forest.

And now appeared on the scene the botanical professor, who could show what he was in black and white.

He inspected the plant and tested it, but found it was not included in his botanical system; and he could not possibly find out to what class it belonged.

“That must be some subordinate species,” he said. “I don’t know it. It’s not included in any system.”

“Not included in any system!” repeated the thistles and the nettles.

The great trees that stood round about saw and heard it; but they said not a word, good or bad, which is the wisest thing to do for people who are stupid.

There came through the forest a poor innocent girl.

Her heart was pure, and her understanding was enlarged by faith.

Her whole inheritance was an old Bible; but out of its pages a voice said to her, “If people wish to do us evil, remember how it was said of Joseph.

They imagined evil in their hearts, but God turned it to good.

If we suffer wrong—if we are misunderstood and despised—then we may recall the words of Him who was purity and goodness itself, and who forgave and prayed for those who buffeted Him and nailed Him to the cross.”

The girl stood still in front of the wonderful plant, whose great leaves exhaled a sweet and refreshing fragrance, and whose flowers glittered like a coloured flame in the sun; and from each flower there came a sound as though it concealed within itself a deep fount of melody that thousands of years could not exhaust.

With pious gratitude the girl looked on this beautiful work of the Creator, and bent down one of the branches towards herself to breathe in its sweetness; and a light arose in her soul.

It seemed to do her heart good; and gladly would she have plucked a flower, but she could not make up her mind to break one off, for it would soon fade if she did so.

Therefore the girl only took a single leaf, and laid it in her Bible at home; and it lay there quite fresh, always green, and never fading.

Among the pages of the Bible it was kept; and, with the Bible, it was laid under the young girl’s head when, a few weeks afterwards, she lay in her coffin, with the solemn calm of death on her gentle face, as if the earthly remains bore the impress of the truth that she now stood before her Creator.

But the wonderful plant still bloomed without in the forest.

It was almost like a tree to look upon; and all the birds of passage bowed before it.

“That’s giving itself foreign airs now,” said the thistles and the burdocks; “we never behave like that here.”

And the black snails actually spat at the flower.

Then came the swineherd. He was collecting thistles and shrubs, to burn them for the ashes.

The wonderful plant was placed bodily in his bundle.

“It shall be made useful,” he said; and so said, so done.

But soon afterwards, the king of the country was troubled with a terrible depression of spirits.

He was busy and industrious, but that did him no good.

They read him deep and learned books, and then they read from the lightest and most superficial that they could find;but it was of no use.

Then one of the wise men of the world, to whom they had applied, sent a messenger to tell the king that there was one remedy to give him relief and to cure him.

He said:

“In the king’s own country there grows in a forest a plant of heavenly origin. Its appearance is thus and thus. It cannot be mistaken.”

“I fancy it was taken up in my bundle, and burnt to ashes long ago,” said the swineherd; “but I did not know any better.”

“You didn’t know any better! Ignorance of ignorances!”

And those words the swineherd might well take to himself, for they were meant for him, and for no one else.

Not another leaf was to be found; the only one lay in the coffin of the dead girl, and no one knew anything about that.

And the king himself, in his melancholy, wandered out to the spot in the wood.

“Here is where the plant stood,” he said; “it is a sacred place.”

And the place was surrounded with a golden railing, and a sentry was posted there.

The botanical professor wrote a long treatise upon the heavenly plant.

For this he was gilded all over, and this gilding suited him and his family very well.

And indeed that was the most agreeable part of the whole story.

But the king remained as low-spirited as before; but that he had always been, at least so the sentry said.

Read-Summary-and-Download-Story-Harry-Potter-and-Chamber-Of-Secrets-pdf- By J.K. Rowling

2020-02-14T20:07:00.000-08:00

Read Summary and Download Story Harry Potter and Chamber Of Secrets pdf

By J.K. Rowling

Summary Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets

" Summary chapter by chapter "

1. The Worst Birthday

It's Harry's twelfth birthday, but all of his friends seem to have forgotten about it. Rather than celebrating his 12th birthday, Harry will have to spend the evening in his room pretending not to exist, while his uncle and aunt receive dinner for the Masons, potential customers.

2. Dobby's warning

House elf Dobby infiltrated Harry's room; he had stolen all his mail. Dobby is impressed with Harry, but makes a lot of noise every time he feels he needs to punish himself. He warns Harry that a plot is being prepared at Hogwarts and tries to make him promise not to go back to school. When Harry refuses, Dobby levitates Aunt Petunia's dessert and drops it to the floor. The Ministry of Magic thinks that Harry was the one who unlawfully performed magic, and sends him a warning letter. The Dursleys lock Harry in his room, bars on the windows.

3. The Burrow

Ron, Fred and George Weasley come to free Harry in a flying car and take him home, to the Burrow. They find their parents there and their sister Ginny, who is madly in love with Harry.

4. At Flourish and Blotts

The Weasleys and Harry leave for Diagon Alley via the Cheminette network, but Harry does it badly and ends up in the Alley of Mists. He surprises Draco Malfoy and his father doing business in a black magic shop. At the Fleury & Bott bookstore, author Gilderoy Lockhart signs his books and announces that he will teach Defense Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts. Lucius Malfoy laughs at the poverty of the Weasleys and comes to blows with Arthur Weasley.

5. The Whomping Willow

The Weasleys and Harry are very late to take the Hogwarts Express. When Ron and Harry try to pass on track 9 3/4, the entrance is blocked. Panicked when they miss the train, they decide to take the flying car to Hogwarts. The car does not tolerate the long journey and crashes on arrival in a hitting willow that seeks to knock them out and breaks Ron's magic wand. Harry and Ron are punished for their actions.

6. Gilderoy Lockhart

In Botany, the second years work on Mandrakes, plants capable of restoring health to victims of spells. Gilderoy Lockhart takes himself for an expert on everything and gives advice to everyone, but it is clear that he is an egocentric incapable of teaching defense against the forces of evil.

7. Mudbloods and Murmurs

During a Quidditch training, an argument

breaks out between the Gryffindors and the Slytherins, and Draco Malfoy calls Hermione "mud blood", because her parents are not sorcerers. In the evening, Harry made his punishment: answering the mail from Lockhart's admirers. He hears a strange voice in the hallways threatening to kill someone, but no one else can hear him.

8. The Deathday Party

The trio is invited to the party for the 500th anniversary of the death of the ghost Nick Quasi-Sans-Tête. Harry hears the voice again; by following it, they discover Miss Teigne, the cat of Argus Filch, petrified. A message drawn with blood on the wall states that "the chamber of secrets has been opened; enemies of the heir, beware".

9. The Writing on the Wall

Ginny is very upset by what happened. Harry notices that the spiders seem to be fleeing from Hogwarts. During a History of Magic class, Professor Binns explains that according to a legend, the Chamber of Secrets was created by Salazar Slytherin, one of the founders of Hogwarts, and that it contained a monster that only l heir to Slytherin could control. Students seem to suspect Harry of being the heir, but the trio thinks it's Draco Malfoy and decides to make Polyjuiceto disguise themselves as Slytherin students and discover the truth.

10. The Rogue Bludger

In the Gryffindor vs. Slytherin Quidditch match, a Bludger behaves strangely and only attacks Harry, eventually breaking his arm. Lockhart tries to fix it, but makes the bones in his arm disappear instead. In the infirmary, Harry receives a visit from Dobby, who explains that it was he who blocked platform 9 3/4 and bewitched the Cognard, in order to force Harry to return home. The same night, a new attack took place: Colin Crivey, a first-year student, was found petrified.

11. The dueling club

Gilderoy Lockhart offers to create a dueling club. Harry fights Malfoy, who sends him a snake. Harry manages to speak to the snake, which everyone finds very frightening: Salazar Slytherin also knew how to speak to snakes. The next day, a third attack took place: Justin Finch-Fletchley and Nick Quas-sans-tête were petrified, and it was Harry who discovered them. The whole school is convinced that he is guilty.

12. The Polyjuice Potion

In Dumbledore's office, Harry discovers the phoenix Fumseck, who has the ability to rise from the ashes and heal wounds through his tears. During the Christmas holidays, Harry, Ron and Hermione finish making the Polynectar in the bathroom haunted by Mimi Geignard. Harry turns into Goyle, Ron into Crabbe, but Hermione is wrong and becomes half cat. Harry and Ron question Malfoy and discover that he is not the heir of Slytherin.

13. The Very Secret Diary

Harry discovers a diary someone was looking to get rid of on the toilet. 50 years ago, it belonged to a certain Tom Riddle, who responded to Harry when he wrote in the journal. Tom shows Harry a memory in which he surprises a young Rubeus Hagrid with a huge spider, accused of being the monster of the Chamber of Secrets and of having caused the death of a student. Rubeus Hagrid was fired from Hogwarts following this affair.

14. Cornelius Fudge

Someone is robbing Harry's dorm and stealing Riddle's diary. The next day, Hermione and another student are petrified; we find them with a mirror in hand. Determined to find out more, Ron and Harry go to see Hagrid, but are forced to hide when Albus Dumbledore, Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge, and Lucius Malfoy arrive. Hagrid is sent to Azkaban prison, and Dumbledore is suspended from office. As he leaves, Hagrid advises to follow the spiders, and Dumbledore promises that help will always be given to those who ask for it.

15. Aragog

Following Hagrid's advice, Harry and Ron follow spiders, which take them to the Forbidden Forest. They discover a colony of giant spiders, led by Aragog, the spider that Hagrid had when he was young. Aragog explains to them that he is not the monster of the Chamber of Secrets, and that Hagrid is innocent. He threatens to let his children devour Harry and Ron, but they are saved by the flying car. Harry understands that the student who was killed 50 years ago is Mimi Geignarde.

16. The Chamber of Secrets

Harry and Ron visit Hermione petrified in the infirmary and find a piece of paper in her hand: she understands that the Slytherin monster is a Basilisk, a gigantic snake that kills anyone who meets its gaze, and which moves in the Hogwarts plumbing. Right after, the Slytherin heir leaves a new message: he kidnapped Ginny Weasley and writes that "his skeleton will rest forever in the Chamber".

Harry, Ron and Lockhart find the entrance to the Chamber in Mimi's bathroom. Lockhart tries to bewitch Harry and Ron to get all the glory, but he uses Ron's broken wand and his amnesia spell turns against him. A landslide separates Ron and Lockhart from Harry, who continues on his way in the Chamber alone.

17. The Heir of Slytherin

In the Bedroom, Harry finds Ginny's almost lifeless body, and next to her, Tom Riddle, who explains that he is the heir of Slytherin and that he comes back to life thanks to the diary, in which Ginny has spilled in recent months. Tom Riddle is none other than the young Lord Voldemort, and he launches the Basilisk in pursuit of Harry. With the help of the Fumseck phoenix and the Sorting Hat that provides him with the Gryffindor sword, Harry defeats the Basilisk and plants one of his fangs in the newspaper, eliminating Riddle. Ginny comes back to life.

18. Dobby's reward

Dumbledore takes over as director and explains to Harry that if he can speak to snakes, it's because Voldemort passed some of his powers on to him the night he tried to kill him. But Harry chose to be in Gryffindor and not Slytherin, which shows that he is very different from Voldemort.

Harry realizes that it was Lucius Malfoy who had given Ginny the diary, and that Malfoy is Dobby's master. He manages to get Lucius Malfoy to give Dobby a sock, which makes him a free elf.

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Read Online and Download Fairy Tale Old Sultan - the Brothers Grimm

2020-02-11T14:56:00.000-08:00

A Fairy Tale Old Sultan

by the Brothers Grimm

Read Online Tale Old Sultan:

A farmer once had a faithful dog called Sultan,

who had grown old, and lost all his teeth, so that he could no longer hold anything fast.

One day the farmer was standing with his wife before the house-door, and said, "To-morrow I intend to shoot Old Sultan, he is no longer of any use."

His wife, who felt pity for the faithful beast, answered, "He has served us so long, and been so faithful, that we might well give him his keep."

"Eh! what?" said the man. "You are not very sharp.

He has not a tooth left in his mouth, and not a thief is afraid of him; now he may be off.

If he has served us, he has had good feeding for it."

The poor dog, who was lying stretched out in the sun not far off, had heard everything, and was sorry that the morrow was to be his last day.

He had a good friend, the wolf, and he crept out in the evening into the forest to him, and complained of the fate that awaited him.

"Hark ye, gossip," said the wolf, "be of good cheer, I will help you out of your trouble. I have thought of something.

To-morrow, early in the morning, your master is going with his wife to make hay, and they will take their little child with them, for no one will be left behind in the house.

They are wont, during work-time, to lay the child under the hedge in the shade; you lay yourself there too, just as if you wished to guard it.

Then I will come out of the wood, and carry off the child.

You must rush swiftly after me, as if you would seize it again from me.

I will let it fall, and you will take it back to its parents, who will think that you have saved it, and will be far too grateful to do you any harm; on the contrary, you will be in high favor, and they will never let you want for anything again."

The plan pleased the dog, and it was carried out just as it was arranged.

The father screamed when he saw the Wolf running across the field with his child, but when Old Sultan brought it back, then he was full of joy, and stroked him and said, "Not a hair of yours shall be hurt, you shall eat my bread free as long as you live."

And to his wife he said, "Go home at once and make Old Sultan some bread-sop that he will not have to bite, and bring the pillow out of my bed, I will give him that to lie upon."

Henceforth Old Sultan was as well off as he could wish to be.

Soon afterwards the wolf visited him, and was pleased that everything had succeeded so well.

"But, gossip," said he, "you will just wink an eye if when I have a chance, I carry off one of your master's fat sheep." - "Do not reckon upon that," answered the dog; "I will remain true to my master; I cannot agree to that."

The wolf, who thought that this could not be spoken in earnest, came creeping about in the night and was going to take away the sheep.

But the farmer, to whom the faithful Sultan had told the wolf's plan, caught him and dressed his hide soundly with the flail.

The wolf had to pack off, but he cried out to the dog, "Wait a bit, you scoundrel, you shall pay for this."

The next morning the wolf sent the boar to challenge the dog to come out into the forest so that they might settle the affair.

Old Sultan could find no one to stand by him but a cat with only three legs, and as they went out together the poor cat limped along, and at the same time stretched out her tail into the air with pain.

The wolf and his friend were already on the spot appointed, but when they saw their enemy coming they thought that he was bringing a sabre with him, for they mistook the outstretched tail of the cat for one.

And when the poor beast hopped on its three legs, they could only think every time that it was picking up a stone to throw at them. So they were both afraid; the wild boar crept into the under-wood and the wolf jumped up a tree.

The dog and the cat, when they came up, wondered that there was no one to be seen.

The wild boar, however, had not been able to hide himself altogether; and one of his ears was still to be seen.

Whilst the cat was looking carefully about, the boar moved his ear; the cat, who thought it was a mouse moving there, jumped upon it and bit it hard.

The boar made a fearful noise and ran away, crying out, "The guilty one is up in the tree."

The dog and cat looked up and saw the wolf, who was ashamed of having shown himself so timid, and made friends with the dog.

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A Fairy tale The Tinder Box - By Hans Christian Andersen

2020-02-09T18:28:00.000-08:00

A Fairy Tale The Tinder Box

By Hans Christian Andersen

A soldier came marching along the high road: "Left, right - left, right." He had his knapsack on his back, and a sword at his side; he had been to the wars, and was now returning home.

As he walked on, he met a very frightful-looking old witch in the road. Her under-lip hung quite down on her breast, and she stopped and said, "Good evening, soldier; you have a very fine sword, and a large knapsack, and you are a real soldier; so you shall have as much money as ever you like."

"Thank you, old witch," said the soldier.

"Do you see that large tree," said the witch, pointing to a tree which stood beside them.

"Well, it is quite hollow inside, and you must climb to the top, when you will see a hole, through which you can let yourself down into the tree to a great depth.

I will tie a rope round your body, so that I can pull you up again when you call out to me."

"But what am I to do, down there in the tree?" asked the soldier.

"Get money," she replied; "for you must know that when you reach the ground under the tree, you will find yourself in a large hall, lighted up by three hundred lamps; you will then see three doors, which can be easily opened, for the keys are in all the locks.

On entering the first of the chambers, to which these doors lead, you will see a large chest, standing in the middle of the floor, and upon it a dog seated, with a pair of eyes as large as teacups.

But you need not be at all afraid of him; I will give you my blue checked apron, which you must spread upon the floor, and then boldly seize hold of the dog, and place him upon it.

You can then open the chest, and take from it as many pence as you please, they are only copper pence; but if you would rather have silver money, you must go into the second chamber. Here you will find another dog, with eyes as big as mill-wheels; but do not let that trouble you.

Place him upon my apron, and then take what money you please. If, however, you like gold best, enter the third chamber, where there is another chest full of it.

The dog who sits on this chest is very dreadful; his eyes are as big as a tower, but do not mind him. If he also is placed upon my apron, he cannot hurt you, and you may take from the chest what gold you will."

"This is not a bad story," said the soldier; "but what am I to give you, you old witch? For, of course, you do not mean to tell me all this for nothing."

"No," said the witch; "but I do not ask for a single penny. Only promise to bring me an old tinder-box, which my grandmother left behind the last time she went down there."

"Very well; I promise. Now tie the rope round my body."

"Here it is," replied the witch; "and here is my blue checked apron."

As soon as the rope was tied, the soldier climbed up the tree, and let himself down through the hollow to the ground beneath; and here he found, as the witch had told him, a large hall, in which many hundred lamps were all burning.

Then he opened the first door. "Ah!" there sat the dog, with the eyes as large as teacups, staring at him.

"You're a pretty fellow," said the soldier, seizing him, and placing him on the witch's apron, while he filled his pockets from the chest with as many pieces as they would hold.

Then he closed the lid, seated the dog upon it again, and walked into another chamber, and, sure enough, there sat the dog with eyes as big as mill-wheels.

"You had better not look at me in that way," said the soldier; "you will make your eyes water;" and then he seated him also upon the apron, and opened the chest.

But when he saw what a quantity of silver money it contained, he very quickly threw away all the coppers he had taken, and filled his pockets and his knapsack with nothing but silver.

Then he went into the third room, and there the dog was really hideous; his eyes were, truly, as big as towers, and they turned round and round in his head like wheels.

"Good morning," said the soldier, touching his cap, for he had never seen such a dog in his life.

But after looking at him more closely, he thought he had been civil enough, so he placed him on the floor, and opened the chest. Good gracious, what a quantity of gold there was! enough to buy all the sugar-sticks of the sweet-stuff women; all the tin soldiers, whips, and rocking-horses in the world, or even the whole town itself There was, indeed, an immense quantity.

So the soldier now threw away all the silver money he had taken, and filled his pockets and his knapsack with gold instead; and not only his pockets and his knapsack, but even his cap and boots, so that he could scarcely walk.

He was really rich now; so he replaced the dog on the chest, closed the door, and called up through the tree: "Now pull me out, you old witch."

"Have you got the tinder-box?" asked the witch.

"No; I declare I quite forgot it." So he went back and fetched the tinderbox, and then the witch drew him up out of the tree, and he stood again in the high road, with his pockets, his knapsack, his cap, and his boots full of gold.

"What are you going to do with the tinder-box?" asked the soldier.

"That is nothing to you," replied the witch; "you have the money, now give me the tinder-box."

"I tell you what," said the soldier, "if you don't tell me what you are going to do with it, I will draw my sword and cut off your head."

"No," said the witch.

The soldier immediately cut off her head, and there she lay on the ground.

Then he tied up all his money in her apron, and slung it on his back like a bundle, put the tinderbox in his pocket, and walked off to the nearest town.

It was a very nice town, and he put up at the best inn, and ordered a dinner of all his favourite dishes, for now he was rich and had plenty of money.

The servant, who cleaned his boots, thought they certainly were a shabby pair to be worn by such a rich gentleman, for he had not yet bought any new ones.

The next day, however, he procured some good clothes and proper boots, so that our soldier soon became known as a fine gentleman, and the people visited him, and told him all the wonders that were to be seen in the town, and of the king's beautiful daughter, the princess.

"Where can I see her?" asked the soldier.

"She is not to be seen at all," they said; "she lives in a large copper castle, surrounded by walls and towers. No one but the king himself can pass in or out, for there has been a prophecy that she will marry a common soldier, and the king cannot bear to think of such a marriage."

"I should like very much to see her," thought the soldier; but he could not obtain permission to do so.

However, he passed a very pleasant time; went to the theatre, drove in the king's garden, and gave a great deal of money to the poor, which was very good of him; he remembered what it had been in olden times to be without a shilling.

Now he was rich, had fine clothes, and many friends, who all declared he was a fine fellow and a real gentleman, and all this gratified him exceedingly.

But his money would not last forever; and as he spent and gave away a great deal daily, and received none, he found himself at last with only two shillings left.

So he was obliged to leave his elegant rooms, and live in a little garret under the roof, where he had to clean his own boots, and even mend them with a large needle.

None of his friends came to see him, there were too many stairs to mount up.

One dark evening, he had not even a penny to buy a candle; then all at once he remembered that there was a piece of candle stuck in the tinder-box, which he had brought from the old tree, into which the witch had helped him.

He found the tinder-box, but no sooner had he struck a few sparks from the flint and steel, than the door flew open and the dog with eyes as big as teacups, whom he had seen while down in the tree, stood before him, and said, "What orders, master?"

"Hallo," said the soldier; "well this is a pleasant tinderbox, if it brings me all I wish for." - "Bring me some money," said he to the dog. He was gone in a moment, and presently returned, carrying a large bag of coppers in his month.

The soldier very soon discovered after this the value of the tinder-box.

If he struck the flint once, the dog who sat on the chest of copper money made his appearance; if twice, the dog came from the chest of silver; and if three times, the dog with eyes like towers, who watched over the gold.

The soldier had now plenty of money; he returned to his elegant rooms, and reappeared in his fine clothes, so that his friends knew him again directly, and made as much of him as before.

After a while he began to think it was very strange that no one could get a look at the princess.

"Every one says she is very beautiful," thought he to himself; "but what is the use of that if she is to be shut up in a copper castle surrounded by so many towers.

Can I by any means get to see her. Stop! where is my tinder-box?" Then he struck a light, and in a moment the dog, with eyes as big as teacups, stood before him.

"It is midnight," said the soldier, "yet I should very much like to see the princess, if only for a moment."

The dog disappeared instantly, and before the soldier could even look round, he returned with the princess.

She was lying on the dog's back asleep, and looked so lovely, that every one who saw her would know she was a real princess.

The soldier could not help kissing her, true soldier as he was.

Then the dog ran back with the princess; but in the morning, while at breakfast with the king and queen, she told them what a singular dream she had had during the night, of a dog and a soldier, that she had ridden on the dog's back, and been kissed by the soldier.

"That is a very pretty story, indeed," said the queen.

So the next night one of the old ladies of the court was set to watch by the princess's bed, to discover whether it really was a dream, or what else it might be.

The soldier longed very much to see the princess once more, so he sent for the dog again in the night to fetch her, and to run with her as fast as ever he could.

But the old lady put on water boots, and ran after him as quickly as he did, and found that he carried the princess into a large house.

She thought it would help her to remember the place if she made a large cross on the door with a piece of chalk. Then she went home to bed, and the dog presently returned with the princess.

But when he saw that a cross had been made on the door of the house, where the soldier lived, he took another piece of chalk and made crosses on all the doors in the town, so that the lady-in-waiting might not be able to find out the right door.

Early the next morning the king and queen accompanied the lady and all the officers of the household, to see where the princess had been.

"Here it is," said the king, when they came to the first door with a cross on it.

"No, my dear husband, it must be that one," said the queen, pointing to a second door having a cross also.

"And here is one, and there is another!" they all exclaimed; for there were crosses on all the doors in every direction. So they felt it would be useless to search any farther.

But the queen was a very clever woman; she could do a great deal more than merely ride in a carriage.

She took her large gold scissors, cut a piece of silk into squares, and made a neat little bag.

This bag she filled with buckwheat flour, and tied it round the princess's neck; and then she cut a small hole in the bag, so that the flour might be scattered on the ground as the princess went along.

During the night, the dog came again and carried the princess on his back, and ran with her to the soldier, who loved her very much, and wished that he had been a prince, so that he might have her for a wife.

The dog did not observe how the flour ran out of the bag all the way from the castle wall to the soldier's house, and even up to the window, where he had climbed with the princess.

Therefore in the morning the king and queen found out where their daughter had been, and the soldier was taken up and put in prison.

Oh, how dark and disagreeable it was as he sat there, and the people said to him, "To-morrow you will be hanged."

It was not very pleasant news, and besides, he had left the tinder-box at the inn.

In the morning he could see through the iron grating of the little window how the people were hastening out of the town to see him hanged; he heard the drums beating, and saw the soldiers marching.

Every one ran out to look at them, and a shoemaker's boy, with a leather apron and slippers on, galloped by so fast, that one of his slippers flew off and struck against the wall where the soldier sat looking through the iron grating.

"Hallo, you shoemaker's boy, you need not be in such a hurry," cried the soldier to him.

"There will be nothing to see till I come; but if you will run to the house where I have been living, and bring me my tinder-box, you shall have four shillings, but you must put your best foot foremost."

The shoemaker's boy liked the idea of getting the four shillings, so he ran very fast and fetched the tinder-box, and gave it to the soldier. And now we shall see what happened.

Outside the town a large gibbet had been erected, round which stood the soldiers and several thousands of people.

The king and the queen sat on splendid thrones opposite to the judges and the whole council.

The soldier already stood on the ladder; but as they were about to place the rope around his neck, he said that an innocent request was often granted to a poor criminal before he suffered death.

He wished very much to smoke a pipe, as it would be the last pipe he should ever smoke in the world.

The king could not refuse this request, so the soldier took his tinder-box, and struck fire, once, twice, thrice, and there in a moment stood all the dogs; the one with eyes as big as teacups, the one with eyes as large as mill-wheels, and the third, whose eyes were like towers.

"Help me now, that I may not be hanged," cried the soldier.

And the dogs fell upon the judges and all the councillors; seized one by the legs, and another by the nose, and tossed them many feet high in the air, so that they fell down and were dashed to pieces.

"I will not be touched," said the king.

But the largest dog seized him, as well as the queen, and threw them after the others.

Then the soldiers and all the people were afraid, and cried, "Good soldier, you shall be our king, and you shall marry the beautiful princess."

So they placed the soldier in the king's carriage, and the three dogs ran on in front and cried "Hurrah!" and the little boys whistled through their fingers, and the soldiers presented arms.

The princess came out of the copper castle, and became queen, which was very pleasing to her.

The wedding festivities lasted a whole week, and the dogs sat at the table, and stared with all their eyes.

A Fairy Tale The Twelve Huntsmen By The Brothers Grimm

2020-02-09T14:56:00.000-08:00

A Fairy Tale

The Twelve Huntsmen

" The Twelve Brothers "

By The Brothers Grimm

There were once on a time a king and a queen who lived happily together and had twelve children, but they were all boys.

Then said the King to his wife, "If the thirteenth child which thou art about to bring into the world, is a girl, the twelve boys shall die, in order that her possessions may be great, and that the kingdom may fall to her alone."

He caused likewise twelve coffins to be made, which were already filled with shavings, and in each lay the little pillow for the dead, and he had them taken into a locked-up room, and then he gave the Queen the key of it, and bade her not to speak of this to any one.

The mother, however, now sat and lamented all day long, until the youngest son, who was always with her, and whom she had named Benjamin, from the Bible, said to her, "Dear mother, why art thou so sad?"

"Dearest child," she answered, "I may not tell thee."

But he let her have no rest until she went and unlocked the room, and showed him the twelve coffins ready filled with shavings.

Then she said, my dearest Benjamin, thy father has had these coffins made for thee and for thy eleven brothers, for if I bring a little girl into the world, you are all to be killed and buried in them."

And as she wept while she was saying this, the son comforted her and said, "Weep not, dear mother, we will save ourselves, and go hence."

But she said, "Go forth into the forest with thy eleven brothers, and let one sit constantly on the highest tree which can be found, and keep watch, looking towards the tower here in the castle.

If I give birth to a little son, I will put up a white flag, and then you may venture to come back, but if I bear a daughter, I will hoist a red flag, and then fly hence as quickly as you are able, and may the good God protect you.

And every night I will rise up and pray for you -- in winter that you may be able to warm yourself at a fire, and in summer that you may not faint away in the heat."

After she had blessed her sons therefore, they went forth into the forest. They each kept watch in turn, and sat on the highest oak and looked towards the tower.

When eleven days had passed and the turn came to Benjamin, he saw that a flag was being raised. It was, however, not the white, but the blood-red flag which announced that they were all to die.

When the brothers heard that, they were very angry and said, "Are we all to suffer death for the sake of a girl? We swear that we will avenge ourselves!-- wheresoever we find a girl, her red blood shall flow."

Thereupon they went deeper into the forest, and in the midst of it, where it was the darkest, they found a little bewitched hut, which was standing empty.

Then said they, "Here we will dwell, and thou Benjamin, who art the youngest and weakest, thou shalt stay at home and keep house, we others will go out and get food."

Then they went into the forest and shot hares, wild deer, birds and pigeons, and whatsoever there was to eat; this they took to Benjamin, who had to dress it for them in order that they might appease their hunger.

They lived together ten years in the little hut, and the time did not appear long to them.

The little daughter which their mother the Queen had given birth to, was now grown up; she was good of heart, and fair of face, and had a golden star on her forehead.

Once, when it was the great washing, she saw twelve men's shirts among the things, and asked her mother, "To whom do these twelve shirts belong, for they are far too small for father?" Then the Queen answered with a heavy heart, "Dear child, these belong to thy twelve brothers."

Said the maiden, "Where are my twelve brothers, I have never yet heard of them?" She replied, "God knows where they are, they are wandering about the world."

Then she took the maiden and opened the chamber for her, and showed her the twelve coffins with the shavings, and pillows for the head.

"These coffins," said she, "were destined for thy brothers, but they went away secretly before thou wert born," and she related to her how everything had happened; then said the maiden, "Dear mother, weep not, I will go and seek my brothers."

So she took the twelve shirts and went forth, and straight into the great forest.

She walked the whole day, and in the evening she came to the bewitched hut.

Then she entered it and found a young boy, who asked, "From whence comest thou, and whither art thou bound?" and was astonished that she was so beautiful, and wore royal garments, and had a star on her forehead.

And she answered, "I am a king's daughter, and am seeking my twelve brothers, and I will walk as far as the sky is blue until I find them."

She likewise showed him the twelve shirts which belonged to them.

Then Benjamin saw that she was his sister, and said, "I am Benjamin, thy youngest brother."

And she began to weep for joy, and Benjamin wept also, and they kissed and embraced each other with the greatest love.

But after this he said, "Dear sister, there is still one difficulty.

We have agreed that every maiden whom we meet shall die, because we have been obliged to leave our kingdom on account of a girl."

Then said she, "I will willingly die, if by so doing I can deliver my twelve brothers."

"No," answered he, "thou shalt not die, seat thyself beneath this tub until our eleven brothers come, and then I will soon come to an agreement with them."

She did so, and when it was night the others came from hunting, and their dinner was ready.

And as they were sitting at table, and eating, they asked, "What news is there?" Said Benjamin, "Don't you know anything?" - "No," they answered. He continued, "You have been in the forest and I have stayed at home, and yet I know more than you do."

- "Tell us then," they cried. He answered, "But promise me that the first maiden who meets us shall not be killed."

- "Yes," they all cried, "she shall have mercy, only do tell us."

Then said he, "Our sister is here," and he lifted up the tub, and the King's daughter came forth in her royal garments with the golden star on her forehead, and she was beautiful, delicate and fair.

Then they were all rejoiced, and fell on her neck, and kissed and loved her with all their hearts.

Now she stayed at home with Benjamin and helped him with the work.

The eleven went into the forest and caught game, and deer, and birds, and wood-pigeons that they might have food, and the little sister and Benjamin took care to make it ready for them.

She sought for the wood for cooking and herbs for vegetables, and put the pans on the fire so that the dinner was always ready when the eleven came.

She likewise kept order in the little house, and put beautifully white clean coverings on the little beds, and the brothers were always contented and lived in great harmony with her.

Once on a time the two at home had prepared a beautiful entertainment, and when they were all together, they sat down and ate and drank and were full of gladness.

There was, however, a little garden belonging to the bewitched house wherein stood twelve lily flowers, which are likewise called students.

She wished to give her brothers pleasure, and plucked the twelve flowers, and thought she would present each brother with one while at dinner.

But at the self-same moment that she plucked the flowers the twelve brothers were changed into twelve ravens, and flew away over the forest, and the house and garden vanished likewise.

And now the poor maiden was alone in the wild forest, and when she looked around, an old woman was standing near her who said, "My child, what hast thou done? Why didst thou not leave the twelve white flowers growing? They were thy brothers, who are now for evermore changed into ravens."

The maiden said, weeping, "Is there no way of delivering them?"

"No," said the woman, "there is but one in the whole world, and that is so hard that thou wilt not deliver them by it, for thou must be dumb for seven years, and mayst not speak or laugh, and if thou speakest one single word, and only an hour of the seven years is wanting, all is in vain, and thy brothers will be killed by the one word."

Then said the maiden in her heart, "I know with certainty that I shall set my brothers free," and went and sought a high tree and seated herself in it and span, and neither spoke nor laughed.

Now it so happened that a king was hunting in the forest, who had a great greyhound which ran to the tree on which the maiden was sitting, and sprang about it, whining, and barking at her.

Then the King came by and saw the beautiful King's daughter with the golden star on her brow, and was so charmed with her beauty that he called to ask her if she would be his wife. She made no answer, but nodded a little with her head.

So he climbed up the tree himself, carried her down, placed her on his horse, and bore her home.

Then the wedding was solemnized with great magnificence and rejoicing, but the bride neither spoke nor smiled.

When they had lived happily together for a few years, the King's mother, who was a wicked woman, began to slander the young Queen, and said to the King, "This is a common beggar girl whom thou hast brought back with thee.

Who knows what impious tricks she practises secretly! Even if she be dumb, and not able to speak, she still might laugh for once; but those who do not laugh have bad consciences."

At first the King would not believe it, but the old woman urged this so long, and accused her of so many evil things, that at last the King let himself be persuaded and sentenced her to death.

And now a great fire was lighted in the courtyard in which she was to be burnt, and the King stood above at the window and looked on with tearful eyes, because he still loved her so much. And when she was bound fast to the stake, and the fire was licking at her clothes with its red tongue, the last instant of the seven years expired.

Then a whirring sound was heard in the air, and twelve ravens came flying towards the place, and sank downwards, and when they touched the earth they were her twelve brothers, whom she had delivered. They tore the fire asunder, extinguished the flames, set their dear sister free, and kissed and embraced her.

And now as she dared to open her mouth and speak, she told the King why she had been dumb, and had never laughed. The King rejoiced when he heard that she was innocent, and they all lived in great unity until their death.

The wicked step-mother was taken before the judge, and put into a barrel filled with boiling oil and venomous snakes, and died an evil death.

Summary and Download Story Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

2020-02-06T19:47:00.000-08:00

The Story Of Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone

(Harry Potter and The Wizard's Stone)

Summary Story Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Harry Potter and the Wizard's Stone)

Dursley family

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone opens with a description of the Dursley family and is the testament to Harry who has been abused by his aunt Petunia the will on him, her husband and their son, a middle-class family who lives in (Little Wing, Surrey Little Whinging, Surrey). But his husband's aunt Vernon and his aunt Petunia Dorsley were constantly concerned that someone would discover that Petunia's sister is the 'unforeseen' witch, Lily, and that their fears are justified especially when Lily's infant son, Harry, is left on their doorstep. After Lily and her husband James Potter were killed by the dark wizard, Voldemort, but when Voldemort tried to kill Harry, his strength collapsed in some way.

The Boy Who Lived

Harry Potter becomes the only living person to survive the curse of murder, and the only sign of his confrontation with Voldemort is a unique thunderbolt scar on his forehead. Since Harry Potter has no other relatives, Albus Dumbledore, head of the Hogwarts of Witchcraft and Wizardry, decides to leave him with the Dorsley family until he is old enough to attend Hogwarts School.

Ten years later, Harry has grown into a skinny pale boy with black hair flowing everywhere and bright green eyes. From a young age, Harry was told that his parents had died in a car accident but had no further information about them, not even a photograph of his parents.

Strange things happen

Dudley with a gang of friends spoils Harry's life. The bedrooms spoiled by his parents, Harry Dudley, dominate the bedrooms, as Dudley takes control of two bedrooms - one for his bed and one for all his broken toys - Harry was transported by Uncle Vernon and his aunt Petunia to the small locker down the stairs. Although he strives to avoid attracting attention, Harry cannot deny that strange things have happened around him. Where, on one occasion, Aunt Petunia cut all of my hair in a fit of frustration, and his hair returned to its original length at the appropriate time on the day after he went to school. Once again, Harry was chased by a Dudley gang and suddenly found himself on the roof of the kitchen.

The Vanishing Glass

On Dudley's eleventh birthday, Harry accompanies the family and Dudley's best friend, Pierce Polkis, to the zoo, while Harry is at the reptile house, the glass façade suddenly disappears from the snake cage, Harry cannot explain or explain the accident, but Uncle Vernon blames him for any State and tied it to the closet down the stairs until the summer vacation.

The letters from nowhere

After a day, a mysterious message begins to arrive in Harry. Uncle Vernon refuses to allow Harry to read the letter but tells him that the letter was addressed to him in error. Over the next few days, an increasing number of messages arrive home, but Uncle Vernon prevents Harry from intercepting any of them. In an extreme effort to escape the letters, Uncle Vernon takes the family to an abandoned cottage on an island the night before Harry's eleventh birthday.

The keeper of the keys

When midnight hits, Harry wishes for himself 'Happy Birthday Harry' while silent, there is a loud sound at the door and Hagrid enters. Hagrid introduces himself as a keyguard at Hogwarts School, then explains that Harry is the magician who was accepted into Hogwarts in order to study magic. Harry discovers that Uncle Vernon was always aware of his magical abilities but tried to dampen his abilities and make him 'natural'. Moreover, Harry learns the truth about his parents being killed by Voldemore.

Daejeon Alley

The next day, Hagrid takes Harry to Daejeon Alley in London to buy school supplies. Their first stop is the enchanting bank, Gringotts, where Harry is shown in his family safe and realizes that his parents left him with a wealth of magical gold. During his trip to the bank, Hagrid stops in Treasury 713 and removes a mysterious package: Hogwarts' business for Dumbledore, he explains. After the bank, Harry Madame, owner of Robs, visited an apparel designer for all occasions to create his simple black school gown and magical textbook holder, as well as other shops for magic potion ingredients. Hagrid buys Harry a snow owl as a birthday present, and Harry decides to name the owl Hedwig. Their last stop on the Daejeon Lane is Elephantre, where Harry buys a magic wand that has an essence identical to the evil Voldemort stick.

The Way of Traverse

A month later, Harry Little Whiting left from Hogwarts Express, which leaves Kings Cross Station from platform nine and three quarters. Initially, he wasn't sure how to get to the Magic Deck, but he's getting help from Molly Weasley, who shows him how to get to the train. While on the train, Harry befriends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, the first-year Taliban suffering from insecurity about entering Hogwarts: because the youngest of the five brothers who had success in Hogwarts, Ron is concerned about the distinction between him and that Hermione is concerned about her background as a raven child . Harry also meets Neville Longbottom, a little cocky man in his first year with a pet frog named Trevor, and Draco Malfoy, an annoying student arrogantly advising Harry on who to befriend.

The Magic Choice

When the train arrives at Hogwarts, the students are immediately placed in the dining hall to be 'sorted', and assigned to one of the four homes in Hogwarts: Gryffindor, Slytherin, Hovelbav, and Ravinclav. Harry worries that he will be sorted into Voldemort's old house, Slytherin, and that he makes a special request to the sorting hat to customize it to any other home. It's a carefully sorted hat game but eventually puts Harry (as well as Ron and Hermione) at Gryffindor's house.

With the start of the school year, Harry receives more attention than ever, especially when other students watch the thunderbolt in the form of a thunderbolt. Although most of his classes are fun, Professor Snape, the potion instructor, seems intent on hating Harry, and Harry notes that his scar looks like tingling as Snape glows at his face. After the first lesson of potions, Harry and Ron decide to visit Hagrid in his hut near the Forbidden Forest. Hagrid inadvertently reveals that the Treasury of 713, the Gringotts vault containing the mysterious bundle, was stormed shortly after Harry and Hagrid's visit to the Daejeon Lane.

During the first lesson, Neville broke his wrist and should be taken to the hospital ward by the coach. Malfoy snatches Remembrall Neville - he forgot after his injury - and flies in the air with her. Harry flies after Malfoy to take back the game Neville, and when he throws Malfoy Remembrall on the ground, he performs amazing diving to capture Remembrall a few inches from the ground. Professor McGonagal notes Harry's skilled flight, and instead of punishing him for breaking the rules, he prepares him to play with the researcher of the Gryffindor Quidditch team.

The Midnight Duel

Malfoy arranges a midnight duel with Harry to iron the score, and Ron, Hermione and Neville accompany him to make sure he stays out of trouble. The four mistakenly enter a forbidden path and encounter a three-legged dog standing guard at a door. They leave the boardwalk quickly, but not before Harry concludes that the dog is guarding the mysterious packaging from the 713 safe.

Quidditch game

On Halloween, faculty members are alerted to a stray dwarf at school and escort students to their homes. Harry and Ron sneak away to find Hermione, who is in the girls' bathroom, and he missed the warning. After inadvertently closing the dwarf in the girls' bath with Hermione, Ron and Harry strike the dwarf and lose consciousness. Hermione takes the blame in battle, and the three become fast friends. During Harry's first Quidditch match, his broom is filled with a mysterious source. Hermione and Ron assume that Snape is bringing jinx to Harry after Hermione sees Snape mumbling in himself. Ron set fire to the Snape robot in time for Harry to regain control of his broom and win the match.

Harry resides in Hogwarts with Ron over the Christmas holidays and spends time playing magic chess and researching Nicholas Flamel, who unintentionally mentioned Hajid regarding the package from Treasury 713.

The Mirror of Erised

On Christmas morning, Harry was surprised to receive many gifts, including a rare cloak for disappearance. The note accompanying the cloak says it belongs to Harry's father. That night, Harry decided to try the concealment gown and encountered a large mirror in the middle of the room. Looking at the mirror, he sees his deceased parents and other unknown relatives staring at him. The next night, Harry rushed to the room to see his family in the mirror and was surprised by Professor Dumbledore, who was waiting for him. Dumbledore explains that Iriseed's mirror reveals the deepest desires of a person's heart but cannot give truth or knowledge. Dumbledore also told Harry that the mirror would be moved to a new location the next day, and Harry shouldn't try to find her again.

Norbert the Dragon

After the holiday ends, Harry, Ron and Hermione finally discover the identity of Nicholas Flamel: he is the only known manufacturer of magician's stone that produces the elixir of life. They realized that the three-headed dog was guarding the sorcerer's stone, and Harry began to suspect that Snape was planning to steal that. Harry, Ron, and Hermione also discover that Hagrid is raising an illegal dragon provided by a mysterious stranger in a bar in exchange for information about the three-headed dog. Harry and Hermione decide to smuggle the dragon to Ron's brother, Charlie, who works with dragons in Romania, but is caught right after handing the dragon straight to a friend of Charlie.

The Forbidden Forest

As punishment for disobeying the school's curfew, Harry and Hermione (as well as Malfoy and Neville, who were out of bed at the time) are sent to the Forbidden Forest with Hagrid to locate a rhinoceros wounded. When the group is split into two, Harry and Malfoy encounters the unicorn's body just as a hooded person crawls towards him and begins to drink his blood. Malfoye screams and runs, but Harry freezes in his place due to the painful pain that suddenly spreads from his scar. As the masked man moves toward him, Centaur walks past Harry with protection and the shape disappears. Centaurus suggests that the masked man was Voldemort and that he drank the blood of the unicorn in order to survive so that he could steal the magician's stone.

decided steal the Wizard's Stone

Harry decided to steal the Wizard's Stone before Voldemort could. Harry, Ron and Hermione slip into the forbidden lane and skip the three-headed dog by calming him to sleep with music. Once they reach the trap door, they land on Devil's Snare, which is the first of many challenges that Hogwart gurus put on. As snake-like tendrils threaten to strangle Ron and Harry, Hermione uses magic fire to repel and liberate the plant. The next challenge is to pass through a room filled with hundreds of tiny flying keys. Harry flies on a broom to find the silver key that matches the lock on the door and finally takes it out of the flock. The door opens to reveal the chessboard of the giant magician. Being a chess expert, Ron takes the lead in this challenge and eventually sacrifices himself in order to allow Harry and Hermione to reach the next challenge. When Harry and Hermione enter the next room, they are immediately surrounded by fire and face a complex mystery of toxic potions. Hermione solves the puzzle rationally and gives Harry the dose to travel to the next room and the last challenge as she returns to help Ron.

In the last room

In the last room, Harry was surprised to find Snape and Voldemort, but Professor Quirrell, a meek defense teacher against dark arts, and Mirror of Erised. Quirrell reveals that, not Snape, he was Voldemort's servant the whole time: Quirrill felt Harry's broom during a Quidditch match and drunk unicorn blood in the Forbidden Forest. Now, in the last challenge, Quirrell only needs to recover the Wizard's Stone from within the Mirror of Erised. He asks his master for help, Harry listens to a non-monophonic speaking from inside Quirrell, and asks him to use Harry to reach him. Quirrell stands before Harry in front of the mirror and orders him to tell him what he sees. Determined to prevent Voldemort falling into the hands, Harry lies and tells Quirill that he sees himself winning the Gwendor Quidditch Cup. Then he actually sees that he holds the magician's stone and puts him in his pocket. Realizing that the stone is now in his pocket, Harry tries to stop working so he can escape. Quirill removes a turban and reveals Voldemort's face from the back of his head. Voldemort speaks directly to Harry, making fun of him about the death of his parents, then orders Quirrell to kill him. When Quirrell tries to touch Harry with his skin blisters, and although Harry suffers severe pain from his scar, he imposes contact with Quirrell. With Voldemort's wrath screaming at his head, Harry is finally fainted.

Harry wakes up

When Harry wakes up, he finds himself in the hospital ward with Dumbledore. Dumbledore found Harry in time to prevent Kirill from killing him, although Voldemort fled again. Dumbledore explains that Quirrell was unable to touch Harry's skin because of his mother's love: when Lily Potter sacrificed herself for him, she left Harry with an ancient magic protection. He knew that only Harry could recover the stone from the Erised Mirror because, unlike Quirrell and Voldemort, Harry wanted to find the Stone but he didn't want to use it. Although Voldemort was not destroyed, Harry's actions prevented him from regaining his strength for the time being.

At the end of the year

At the end of the year, Slytherin House members celebrated their victory in the House Cup for the seventh year in a row. Unexpectedly, Dumbledore awards last-minute points for Harry, Ron, Hermione and Neville, which gives Gryffindor the edge over Slytherin. Harry considers it the best night of his life and returns to spend the summer with the Desler's family with his friendships made at Hogwarts

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A Fairy Tale The Frog King Or Iron Henry - By The Brothers Grimm

2020-01-02T18:50:00.000-08:00

A Fairy Tale

The Frog King Or Iron Henry

By The Brothers Grimm

In the old times, when it was still of some use to wish for the thing one wanted, there lived a King whose daughters were all handsome, but the youngest was so beautiful that the sun himself, who has seen so much, wondered each time he shone over her because of her beauty.

Near the royal castle there was a great dark wood, and in the wood under an old linden-tree was a well; and when the day was hot, the King's daughter used to go forth into the wood and sit by the brink of the cool well, and if the time seemed long, she would take out a golden ball, and throw it up and catch it again, and this was her favourite pastime.

Now it happened one day that the golden ball, instead of falling back into the maiden's little hand which had sent it aloft, dropped to the ground near the edge of the well and rolled in. The king's daughter followed it with her eyes as it sank, but the well was deep, so deep that the bottom could not be seen. Then she began to weep, and she wept and wept as if she could never be comforted.

And in the midst of her weeping she heard a voice saying to her: "What ails thee, king's daughter? Thy tears would melt a heart of stone." And when she looked to see where the voice came from, there was nothing but a frog stretching his thick ugly head out of the water.

"Oh, is it you, old waddler?" said she, "I weep because my golden ball has fallen into the well."

- "Never mind, do not weep," answered the frog, "I can help you; but what will you give me if I fetch up your ball again?" - "Whatever you like, dear frog," said she, "any of my clothes, my pearls and jewels, or even the golden crown that I wear."

- "Thy clothes, thy pearls and jewels, and thy golden crown are not for me," answered the frog, "but if thou wouldst love me, and have me for thy companion and play-fellow, and let me sit by thee at table, and eat from thy plate, and drink from thy cup, and sleep in thy little bed, if thou wouldst promise all this, then would I dive below the water and fetch thee thy golden ball again."

- "Oh yes," she answered, "I will promise it all, whatever you want, if you will only get me my ball again." But she thought to herself: What nonsense he talks! As if he could do anything but sit in the water and croak with the other frogs, or could possibly be any one's companion.

But the frog, as soon as he heard her promise, drew his head under the water and sank down out of sight, but after a while he came to the surface again with the ball in his mouth, and he threw it on the grass.

The King's daughter was overjoyed to see her pretty plaything again, and she caught it up and ran off with it.

"Stop, stop!" cried the frog, "take me up too. I cannot run as fast as you!" But it was of no use, for croak, croak after her as he might, she would not listen to him, but made haste home, and very soon forgot all about the poor frog, who had to betake himself to his well again.

The next day, when the King's daughter was sitting at table with the King and all the court, and eating from her golden plate, there came something pitter patter up the marble stairs, and then there came a knocking at the door, and a voice crying: "Youngest King's daughter, let me in!" And she got up and ran to see who it could be, but when she opened the door, there was the frog sitting outside. Then she shut the door hastily and went back to her seat, feeling very uneasy.

The King noticed how quickly her heart was beating, and said: "My child, what are you afraid of? Is there a giant standing at the door ready to carry you away?" - "Oh no," answered she, "no giant, but a horrid frog." - "And what does the frog want?" asked the King.

"O dear father," answered she, "when I was sitting by the well yesterday, and playing with my golden ball, it fell into the water, and while I was crying for the loss of it, the frog came and got it again for me on condition I would let him be my companion, but I never thought that he could leave the water and come after me; but now there he is outside the door, and he wants to come in to me."

And then they all heard him knocking the second time and crying:

"Youngest King's daughter,

Open to me!

By the well water

What promised

you me?

Youngest King's daughter

Now open to me!"

"That which thou hast promised must thou perform," said the King, "so go now and let him in."

So she went and opened the door, and the frog hopped in, following at her heels, till she reached her chair. Then he stopped and cried: "Lift me up to sit by you."

But she delayed doing so until the King ordered her.

When once the frog was on the chair, he wanted to get on the table, and there he sat and said: "Now push your golden plate a little nearer, so that we may eat together."

And so she did, but everybody might see how unwilling she was, and the frog feasted heartily, but every morsel seemed to stick in her throat. "I have had enough now," said the frog at last, "and as I am tired, you must carry me to your room, and make ready your silken bed, and we will lie down and go to sleep." Then the King's daughter began to weep, and was afraid of the cold frog, that nothing would satisfy him but he must sleep in her pretty clean bed.

Now the King grew angry with her, saying: "That which thou hast promised in thy time of necessity, must thou now perform."

So she picked up the frog with her finger and thumb, carried him upstairs and put him in a corner, and when she had lain down to sleep, he came creeping up, saying: "I am tired and want sleep as much as you; take me up, or I will tell your father."

Then she felt beside herself with rage, and picking him up, she threw him with all her strength against the wall, crying: "Now will you be quiet, you horrid frog!"

But as he fell, he ceased to be a frog, and became all at once a prince with beautiful kind eyes.

And it came to pass that, with her father's consent, they became bride and bridegroom.

And he told her how a wicked witch had bound him by her spells, and how no one but she alone could have released him, and that they two would go together to his father's kingdom.

And there came to the door a carriage drawn by eight white horses, with white plumes on their heads, and with golden harness, and behind the carriage was standing faithful Henry, the servant of the young prince.

Now, faithful Henry had suffered such care and pain when his master was turned into a frog, that he had been obliged to wear three iron bands over his heart, to keep it from breaking with trouble and anxiety.

When the carriage started to take the prince to his kingdom, and faithful Henry had helped them both in, he got up behind, and was full of joy at his master's deliverance.

And when they had gone a part of the way, the prince heard a sound at the back of the carriage, as if something had broken, and he turned round and cried:

"Henry, the wheel must be breaking!"

"The wheel does not break,

'Tis the band round my heart

That, to lessen its ache,

When I grieved for your sake,

I bound round my heart."

Again, and yet once again there was the same sound, and the prince thought it must be the wheel breaking, but it was the breaking of the other bands from faithful Henry's heart, because it was now so relieved and happy.

The Last Dream of Old Oak by Hans Christian Andersen

2019-03-23T17:17:00.001-07:00

The Last Dream of Old Oak

by Hans Christian Andersen

IN the forest, high up on the steep shore, and not far from the open seacoast, stood a very old oak-tree. It was just three hundred and sixty-five years old, but that long time was to the tree as the same number of days might be to us; we wake by day and sleep by night, and then we have our dreams. It is different with the tree; it is obliged to keep awake through three seasons of the year, and does not get any sleep till winter comes. Winter is its time for rest; its night after the long day of spring, summer, and autumn. On many a warm summer, the Ephemera, the flies that exist for only a day, had fluttered about the old oak, enjoyed life and felt happy and if, for a moment, one of the tiny creatures rested on one of his large fresh leaves, the tree would always say, “Poor little creature! your whole life consists only of a single day. How very short. It must be quite melancholy.”

“Melancholy! what do you mean?” the little creature would always reply. “Everything around me is so wonderfully bright and warm, and beautiful, that it makes me joyous.”

“But only for one day, and then it is all over.”

“Over!” repeated the fly; “what is the meaning of all over? Are you all over too?”

“No; I shall very likely live for thousands of your days, and my day is whole seasons long; indeed it is so long that you could never reckon it out.”

“No? then I don’t understand you. You may have thousands of my days, but I have thousands of moments in which I can be merry and happy. Does all the beauty of the world cease when you die?”

“No,” replied the tree; “it will certainly last much longer,— infinitely longer than I can even think of.” “Well, then,” said the little fly, “we have the same time to live; only we reckon differently.” And the little creature danced and floated in the air, rejoicing in her delicate wings of gauze and velvet, rejoicing in the balmy breezes, laden with the fragrance of clover-fields and wild roses, elder-blossoms and honeysuckle, from the garden hedges, wild thyme, primroses, and mint, and the scent of all these was so strong that the perfume almost intoxicated the little fly. The long and beautiful day had been so full of joy and sweet delights, that when the sun sank low it felt tired of all its happiness and enjoyment. Its wings could sustain it no longer, and gently and slowly it glided down upon the soft waving blades of grass, nodded its little head as well as it could nod, and slept peacefully and sweetly. The fly was dead.

“Poor little Ephemera!” said the oak; “what a terribly short life!” And so, on every summer day the dance was repeated, the same questions asked, and the same answers given. The same thing was continued through many generations of Ephemera; all of them felt equally merry and equally happy.

The oak remained awake through the morning of spring, the noon of summer, and the evening of autumn; its time of rest, its night drew nigh—winter was coming. Already the storms were singing, “Good-night, good-night.” Here fell a leaf and there fell a leaf. “We will rock you and lull you. Go to sleep, go to sleep. We will sing you to sleep, and shake you to sleep, and it will do your old twigs good; they will even crackle with pleasure. Sleep sweetly, sleep sweetly, it is your three-hundred-and-sixty-fifth night. Correctly speaking, you are but a youngster in the world. Sleep sweetly, the clouds will drop snow upon you, which will be quite a cover-lid, warm and sheltering to your feet. Sweet sleep to you, and pleasant dreams.” And there stood the oak, stripped of all its leaves, left to rest during the whole of a long winter, and to dream many dreams of events that had happened in its life, as in the dreams of men. The great tree had once been small; indeed, in its cradle it had been an acorn. According to human computation, it was now in the fourth century of its existence. It was the largest and best tree in the forest. Its summit towered above all the other trees, and could be seen far out at sea, so that it served as a landmark to the sailors. It had no idea how many eyes looked eagerly for it. In its topmost branches the wood-pigeon built her nest, and the cuckoo carried out his usual vocal performances, and his well-known notes echoed amid the boughs; and in autumn, when the leaves looked like beaten copper plates, the birds of passage would come and rest upon the branches before taking their flight across the sea. But now it was winter, the tree stood leafless, so that every one could see how crooked and bent were the branches that sprang forth from the trunk. Crows and rooks came by turns and sat on them, and talked of the hard times which were beginning, and how difficult it was in winter to obtain food.

It was just about holy Christmas time that the tree dreamed a dream. The tree had, doubtless, a kind of feeling that the festive time had arrived, and in his dream fancied he heard the bells ringing from all the churches round, and yet it seemed to him to be a beautiful summer’s day, mild and warm. His mighty summits was crowned with spreading fresh green foliage; the sunbeams played among the leaves and branches, and the air was full of fragrance from herb and blossom; painted butterflies chased each other; the summer flies danced around him, as if the world had been created merely for them to dance and be merry in. All that had happened to the tree during every year of his life seemed to pass before him, as in a festive procession. He saw the knights of olden times and noble ladies ride by through the wood on their gallant steeds, with plumes waving in their hats, and falcons on their wrists. The hunting horn sounded, and the dogs barked. He saw hostile warriors, in colored dresses and glittering armor, with spear and halberd, pitching their tents, and anon striking them. The watchfires again blazed, and men sang and slept under the hospitable shelter of the tree. He saw lovers meet in quiet happiness near him in the moonshine, and carve the initials of their names in the grayish-green bark on his trunk. Once, but long years had intervened since then, guitars and Eolian harps had been hung on his boughs by merry travellers; now they seemed to hang there again, and he could hear their marvellous tones. The wood-pigeons cooed as if to explain the feelings of the tree, and the cuckoo called out to tell him how many summer days he had yet to live. Then it seemed as if new life was thrilling through every fibre of root and stem and leaf, rising even to the highest branches. The tree felt itself stretching and spreading out, while through the root beneath the earth ran the warm vigor of life. As he grew higher and still higher, with increased strength, his topmost boughs became broader and fuller; and in proportion to his growth, so was his self-satisfaction increased, and with it arose a joyous longing to grow higher and higher, to reach even to the warm, bright sun itself. Already had his topmost branches pierced the clouds, which floated beneath them like troops of birds of passage, or large white swans; every leaf seemed gifted with sight, as if it possessed eyes to see. The stars became visible in broad daylight, large and sparkling, like clear and gentle eyes. They recalled to the memory the well-known look in the eyes of a child, or in the eyes of lovers who had once met beneath the branches of the old oak. These were wonderful and happy moments for the old tree, full of peace and joy; and yet, amidst all this happiness, the tree felt a yearning, longing desire that all the other trees, bushes, herbs, and flowers beneath him, might be able also to rise higher, as he had done, and to see all this splendor, and experience the same happiness. The grand, majestic oak could not be quite happy in the midst of his enjoyment, while all the rest, both great and small, were not with him. And this feeling of yearning trembled through every branch, through every leaf, as warmly and fervently as if they had been the fibres of a human heart. The summit of the tree waved to and fro, and bent downwards as if in his silent longing he sought for something. Then there came to him the fragrance of thyme, followed by the more powerful scent of honeysuckle and violets; and he fancied he heard the note of the cuckoo. At length his longing was satisfied. Up through the clouds came the green summits of the forest trees, and beneath him, the oak saw them rising, and growing higher and higher. Bush and herb shot upward, and some even tore themselves up by the roots to rise more quickly. The birch-tree was the quickest of all. Like a lightning flash the slender stem shot upwards in a zigzag line, the branches spreading around it like green gauze and banners. Every native of the wood, even to the brown and feathery rushes, grew with the rest, while the birds ascended with the melody of song. On a blade of grass, that fluttered in the air like a long, green ribbon, sat a grasshopper, cleaning his wings with his legs. May beetles hummed, the bees murmured, the birds sang, each in his own way; the air was filled with the sounds of song and gladness.

“But where is the little blue flower that grows by the water?” asked the oak, “and the purple bell-flower, and the daisy?” You see the oak wanted to have them all with him.

“Here we are, we are here,” sounded in voice and song.

“But the beautiful thyme of last summer, where is that? and the lilies-of-the-valley, which last year covered the earth with their bloom? and the wild apple-tree with its lovely blossoms, and all the glory of the wood, which has flourished year after year? even what may have but now sprouted forth could be with us here.”

“We are here, we are here,” sounded voices higher in the air, as if they had flown there beforehand.

“Why this is beautiful, too beautiful to be believed,” said the oak in a joyful tone. “I have them all here, both great and small; not one has been forgotten. Can such happiness be imagined?” It seemed almost impossible.

“In heaven with the Eternal God, it can be imagined, and it is possible,” sounded the reply through the air.

And the old tree, as it still grew upwards and onwards, felt that his roots were loosening themselves from the earth.

“It is right so, it is best,” said the tree, “no fetters hold me now. I can fly up to the very highest point in light and glory. And all I love are with me, both small and great. All—all are here.”

Such was the dream of the old oak: and while he dreamed, a mighty storm came rushing over land and sea, at the holy Christmas time. The sea rolled in great billows towards the shore. There was a cracking and crushing heard in the tree. The root was torn from the ground just at the moment when in his dream he fancied it was being loosened from the earth. He fell—his three hundred and sixty-five years were passed as the single day of the Ephemera. On the morning of Christmas-day, when the sun rose, the storm had ceased. From all the churches sounded the festive bells, and from every hearth, even of the smallest hut, rose the smoke into the blue sky, like the smoke from the festive thank-offerings on the Druids’ altars. The sea gradually became calm, and on board a great ship that had withstood the tempest during the night, all the flags were displayed, as a token of joy and festivity. “The tree is down! The old oak,—our landmark on the coast!” exclaimed the sailors. “It must have fallen in the storm of last night. Who can replace it? Alas! no one.” This was a funeral oration over the old tree; short, but well-meant. There it lay stretched on the snow-covered shore, and over it sounded the notes of a song from the ship—a song of Christmas joy, and of the redemption of the soul of man, and of eternal life through Christ’s atoning blood.

“Sing aloud on the happy morn,

All is fulfilled, for Christ is born;

With songs of joy let us loudly sing,

‘Hallelujahs to Christ our King.’”

Thus sounded the old Christmas carol, and every one on board the ship felt his thoughts elevated, through the song and the prayer, even as the old tree had felt lifted up in its last, its beautiful dream on that Christmas morn.

Story While the Light Lasts - Author : Agatha Christie

2019-03-21T15:00:00.000-07:00

Story While the Light Lasts

Author : Agatha Christie

WHILE THE LIGHT LASTS

The Ford car bumped from rut to rut, and the hot African sun poured down unmercifully. On either side of the so-called road stretched an unbroken line of trees and scrub, rising and falling in gently undulating lines as far as the eye could reach, the colouring a soft, deep yellow-green, the whole effect languorous and strangely quiet. Few birds stirred the slumbering silence.

Once a snake wriggled across the road in front of the car, escaping the driver’s efforts at destruction with sinuous ease. Once a native stepped out from the bush, dignified and upright, behind him a woman with an infant bound closely to her broad back and a complete household equipment, including a frying pan, balanced magnificently on her head.

All these things George Crozier had not failed to point out to his wife, who had answered him with a monosyllabic lack of attention which irritated him.

“Thinking of that fellow,” he deduced wrathfully. It was thus that he was wont to allude in his own mind to Deirdre Crozier’s first husband, killed in the first year of the War. Killed, too, in the campaign against German West Africa. Natural she should, perhaps—he stole a glance at her, her fairness, the pink and white smoothness of her cheek, the rounded lines of her figure—rather more rounded perhaps than they had been in those far-off days when she had passively permitted him to become engaged to her, and then, in that first emotional scare of war, had abruptly cast him aside and made a war wedding of it with that lean, sunburnt boy lover of hers, Tim Nugent.

Well, well, the fellow was dead—gallantly dead—and he, George Crozier, had married the girl he had always meant to marry. She was fond of him, too; how could she help it when he was ready to gratify her every wish and had the money to do it, too! He reflected with some complacency on his last gift to her, at Kimberley, where, owing to his friendship with some of the directors of De Beers, he had been able to purchase a diamond which, in the ordinary way, would not have been in the market, a stone not remarkable as to size, but of a very exquisite and rare shade, a peculiar deep amber, almost old gold, a diamond such as you might not find in a hundred years. And the look in her eyes when he gave it to her! Women were all the same about diamonds.

The necessity of holding on with both hands to prevent himself being jerked out brought George Crozier back to the realities. He cried out for perhaps the fourteenth time, with the pardonable irritation of a man who owns two Rolls-Royce cars and who has exercised his stud on the highways of civilization: “Good Lord, what a car! What a road!” He went on angrily: “Where the devil is this tobacco estate, anyway? It’s over an hour since we left Bulawayo.”

“Lost in Rhodesia,” said Deirdre lightly between two involuntary leaps into the air.

But the coffee-coloured driver, appealed to, responded with the cheering news that their destination was just round the next bend of the road.

The manager of the estate, Mr. Walters, was waiting on the stoep to receive them with the touch of deference due to George Crozier’s prominence in Union Tobacco. He introduced his daughter-in-law, who shepherded Deirdre through the cool, dark inner hall to a bedroom beyond, where she could

remove the veil with which she was always careful to shield her complexion when motoring. As she unfastened the pins in her usual leisurely, graceful fashion, Deirdre’s eyes swept round the whitewashed ugliness of the bare room.

No luxuries here, and Deirdre, who loved comfort as a cat loves cream, shivered a little. On the wall a text confronted her. “What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?” it demanded of all and sundry, and Deirdre, pleasantly conscious that the question had nothing to do

with her, turned to accompany her shy and rather silent guide. She noted, but not in the least maliciously, the spreading hips and the unbecoming cheap cotton gown. And with a glow of quiet appreciation her eyes dropped to the exquisite, costly simplicity of her own French white linen. Beautiful clothes,

especially when worn by herself, roused in her the joy of the artist.

The two men were waiting for her.

“It won’t bore you to come round, too, Mrs. Crozier?” “Not at all. I’ve never been over a tobacco factory.”

They stepped out into the still Rhodesian afternoon.

“These are the seedlings here; we plant them out as required. You see—” The manager’s voice droned on, interpolated by her husband’s sharp staccato questions—output, stamp duty, problems of coloured labour. She ceased to listen.

This was Rhodesia, this was the land Tim had loved, where he and she were to have gone together after the War was over. If he had not been killed!

As always, the bitterness of revolt surged up in her at that thought. Two short months—that was all they had had. Two months of happiness—if that mingled rapture and pain were happiness. Was love ever happiness? Did not a thousand tortures beset the lover’s heart? She had lived intensely in that

short space, but had she ever known the peace, the leisure, the quiet contentment of her present life? And for the first time she admitted, somewhat unwillingly, that perhaps all had been for the best.

“I wouldn’t have liked living out here. I mightn’t have been able to make Tim happy. I might have disappointed him. George loves me, and I’m very fond of him, and he’s very, very good to me. Why, look at that diamond he bought me only the other day.” And, thinking of it, her eyelids dropped a little in pure pleasure.

“This is where we thread the leaves.” Walters led the way into a low, long shed.

On the floor were vast heaps of green leaves, and white-clad black “boys” squatted round them, picking and rejecting with deft fingers, sorting them into sizes, and stringing them by means of primitive needles on a long line of string. They worked with a cheerful leisureliness, jesting amongst

themselves, and showing their white teeth as they laughed.

“Now, out here—” They passed through the shed into the daylight again, where the lines of leaves hung drying in the sun. Deirdre sniffed delicately at the faint, almost imperceptible fragrance that filled the air.

Walters led the way into other sheds where the tobacco, kissed by the sun into faint yellow discoloration, underwent its further treatment. Dark here, with the brown swinging masses above, ready to fall to powder at a rough touch. The fragrance was stronger, almost overpowering it seemed to deirdre, and suddenly a sort of terror came upon her, a fear of she knew not what, that drove her from that menacing, scented obscurity out into the sunlight. Crozier noted her pallor.

“What’s the matter, my dear, don’t you feel well? The sun, perhaps.

Better not come with us round the plantations? Eh?”

Walters was solicitous. Mrs. Crozier had better go back to the house and rest. He called to a man a little distance away.

“Mr. Arden—Mrs. Crozier. Mrs. Crozier’s feeling a little done up with the heat, Arden. Just take her back to the house, will you?”

The momentary feeling of dizziness was passing. Deirdre walked by Arden’s side. She had as yet hardly glanced at him.

“Deirdre!”

Her heart gave a leap, and then stood still. Only one person had ever spoken her name like that, with the faint stress on the first syllable that made of it a caress.

She turned and stared at the man by her side. He was burnt almost black by the sun, he walked with a limp, and on the cheek nearer hers was a long scar which altered his expression, but she knew him.

“Tim!”

For an eternity, it seemed to her, they gazed at each other, mute and trembling, and then, without knowing how or why, they were in each other’s arms. Time rolled back for them. Then they drew apart again, and Deirdre, conscious as she put it of the idiocy of the question, said: “Then you’re not dead?”

“No, they must have mistaken another chap for me. I was badly knocked on the head, but I came to and managed to crawl into the bush. After that I don’t know what happened for months and months, but a friendly tribe looked after me, and at last I got my proper wits again and managed to get back to civilization.” He paused. “I found you’d been married six months.”

Deirdre cried out: “Oh, Tim, understand, please understand! It was so awful, the loneliness —and the poverty. I didn’t mind being poor with you, but when I was alone I hadn’t the nerve to stand up against the sordidness of it all.”

“It’s all right, Deirdre; I did understand. I know you always have had a hankering after the fleshpots. I took you from them once—but the second time, well—my nerve failed. I was pretty badly broken up, you see, could hardly walk without a crutch, and then there was this scar.”

She interrupted him passionately.

“Do you think I would have cared for that?”

“No, I know you wouldn’t. I was a fool. Some women did mind, you know. I made up my mind I’d manage to get a glimpse of you. If you looked happy, if I thought you were contented to be with Crozier—why, then I’d remain dead. I did see you. You were just getting into a big car. You had on some lovely sable furs—things I’d never be able to give you if I worked my fingers to the bone—and—well—you seemed happy enough. I hadn’t the same strength and courage, the same belief in myself, that I’d had before the War. All I could see was myself, broken and useless, barely able to earn enough to keep you—and you looked so beautiful, Deirdre, such a queen amongst women, so worthy to have furs and jewels and lovely clothes and all the hundred and one luxuries Crozier could give you. That—and—well, the pain—of seeing you together, decided me. Everyone believed me dead. I would stay dead.”

“The pain!” repeated Deirdre in a low voice.

“Well, damn it all, Deirdre, it hurt! It isn’t that I blame you. I don’t. But it hurt.”

They were both silent. Then Tim raised her face to his and kissed it with a new tenderness.

“But that’s all over now, sweetheart. The only thing to decide is how we’re going to break it to Crozier.”

“Oh!” She drew herself away abruptly. “I hadn’t thought—” She broke off as Crozier and the manager appeared round the angle of the path. With a swift turn of the head she whispered: “Do nothing now. Leave it to me. I must prepare him. Where could I meet you tomorrow?” Nugent reflected.

“I could come in to Bulawayo. How about the Café near the Standard Bank? At three o’clock it would be pretty empty.”

Deirdre gave a brief nod of assent before turning her back on him and joining the other two men. Tim Nugent looked after her with a faint frown.

Something in her manner puzzled him.

Deirdre was very silent during the drive home. Sheltering behind the fiction of a “touch of the sun,” she deliberated on her course of action. How should she tell him? How would he take it? A strange lassitude seemed to possess her, and a growing desire to postpone the revelation as long as might be.

Tomorrow would be soon enough. There would be plenty of time before three o’clock.

The hotel was uncomfortable. Their room was on the ground floor, looking out on to an inner court. Deirdre stood that evening sniffing the stale air and glancing distastefully at the tawdry furniture. Her mind flew to the easy luxury of Monkton Court amidst the Surrey pinewoods. When her maid left her at last, she went slowly to her jewel case. In the palm of her hand the golden diamond returned her stare.

With an almost violent gesture she returned it to the case and slammed down the lid. Tomorrow morning she would tell George.

She slept badly. It was stifling beneath the heavy folds of the mosquito netting. The throbbing darkness was punctuated by the ubiquitous ping she had learnt to dread. She awoke white and listless. Impossible to start a scene so early in the day!

She lay in the small, close room all the morning, resting. Lunchtime came upon her with a sense of shock. As they sat drinking coffee, George Crozier proposed a drive to the Matopos.

“Plenty of time if we start at once.”

Deirdre shook her head, pleading a headache, and she thought to herself: “That settles it. I can’t rush the thing. After all, what does a day more or less matter? I’ll explain to Tim.”

She waved goodbye to Crozier as he rattled off in the battered Ford.

Then, glancing at her watch, she walked slowly to the meeting place.

The Café was deserted at this hour. They sat down at a little table and ordered the inevitable tea that South Africa drinks at all hours of the day and night. Neither of them said a word till the waitress brought it and withdrew to her fastness behind some pink curtains. Then Deirdre looked up and started

as she met the intense watchfulness in his eyes.

“Deirdre, have you told him?”

She shook her head, moistening her lips, seeking for words that would not come.

“Why not?”

“I haven’t had a chance; there hasn’t been time.”

Even to herself the words sounded halting and unconvincing.

“It’s not that. There’s something else. I suspected it yesterday. I’m sure of it today. Deirdre, what is it?”

She shook her head dumbly.

“There’s some reason why you don’t want to leave George Crozier, why you don’t want to come back to me. What is it?”

It was true. As he said it she knew it, knew it with sudden scorching shame, but knew it beyond any possibility of doubt. And still his eyes searched her.

“It isn’t that you love him! You don’t. But there’s something.”

She thought: “In another moment he’ll see! Oh, God, don’t let him!” Suddenly his face whitened.

“Deirdre—is it—is it that there’s going to be a—child?”

In a flash she saw the chance he offered her. A wonderful way! Slowly, almost without her own volition, she bowed her head.

She heard his quick breathing, then his voice, rather high and hard.

“That—alters things. I didn’t know. We’ve got to find a different way out.” He leant across the table and caught both her hands in his. “Deirdre, my

darling, never think—never dream that you were in any way to blame.

Whatever happens, remember that. I should have claimed you when I came back to England. I funked it, so it’s up to me to do what I can to put things straight now. You see? Whatever happens, don’t fret, darling. Nothing has been your fault.”

He lifted first one hand, then the other to his lips. Then she was alone, staring at the untasted tea. And, strangely enough, it was only one thing that she saw—a gaudily illuminated text hanging on a whitewashed wall. The words seemed to spring out from it and hurl themselves at her. “What shall it profit a man—” She got up, paid for her tea and went out.

On his return George Crozier was met by a request that his wife might not be disturbed. Her headache, the maid said, was very bad.

It was nine o’clock the next morning when he entered her bedroom, his face rather grave. Deirdre was sitting up in bed. She looked white and haggard, but her eyes shone.

“George, I’ve got something to tell you, something rather terrible—” He interrupted her brusquely.

“So you’ve heard. I was afraid it might upset you.”

“Upset me?”

“Yes. You talked to the poor young fellow that day.”

He saw her hand steal to her heart, her eyelids flicker, then she said in a low, quick voice that somehow frightened him: “I’ve heard nothing. Tell me quickly.”

“I thought—”

“Tell me!”

“Out at that tobacco estate. Chap shot himself. Badly broken up in the War, nerves all to pieces, I suppose. There’s no other reason to account for

it.”

“He shot himself—in that dark shed where the tobacco was hanging.” She spoke with certainty, her eyes like a sleepwalker’s as she saw before her in

the odorous darkness a figure lying there, revolver in hand.

“Why, to be sure; that’s where you were taken queer yesterday. Odd thing, that!”

Deirdre did not answer. She saw another picture—a table with tea things on it, and a woman bowing her head in acceptance of a lie.

“Well, well, the War has a lot to answer for,” said Crozier, and stretched out his hand for a match, lighting his pipe with careful puffs.

His wife’s cry startled him.

“Ah! don’t, don’t! I can’t bear the smell!”

He stared at her in kindly astonishment.

“My dear girl, you mustn’t be nervy. After all, you can’t escape from the smell of tobacco. You’ll meet it everywhere.”

“Yes, everywhere!” She smiled a slow, twisted smile, and murmured some words that he did not catch, words that she had chosen for the original obituary notice of Tim Nugent’s death. “While the light lasts I shall remember, and in the darkness I shall not forget.”

Her eyes widened as they followed the ascending spiral of smoke, and she repeated in a low, monotonous voice: “Everywhere, everywhere.”

Story Marching to Freedom Author: Subhadra Sen Gupta

2019-03-20T14:00:00.000-07:00

Story Marching to Freedom

Author: Subhadra Sen Gupta

Dhani knew something exciting was being planned at the ashram, but no one would tell him anything. “Just because I’m nine years old,” thought Dhani glumly. “I’m sure they think I’m stupid. I am not!”

Dhani and his parents lived in a very special place. It was Mahatma Gandhi’s Sabarmati Ashram near Ahmedabad where people from all over India came to stay. Like Gandhiji, they were all fighting for India’s freedom. During their stay at the ashram, they spent their time spinning khadi thread on charkhas, singing bhajans and listening to Gandhiji’s lectures.

At Sabarmati, everyone had to work – cook and clean, wash clothes, fetch water from the well, milk the cows and goats, and grow vegetables. Even Dhani had a job – he had to take care of Binni, one of the ashram’s goats. He quite enjoyed that because Binni was his best friend and he liked talking to her.

That morning, as Dhani fed Binni with fresh grass and changed the water in her bowl, he said, “Something’s up, Binni! They all sit and talk in Gandhiji’s room. They are planning something. I know it!”

Binni chewed and nodded as if she understood. Dhani felt hungry. He headed towards the kitchen, with Binni skipping along beside him. His mother was fanning the chulha, filling up the room with smoke.

“Amma, is Gandhiji going somewhere?” he asked. His mother coughed in the smoke and said, “They are going on a march.”

“March? Where are they going?” Dhani queried.

“Somewhere near the sea. Now stop asking questions and go away Dhani!” his mother said impatiently. “Let me finish the cooking first.”

Dhani wandered off to the vegetable garden where old Binda was digging up potatoes.

“Binda chacha,” Dhani sat beside him, “are you going on the march too?”

Binda shook his head. Before he could say anything, Dhani eagerly asked, “Who is marching? Where are they going? What is happening?”

Binda stopped digging and said, “I’ll answer all your questions, but first tie up that troublesome goat. She’s chewing up my spinach.”

Dhani dragged Binni away and tied her to the lemon tree nearby. Then Binda told him about the march. Gandhiji and some of the men from the ashram were going to walk through Gujarat to reach the sea at a place called Dandi. They would walk through villages and towns for a whole month. Once they reached Dandi, they would make salt.

“Salt?” Dhani sat up and frowned. “Why will they make salt? You can buy it in every shop!”

“I know,” Binda laughed. “But Mahatmaji has a plan. You know he always marches to protest against something, right?”

“Of course I know. He leads the Satyagraha marches to fight the British government and win freedom for India. But why is he protesting about salt? It’s silly!”

“It’s not silly at all, Dhani! Do you know we all have to pay a tax on salt?”

“So what?”

“Everyone needs salt... that means, every Indian, even the poorest, has to pay this tax,” explained Binda chacha.

“That is really unfair!” Dhani’s eyes were hot with anger.

“Of course it’s unfair. Not only that, Indians are not allowed to make any salt either. Mahatmaji has asked the British to stop the tax, but they have refused. So he has decided to walk to Dandi and make salt from seawater.”

“Walking for a month!” Dhani brooded worriedly. “Gandhiji will get really tired. Why don’t they take a bus or train to Dandi instead?”

“Because, if he goes on this long march and walks all the way to Dandi, the news will spread. There will be pictures in the papers and reports on the radio, and people all over the world will know that we are fighting for our freedom. And that will really embarrass the British.”

“Gandhiji is clever, isn’t he?” Dhani’s eyes were shining. “Ah, that he is!” Binda’s eyes crinkled with laughter. “He’s even written to the Viceroy and told him what he plans to do! The British have no idea what they are in for!”

Later in the morning, Dhani wandered up to the hut where Gandhiji was staying and peered in through a window. Inside, many of the ashram people were talking to Gandhiji. Dhani heard them planning the route along which they would walk to Dandi. He was thrilled to see his father sitting among the people.

In the afternoon, when the ashram was quiet, Dhani went looking for his father. He found him under a tree, spinning on his charkha.

“Pitaji, are you and Amma going on the march to Dandi?” Dhani got straight to the point.

“I am going. You and Amma will stay here.”

“I am coming with you.”

“Don’t be silly, Dhani. You can’t walk so much. Only the ashram’s young men will go.”

“I’m nine and I can run faster than you can!” Dhani replied stubbornly. “You can’t stop me from coming with you.”

His father stopped spinning and explained patiently, “Only the people who have been chosen by Mahatmaji will go.”

“Fine! I’ll talk to him then! I’m sure he’ll say yes,” said Dhani and marched off.

Gandhiji was a very busy man and it was not easy to catch him alone. But Dhani knew exactly when he would have the time to listen – early every morning when he went for a walk around the ashram.

The next morning, as the sun came up, Dhani slipped out of bed and went looking for Gandhiji. He found him in the cowshed checking on all the cows. Then he strolled into the vegetable garden to inspect the peas and cabbage and have a chat with Binda.

All the while, Dhani and Binni followed him.

Finally, Gandhiji headed back to his hut. He sat down beside his charkha in the verandah and called out to Dhani, “Come here, child!” Dhani ran up, with Binni skipping along.

“What’s your name beta?”

“Dhani, Gandhiji.”

“And this is your goat?”

“Yes, Gandhiji! This is my friend Binni, who gives the milk you drink every morning.” Dhani smiled proudly and said, “I take care of her.”

“Good!” Gandhiji leaned forward. “Now Dhani, tell me why you and Binni have been following

me everywhere this morning?”

“I wanted to ask you something,” Dhani began nervously. “Can I come with you to Dandi?”

Gandhiji smiled, “You are too small, beta. Dandi is 385 kilometres away and only young men like your father will be able to walk with me.”

“But you are not young!” Dhani said. “Won’t you feel tired?”

“I am a very good walker,” Gandhiji replied.

“I am a good walker too.” Dhani was adamant.

“Ah yes,” Gandhiji looked thoughtful. “But there is a problem. If you go with me, who will take care of Binni? After walking for so long, I will become weak. When I come back, I’ll need to drink lots of milk to become strong again.”

“Hmm, you’re right, Gandhiji. Binni eats only when I feed her.” Dhani lovingly stroked Binni’s head, “And only I know what she likes to eat.”

“Exactly! So will you stay in the ashram and take care of Binni for me?”

"Yes, Gandhiji, I will,” said Dhani. “And Binni and I will be waiting for you.”

Fun facts of History

1. In March 1930, Mahatma Gandhi led the march to Dandi to protest against the tax on salt imposed by the British. Gandhi and his followers walked through Gujarat for 24 days. All along the way, they were welcomed with flowers and songs. Newspapers across the world carried reports about the march.

2. At Dandi, Gandhi and his followers collected salt from the seashore and were arrested. The arrest sparked off the Non-cooperation Movement, and people all over India boycotted schools, colleges and offices.

3. There were 78 volunteers who accompanied Gandhi on the march. They covered a distance of 385 kilometres.

4. The march began on 12 March and ended on 5 April 1930. The youngest marcher was 16 years old.

5. The year 2005 marks the 75th anniversary of the Dandi March.

Story Off to See Spiders! Author: Vena Kapoor

2019-03-19T15:00:00.000-07:00

Story Off to See Spiders!

Author: Vena Kapoor

We are off to see spiders, Some large as a plate,some small as a pin.

We will see so many spiders, Our heads will spin, spin, spin!

“Is that an ant or a spider?” asks Kaveri. It looks like an ant, but it has eight legs.

“Uff, ants are insects. All insects have six legs, not eight. But you are right, this does look like an ant!” says Shivi.

“Full marks,” says Shama. “It is an ant-mimic spider.”

Kaveri and Shivi love being with Shama. She is studying to be a wildlife biologist, and is full of fun facts and stories about different animals and plants.

Just then, Kaveri spots the sac spider. It's neatly rolled up inside a leaf!

“How did you find it?” asks Shivi.

“Ah! When you get to know the different signs that spiders make, you start finding them everywhere,” Shama says, with a wink.

We are off to see spiders, Some fat, some thin, some hairy.

They have eight legs and eight eyes, But don’t worry! They are not scary!

“Ummm, that looks like a crab!” says Shivi, squinting at a yellow flower.

“Ha!” Shama says. “It’s the crab spider. And look! It has caught a poor bee that was visiting the flower for nectar.”

“Ah, no wonder the bee didn’t see the spider. It’s almost the same colour as the flower,” says Kaveri.

“Look, look,” yells Shivi, pointing towards the leaves on the damp ground. A female wolf spider is carrying her egg sac.

“And there is another one! Ooh! There are hundreds of tiny baby spiders on her back!” Shama whispers in awe.

We are off to see spiders, Oh where, oh where, oh where? On grass, on leaves, on flowers, Here, there and everywhere!

Shivi is leaning on a tree trunk when suddenly he jumps in fright! Something scuttled by at lightning speed.

“There you are!” Shama says, moving closer. “See how well the two-tailed spider blends with the tree bark?”

“Here’s a spider that looks like it has only four legs,” Kaveri says excitedly, pointing towards a bush. The spider has spun a wheel-shaped web between two plants.

“What a beautiful zigzag pattern! This has to be the cross spider,” Shama exclaims.

We are off to see spiders, So far we have had quite a catch! Hey! Someone’s spinning lovely webs, On this grassy patch.

Kaveri, Shivi and Shama stumble upon

a sheet-and-tunnel web spider.

“So many webs,” Kaveri exclaims. “They look like delicate sheets!”

“This juicy grasshopper stuck in the web will become spider food soon. Slurp!” says Shivi.

“Right! It’s time to go home now,” says Shama, looking at her watch. “I have to study for my class tomorrow.”

Kaveri and Shivi’s faces fall.

“Oh don't worry, there’s plenty to see at home as well,” says Shama.

Back home, Shama spies the common house spider. “Oh! There’s the daddy-long-legs spider.”

“They are funny,” says Kaveri. “They dangle upside down and have long, long legs.”

We saw so many wondrous spiders, On grass, trees and flower heads.

Let’s crawl and look for more of them, Will we find some under our beds?

Spider Guide

Meet the spiders that Kaveri, Shivi and Shama see on their walk.

Two-tailed spiders

These spiders get their name because of their long spinning organs that look like a tail! With a flat body, these spiders blend in very well on tree trunks and walls.

Ant-mimic spiders

They behave just like ants and look like them too! These spiders in disguise trick animals and birds that like to eat spiders.

Crab spiders

With a much longer and stronger pair of front legs, these spiders often extend their legs while waiting to catch their food. This pose makes them look very much like a crab!

Wolf spiders

You will often find wolf spiders scuttling on the ground, especially where there are leaves and shrubs. A female wolf spider carries egg sacs attached to her spinning organs. When the sac opens, hundreds of baby spiders climb onto her back and stay there for several days.

Sac spiders

These spiders rest inside silken sacs that they make within rolled leaves and blades of grass. They come out of their silken retreats when they have to hunt for food.

Sheet-and-tunnel web spiders

These spiders make beautiful and delicate sheet- like webs. A tunnel at the end of the sheet web is the perfect hiding place for them. They dart out when an insect gets caught in the web.

Daddy-long-legs spiders

These common house spiders are found on the ceiling, in corners of houses and sheds. Their cobwebs may look untidy, but they catch a lot of flying insect pests.

Cross spiders

When cross spiders are on their wheel-shaped webs, they look like they’re making an X-shape! They are also called signature spiders because of the zigzag pattern they make on their webs.

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Book A Passion in the Desert By Honoré de Balzac

2019-03-18T15:30:00.000-07:00

A Passion in the Desert

Honoré de Balzac

“The whole show is dreadful,” she cried coming out of the menagerie of M. Martin. She had just been looking at that daring speculator “working with his hyena,”— to speak in the style of the programme.
“By what means,” she continued, “can he have tamed these animals to such a point as to be certain of their affection for ——”
“What seems to you a problem,” said I, interrupting, “is really quite natural.”
“Oh!” she cried, letting an incredulous smile wander over her lips.
“You think that beasts are wholly without passions?” I asked her. “Quite the reverse; we can communicate to them all the vices arising in our own state of civilization.”
She looked at me with an air of astonishment.
“But,” I continued, “the first time I saw M. Martin, I admit, like you, I did give vent to an exclamation of surprise. I found myself next to an old soldier with the right leg amputated, who had come in with me. His face had struck me. He had one of those heroic heads, stamped with the seal of warfare, and on which the battles of Napoleon are written. Besides, he had that frank, good-humored expression which always impresses me favorably. He was without doubt one of those troopers who are surprised at nothing, who find matter for laughter in the contortions of a dying comrade, who bury or plunder him quite light-heartedly, who stand intrepidly in the way of bullets; — in fact, one of those men who waste no time in deliberation, and would not hesitate to make friends with the devil himself. After looking very attentively at the proprietor of the menagerie getting out of his box, my companion pursed up his lips with an air of mockery and contempt, with that peculiar and expressive twist which superior people assume to show they are not taken in. Then, when I was expatiating on the courage of M.
Martin, he smiled, shook his head knowingly, and said, ‘Well known.’
“‘How “well known”?’ I said. ‘If you would only explain me the mystery, I should be vastly obliged.’
“After a few minutes, during which we made acquaintance, we went to dine at the first restauranteur’s whose shop caught our eye. At dessert a bottle of champagne completely refreshed and brightened up the memories of this odd old soldier. He told me his story, and I saw that he was right when he exclaimed, ‘Well
known.’”
When she got home, she teased me to that extent, was so charming, and made so many promises, that I consented to communicate to her the confidences of the old soldier. Next day she received the following episode of an epic which one might call “The French in Egypt.”
During the expedition in Upper Egypt under General Desaix, a Provencal soldier fell into the hands of the Maugrabins, and was taken by these Arabs into the deserts beyond the falls of the Nile.
In order to place a sufficient distance between themselves and the French army, the Maugrabins made forced marches, and only halted when night was upon them. They camped round a well overshadowed by palm trees under which they had previously concealed a store of provisions. Not surmising that the notion of flight would occur to their prisoner, they contented themselves with binding his hands, and after eating a few dates, and giving provender to their horses, went to sleep.
When the brave Provencal saw that his enemies were no longer watching him, he made use of his teeth to steal a scimiter, fixed the blade between his knees, and cut the cords which prevented him from using his hands; in a moment he was free.
He at once seized a rifle and a dagger, then taking the precautions to provide himself with a sack of dried dates, oats, and powder and shot, and to fasten a scimiter to his waist, he leaped on to a horse, and spurred on vigorously in the direction where he thought to find the French army. So impatient was he to see a bivouac again that he pressed on the already tired courser at such speed, that its flanks were lacerated with his spurs, and at last the poor animal died, leaving the Frenchman alone in the desert. After walking some time in the sand with all the courage of an escaped convict, the soldier was obliged to stop, as the day had already ended. In spite of the beauty of an Oriental sky at night, he felt he had not strength enough to go on. Fortunately he had been able to find a small hill, on the
summit of which a few palm trees shot up into the air; it was their verdure seen from afar which had brought hope and consolation to his heart. His fatigue was so great that he lay down upon a rock of granite, capriciously cut out like a camp-bed; there he fell asleep without taking any precaution to defend himself while he slept. He had made the sacrifice of his life. His last thought was one of regret. He repented having left the Maugrabins, whose nomadic life seemed to smile upon him now that he was far from them and without help. He was awakened by the sun, whose pitiless rays fell with all their force on the granite and produced an intolerable heat — for he had had the stupidity to place himself adversely to the shadow thrown by the verdant majestic heads of the palm trees. He looked at the solitary trees and shuddered — they reminded him of the graceful shafts crowned with foliage which characterize the Saracen columns in the cathedral of Arles.
But when, after counting the palm trees, he cast his eyes around him, the most horrible despair was infused into his soul. Before him stretched an ocean without limit. The dark sand of the desert spread further than eye could reach in every direction, and glittered like steel struck with bright light. It might have been a sea of looking-glass, or lakes melted together in a mirror. A fiery vapor carried up in surging waves made a perpetual whirlwind over the quivering land. The sky was lit with an Oriental splendor of insupportable purity, leaving naught for the imagination to desire. Heaven and earth were on fire.
The silence was awful in its wild and terrible majesty. Infinity, immensity, closed in upon the soul from every side. Not a cloud in the sky, not a breath in the air, not a flaw on the bosom of the sand, ever moving in diminutive waves; the horizon ended as at sea on a clear day, with one line of light, definite as the cut of a
sword.
The Provencal threw his arms round the trunk of one of the palm trees, as though it were the body of a friend, and then, in the shelter of the thin, straight shadow that the palm cast upon the granite, he wept. Then sitting down he remained as he was, contemplating with profound sadness the implacable scene, which was all he had to look upon. He cried aloud, to measure the solitude. His voice, lost in the hollows of the hill, sounded faintly, and aroused no echo — the echo was in his own heart. The Provencal was twenty-two years old:— he loaded his carbine.
“There’ll be time enough,” he said to himself, laying on the ground the weapon which alone could bring him deliverance.
Viewing alternately the dark expanse of the desert and the blue expanse of the sky, the soldier dreamed of France — he smelled with delight the gutters of Paris — he remembered the towns through which he had passed, the faces of his comrades, the most minute details of his life. His Southern fancy soon showed
him the stones of his beloved Provence, in the play of the heat which undulated above the wide expanse of the desert. Realizing the danger of this cruel mirage, he went down the opposite side of the hill to that by which he had come up the day before. The remains of a rug showed that this place of refuge had at one time been inhabited; at a short distance he saw some palm trees full of dates. Then the instinct which binds us to life awoke again in his heart. He hoped to live long enough to await the passing of some Maugrabins, or perhaps he might hear the sound of cannon; for at this time Bonaparte was traversing Egypt.
This thought gave him new life. The palm tree seemed to bend with the weight of the ripe fruit. He shook some of it down. When he tasted this unhoped- for manna, he felt sure that the palms had been cultivated by a former inhabitant — the savory, fresh meat of the dates were proof of the care of his predecessor. He passed suddenly from dark despair to an almost insane joy. He went up again to the top of the hill, and spent the rest of the day in cutting down one of the sterile palm trees, which the night before had served him for shelter. A vague memory made him think of the animals of the desert; and in case they might come to drink at the spring, visible from the base of the rocks but lost further down, he resolved to guard himself from their visits by placing a barrier at the entrance of his hermitage.
In spite of his diligence, and the strength which the fear of being devoured asleep gave him, he was unable to cut the palm in pieces, though he succeeded in cutting it down. At eventide the king of the desert fell; the sound of its fall resounded far and wide, like a sigh in the solitude; the soldier shuddered as
though he had heard some voice predicting woe.
But like an heir who does not long bewail a deceased relative, he tore off from this beautiful tree the tall broad green leaves which are its poetic adornment, and used them to mend the mat on which he was to sleep.
Fatigued by the heat and his work, he fell asleep under the red curtains of his wet cave.
In the middle of the night his sleep was troubled by an extraordinary noise; he sat up, and the deep silence around allowed him to distinguish the alternative accents of a respiration whose savage energy could not belong to a human
creature.
A profound terror, increased still further by the darkness, the silence, and his waking images, froze his heart within him. He almost felt his hair stand on end, when by straining his eyes to their utmost he perceived through the shadow two faint yellow lights. At first he attributed these lights to the reflections of his own pupils, but soon the vivid brilliance of the night aided him gradually to distinguish the objects around him in the cave, and he beheld a huge animal lying but two steps from him. Was it a lion, a tiger, or a crocodile?
The Provencal was not sufficiently educated to know under what species his enemy ought to be classed; but his fright was all the greater, as his ignorance led him to imagine all terrors at once; he endured a cruel torture, noting every variation of the breathing close to him without daring to make the slightest movement. An odor, pungent like that of a fox, but more penetrating, more profound — so to speak — filled the cave, and when the Provencal became sensible of this, his terror reached its height, for he could no longer doubt the proximity of a terrible companion, whose royal dwelling served him for a shelter.
Presently the reflection of the moon descending on the horizon lit up the den, rendering gradually visible and resplendent the spotted skin of a panther.
This lion of Egypt slept, curled up like a big dog, the peaceful possessor of a sumptuous niche at the gate of an hotel; its eyes opened for a moment and closed again; its face was turned towards the man. A thousand confused thoughts passed through the Frenchman’s mind; first he thought of killing it with a bullet from his gun, but he saw there was not enough distance between them for him to take proper aim — the shot would miss the mark. And if it were to wake! — the thought
made his limbs rigid. He listened to his own heart beating in the midst of the silence, and cursed the too violent pulsations which the flow of blood brought on, fearing to disturb that sleep which allowed him time to think of some means of escape.
Twice he placed his hand on his scimiter, intending to cut off the head of his enemy; but the difficulty of cutting the stiff short hair compelled him to abandon this daring project. To miss would be to die for CERTAIN, he thought; he preferred the chances of fair fight, and made up his mind to wait till morning; the morning did not leave him long to wait.
He could now examine the panther at ease; its muzzle was smeared with blood.
“She’s had a good dinner,” he thought, without troubling himself as to whether her feast might have been on human flesh. “She won’t be hungry when she gets up.”
It was a female. The fur on her belly and flanks was glistening white; many small marks like velvet formed beautiful bracelets round her feet; her sinuous tail was also white, ending with black rings; the overpart of her dress, yellow like burnished gold, very lissome and soft, had the characteristic blotches in the form of rosettes, which distinguish the panther from every other feline species.
This tranquil and formidable hostess snored in an attitude as graceful as that of a cat lying on a cushion. Her blood-stained paws, nervous and well armed, were stretched out before her face, which rested upon them, and from which radiated her straight slender whiskers, like threads of silver.
If she had been like that in a cage, the Provencal would doubtless have admired the grace of the animal, and the vigorous contrasts of vivid color which gave her robe an imperial splendor; but just then his sight was troubled by her
sinister appearance.
The presence of the panther, even asleep, could not fail to produce the effect which the magnetic eyes of the serpent are said to have on the nightingale.
For a moment the courage of the soldier began to fail before this danger, though no doubt it would have risen at the mouth of a cannon charged with shell.
Nevertheless, a bold thought brought daylight to his soul and sealed up the source of the cold sweat which sprang forth on his brow. Like men driven to bay, who defy death and offer their body to the smiter, so he, seeing in this merely a tragic episode, resolved to play his part with honor to the last.
“The day before yesterday the Arabs would have killed me, perhaps,” he said; so considering himself as good as dead already, he waited bravely, with excited curiosity, the awakening of his enemy.
When the sun appeared, the panther suddenly opened her eyes; then she put out her paws with energy, as if to stretch them and get rid of cramp. At last she yawned, showing the formidable apparatus of her teeth and pointed tongue, rough as a file.
“A regular petite maitresse,” thought the Frenchman, seeing her roll herself about so softly and coquettishly. She licked off the blood which stained her paws and muzzle, and scratched her head with reiterated gestures full of prettiness. “All right, make a little toilet,” the Frenchman said to himself, beginning to recover his gaiety with his courage; “we’ll say good morning to each other presently;” and he seized the small, short dagger which he had taken from the Maugrabins.
At this moment the panther turned her head toward the man and looked at him fixedly without moving. The rigidity of her metallic eyes and their insupportable luster made him shudder, especially when the animal walked towards him. But he looked at her caressingly, staring into her eyes in order to magnetize her, and let her come quite close to him; then with a movement both gentle and amorous, as though he were caressing the most beautiful of women, he passed his hand over her whole body, from the head to the tail, scratching the flexible vertebrae which divided the panther’s yellow back. The animal waved her
tail voluptuously, and her eyes grew gentle; and when for the third time the Frenchman accomplished this interesting flattery, she gave forth one of those purrings by which cats express their pleasure; but this murmur issued from a throat so powerful and so deep that it resounded through the cave like the last vibrations of an organ in a church. The man, understanding the importance of his caresses, redoubled them in such a way as to surprise and stupefy his imperious courtesan. When he felt sure of having extinguished the ferocity of his capricious companion, whose hunger had so fortunately been satisfied the day before, he got up to go out of the cave; the panther let him go out, but when he had reached the summit of the hill she sprang with the lightness of a sparrow hopping from twig to twig, and rubbed herself against his legs, putting up her back after the manner of all the race of cats. Then regarding her guest with eyes whose glare had softened a
little, she gave vent to that wild cry which naturalists compare to the grating of a saw.
“She is exacting,” said the Frenchman, smilingly.
He was bold enough to play with her ears; he caressed her belly and scratched her head as hard as he could. When he saw that he was successful, he tickled her skull with the point of his dagger, watching for the right moment to kill her, but the hardness of her bones made him tremble for his success.
The sultana of the desert showed herself gracious to her slave; she lifted her head, stretched out her neck and manifested her delight by the tranquility of her attitude. It suddenly occurred to the soldier that to kill this savage princess with one blow he must poniard her in the throat.
He raised the blade, when the panther, satisfied no doubt, laid herself gracefully at his feet, and cast up at him glances in which, in spite of their natural fierceness, was mingled confusedly a kind of good will. The poor Provencal ate his
dates, leaning against one of the palm trees, and casting his eyes alternately on the desert in quest of some liberator and on his terrible companion to watch her uncertain clemency.
The panther looked at the place where the date stones fell, and every time that he threw one down her eyes expressed an incredible mistrust.
She examined the man with an almost commercial prudence. However, this examination was favorable to him, for when he had finished his meager meal she licked his boots with her powerful rough tongue, brushing off with marvelous skill the dust gathered in the creases.
“Ah, but when she’s really hungry!” thought the Frenchman. In spite of the shudder this thought caused him, the soldier began to measure curiously the proportions of the panther, certainly one of the most splendid specimens of its race. She was three feet high and four feet long without counting her tail; this powerful weapon, rounded like a cudgel, was nearly three feet long. The head, large as that of a lioness, was distinguished by a rare expression of refinement.
The cold cruelty of a tiger was dominant, it was true, but there was also a vague resemblance to the face of a sensual woman. Indeed, the face of this solitary queen had something of the gaiety of a drunken Nero: she had satiated herself with blood, and she wanted to play.

The soldier tried if he might walk up and down, and the panther left him free, contenting herself with following him with her eyes, less like a faithful dog than a big Angora cat, observing everything and every movement of her master.
When he looked around, he saw, by the spring, the remains of his horse; the panther had dragged the carcass all that way; about two thirds of it had been devoured already. The sight reassured him.
It was easy to explain the panther’s absence, and the respect she had had for him while he slept. The first piece of good luck emboldened him to tempt the future, and he conceived the wild hope of continuing on good terms with the panther during the entire day, neglecting no means of taming her, and remaining
in her good graces.
He returned to her, and had the unspeakable joy of seeing her wag her tail with an almost imperceptible movement at his approach. He sat down then, without fear, by her side, and they began to play together; he took her paws and muzzle, pulled her ears, rolled her over on her back, stroked her warm, delicate flanks. She let him do what ever he liked, and when he began to stroke the hair on her feet she drew her claws in carefully.
The man, keeping the dagger in one hand, thought to plunge it into the belly of the too confiding panther, but he was afraid that he would be immediately strangled in her last convulsive struggle; besides, he felt in his heart a sort of remorse which bid him respect a creature that had done him no harm. He seemed to have found a friend, in a boundless desert; half unconsciously he thought of his first sweetheart, whom he had nicknamed “Mignonne” by way of contrast, because she was so atrociously jealous that all the time of their love he was in fear of the knife with which she had always threatened him.
This memory of his early days suggested to him the idea of making the young panther answer to this name, now that he began to admire with less terror her swiftness, suppleness, and softness. Toward the end of the day he had familiarized himself with his perilous position; he now almost liked the painfulness of it. At last his companion had got into the habit of looking up at him whenever he cried in a falsetto voice, “Mignonne.”
At the setting of the sun Mignonne gave, several times running, a profound melancholy cry. “She’s been well brought up,” said the lighthearted soldier; “she says her prayers.” But this mental joke only occurred to him when he noticed what a pacific attitude his companion remained in. “Come, ma petite blonde, I’ll let you go to bed first,” he said to her, counting on the activity of his own legs to run away as quickly as possible, directly she was asleep, and seek another shelter for the night.
The soldier waited with impatience the hour of his flight, and when it had arrived he walked vigorously in the direction of the Nile; but hardly had he made a quarter of a league in the sand when he heard the panther bounding after him, crying with that saw-like cry more dreadful even than the sound of her leaping.
“Ah!” he said, “then she’s taken a fancy to me, she has never met anyone before, and it is really quite flattering to have her first love.” That instant the man fell into one of those movable quicksands so terrible to travelers and from which it is impossible to save oneself. Feeling himself caught, he gave a shriek of alarm; the panther seized him with her teeth by the collar, and, springing vigorously backwards, drew him as if by magic out of the whirling sand.
“Ah, Mignonne!” cried the soldier, caressing her enthusiastically; “we’re bound together for life and death but no jokes, mind!” and he retraced his steps.
From that time the desert seemed inhabited. It contained a being to whom the man could talk, and whose ferocity was rendered gentle by him, though he could not explain to himself the reason for their strange friendship. Great as was the soldier’s desire to stay upon guard, he slept.

On awakening he could not find Mignonne; he mounted the hill, and in the distance saw her springing toward him after the habit of these animals, who cannot run on account of the extreme flexibility of the vertebral column.

Mignonne arrived, her jaws covered with blood; she received the wonted caress of her companion, showing with much purring how happy it made her. Her eyes, full of languor, turned still more gently than the day before toward the Provencal, who talked to her as one would to a tame animal.
“Ah! mademoiselle, you are a nice girl, aren’t you? Just look at that! So we like to be made much of, don’t we? Aren’t you ashamed of yourself? So you have been eating some Arab or other, have you? That doesn’t matter. They’re animals just the same as you are; but don’t you take to eating Frenchmen, or I shan’t like you any longer.”
She played like a dog with its master, letting herself be rolled over, knocked about, and stroked, alternately; sometimes she herself would provoke the soldier, putting up her paw with a soliciting gesture.
Some days passed in this manner. This companionship permitted the Provencal to appreciate the sublime beauty of the desert; now that he had a living thing to think about, alternations of fear and quiet, and plenty to eat, his mind became filled with contrast and his life began to be diversified.
Solitude revealed to him all her secrets, and enveloped him in her delights.
He discovered in the rising and setting of the sun sights unknown to the world. He knew what it was to tremble when he heard over his head the hiss of a bird’s wing, so rarely did they pass, or when he saw the clouds, changing and many colored
travelers, melt one into another. He studied in the night time the effect of the moon upon the ocean of sand, where the simoom made waves swift of movement and rapid in their change. He lived the life of the Eastern day, marveling at its
wonderful pomp; then, after having reveled in the sight of a hurricane over the plain where the whirling sands made red, dry mists and death-bearing clouds, he would welcome the night with joy, for then fell the healthful freshness of the stars,
and he listened to imaginary music in the skies. Then solitude taught him to unroll the treasures of dreams. He passed whole hours in remembering mere nothings, and comparing his present life with his past.
At last he grew passionately fond of the panther; for some sort of affection was a necessity.
Whether it was that his will powerfully projected had modified the character of his companion, or whether, because she found abundant food in her predatory excursions in the desert, she respected the man’s life, he began to fear for it no longer, seeing her so well tamed.
He devoted the greater part of his time to sleep, but he was obliged to watch like a spider in its web that the moment of his deliverance might not escape him, if anyone should pass the line marked by the horizon. He had sacrificed his shirt to make a flag with, which he hung at the top of a palm tree, whose foliage he had torn off. Taught by necessity, he found the means of keeping it spread out, by fastening it with little sticks; for the wind might not be blowing at the moment when the passing traveler was looking through the desert.
It was during the long hours, when he had abandoned hope, that he amused himself with the panther. He had come to learn the different inflections of her voice, the expressions of her eyes; he had studied the capricious patterns of all the rosettes which marked the gold of her robe. Mignonne was not even angry when he took hold of the tuft at the end of her tail to count her rings, those graceful ornaments which glittered in the sun like jewelry. It gave him pleasure to contemplate the supple, fine outlines of her form, the whiteness of her belly, the graceful pose of her head. But it was especially when she was playing that he felt most pleasure in looking at her; the agility and youthful lightness of her movements were a continual surprise to him; he wondered at the supple way in which she jumped and climbed, washed herself and arranged her fur, crouched
down and prepared to spring. However rapid her spring might be, however slippery the stone she was on, she would always stop short at the word “Mignonne.”
One day, in a bright midday sun, an enormous bird coursed through the air.
The man left his panther to look at his new guest; but after waiting a moment the deserted sultana growled deeply.
“My goodness! I do believe she’s jealous,” he cried, seeing her eyes become hard again; “the soul of Virginie has passed into her body; that’s certain.”
The eagle disappeared into the air, while the soldier admired the curved contour of the panther.
But there was such youth and grace in her form! she was beautiful as a woman! the blond fur of her robe mingled well with the delicate tints of faint white which marked her flanks.
The profuse light cast down by the sun made this living gold, these russet markings, to burn in a way to give them an indefinable attraction.
The man and the panther looked at one another with a look full of meaning; the coquette quivered when she felt her friend stroke her head; her eyes flashed like lightning — then she shut them tightly.
“She has a soul,” he said, looking at the stillness of this queen of the sands, golden like them, white like them, solitary and burning like them.
“Well,” she said, “I have read your plea in favor of beasts; but how did two so well adapted to understand each other end?”
“Ah, well! you see, they ended as all great passions do end — by a misunderstanding. For some reason ONE suspects the other of treason; they don’t come to an explanation through pride, and quarrel and part from sheer obstinacy.”
“Yet sometimes at the best moments a single word or a look is enough — but anyhow go on with your story.”
“It’s horribly difficult, but you will understand, after what the old villain told me over his champagne. He said —‘I don’t know if I hurt her, but she turned round, as if enraged, and with her sharp teeth caught hold of my leg — gently, I daresay; but I, thinking she would devour me, plunged my dagger into her throat.
She rolled over, giving a cry that froze my heart; and I saw her dying, still looking at me without anger. I would have given all the world — my cross even, which I had not got then — to have brought her to life again. It was as though I had murdered a real person; and the soldiers who had seen my flag, and were come to my assistance, found me in tears.’
“‘Well sir,’ he said, after a moment of silence, ‘since then I have been in war in Germany, in Spain, in Russia, in France; I’ve certainly carried my carcase about a good deal, but never have I seen anything like the desert. Ah! yes, it is very beautiful!’
“‘What did you feel there?’ I asked him.
“‘Oh! that can’t be described, young man! Besides, I am not always regretting my palm trees and my panther. I should have to be very melancholy for that. In the desert, you see, there is everything and nothing.’
“‘Yes, but explain ——’ “‘Well,’ he said, with an impatient gesture, ‘it is God without mankind.’”

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STORY MY FATHER’S DRAGON BY RUTH STILES GANNETT

2019-03-17T15:30:00.000-07:00

STORY MY FATHER’S DRAGON

BY RUTH STILES GANNETT

Chapter One

MY FATHER MEETS THE CAT

One cold rainy day when my father was a little boy,he met an old alley cat on his street.

The cat was very drippy and uncomfortable so my father said, “Wouldn’t you like to come home with me?”

This surprised the cat—she had never before met anyone who cared about old alley cats—but she said, “I’d be very much obliged if I could sit by a warm furnace, and perhaps have a saucer of milk.”

“We have a very nice furnace to sit by,” said my father, “and I’m sure my mother has an extra saucer of milk.”

My father and the cat became good friends but my father’s mother was very upset about the cat. She hated cats, particularly ugly old alley cats.

“Elmer Elevator,” she said to my father, “if you think I’m going to give that cat a saucer of milk, you’re very wrong.

Once you start feeding stray alley cats you might as well expect to feed every stray in town, and I am not going to do it!”

This made my father very sad, and he apologized to the cat because his mother had been so rude. He told the cat to stay anyway, and that somehow he would bring her a saucer of milk each day.

My father fed the cat for three weeks, but one day his mother found the cat’s saucer in the cellar and she was extremely angry.

She whipped my father and threw the cat out the door, but later on my father sneaked out and found the cat.

Together they went for a walk in the park and tried to think of nice things to talk about. My father said, “When I grow up I’m going to have an airplane. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to fly just anywhere you might think of!”

“Would you like to fly very, very much?” asked the cat.

“I certainly would. I’d do anything if I could fly.”

“Well,” said the cat, “If you’d really like to fly that much, I think I know of a sort of a way you might get to fly while you’re still a little boy.”

“You mean you know where I could get an airplane?”

“Well, not exactly an airplane, but something even better. As you can see, I’m an old cat now, but in my younger days I was quite a traveler.

My traveling days are over but last spring I took just one more trip and sailed to the Island of Tangerina, stopping at the port of Cranberry.

Well, it just so happened that I missed the boat, and while waiting for the next I thought I’d look around a bit.

I was particularly interested in a place called Wild Island, which we had passed on our way to Tangerina.

Wild Island and Tangerina are joined together by a long string of rocks, but people never go to Wild Island because it’s mostly jungle and inhabited by very wild animals.

So, I decided to go across the rocks and explore it for myself.

It certainly is an interesting place, but I saw something there that made me want to weep.”

Chapter Two

MY FATHER RUNS AWAY

“Wild Island is practically cut in two by a very wide and muddy river,” continued the cat.

“This river begins near one end of the island and flows into the ocean at the other. Now the animals there are very lazy, and they used to hate having to go all the way around the beginning of this river to get to the other side of the island.

It made visiting inconvenient and mail deliveries slow, particularly during the Christmas rush. Crocodiles could have carried passengers and mail across the river, but crocodiles are very moody, and not the least bit dependable, and are always looking for something to eat. They don’t care if the animals have to walk around the river, so that’s just what the animals did for many years.”

“But what does all this have to do with airplanes?” asked my father, who thought the cat was taking an awfully long time to explain.

“Be patient, Elmer,” said the cat, and she went on with the story.

“One day about four months before I arrived on Wild Island a baby dragon fell from a low-flying cloud onto the bank of the river.

He was too young to fly very well, and besides, he had bruised one wing quite badly, so he couldn’t get back to his cloud.

The animals found him soon afterwards and everybody said, ‘Why, this is just exactly what we’ve needed all these years!’ They tied a big rope around his neck and waited for the wing to get well.

This was going to end all their crossing-the-river troubles.”

“I’ve never seen a dragon,” said my father.

“Did you see him? How big is he?”

“Oh, yes, indeed I saw the dragon.

In fact, we became great friends,” said the cat.

“I used to hide in the bushes and talk to him when nobody was around.

He’s not a very big dragon, about the size of a large black bear, although I imagine he’s grown quite a bit since I left.

He’s got a long tail and yellow and blue stripes.

His horn and eyes and the bottoms of his feet are bright red, and he has gold-colored wings.”

“Oh, how wonderful!” said my father.

“What did the animals do with him when his wing got well?”

“They started training him to carry passengers, and even though he is just a baby dragon, they work him all day and all night too sometimes.

They make him carry loads that are much too heavy, and if he complains, they twist his wings and beat him. He’s always tied to a stake on a rope just long enough to go across the river.His only friends are the crocodiles, who say ‘Hello’to him once a week if they don’t forget. Really, he’s the most miserable animal I’ve ever come across.

When I left I promised I’d try to help him someday, although I couldn’t see how. The rope around his neck is about the biggest, toughest rope you can imagine, with so many knots it would take days to untie them all.

“Anyway, when you were talking about airplanes, you gave me a good idea.

Now, I’m quite sure that if you were able to rescue the dragon, which wouldn’t be the least bit easy, he’d let you ride him mo st anywhere, provided you were nice to him, of course. How about trying it?”

“Oh, I’d love to,” said my father, and he was so angry at his mother for being rude to the cat that he didn’t feel the least bit sad about running away from home for a while.

That very afternoon my father and the cat went down to the docks to see about ships going to the Island of Tangerina.

They found out that a ship would be sailing the next week, so right away they started planning for the rescue of the dragon.

The cat was a great help in suggesting things for my father to take with him, and she told him everything she knew about Wild Island. Of course, she was too old to go along.

Everything had to be kept very secret, so when they found or bought anything to take on the trip they hid it behind a rock in the park.

The night before my father sailed he borrowed his father’s knapsack and he and the cat packed everything very carefully.

He took chewing gum, two dozen pink lollipops, a package of rubber bands, black rubber boots, a compass, a tooth brush and a tube of tooth paste, six magnifying glasses, a very sharp jackknife, a comb and a hairbrush, seven hair ribbons of different colors, an empty grain bag with a label saying “Cranberry,” some clean clothes, and enough food to last my father while he was on the ship.

He couldn’t live on mice, so he took twenty-five peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and six apples, because that’s all the apples he could find in the pantry.

When everything was packed my father and the cat went down to the docks to the ship.

A night watchman was on duty, so while the cat made loud queer noises to distract his attention, my father ran over the gang -plank onto the ship. He went down into the hold and hid among some bags of wheat. The ship sailed early the next morning.

Chapter Three

MY FATHER FINDS THE ISLAND

My father hid in the hold for six days and nights.

Twice he was nearly caught when the ship stopped to take on more cargo. But at last he heard a sailor say that the next port would be Cranberry and that they’d be unloading the wheat there.

My father knew that the sailors would send him home if they caught him, so he looked in his knapsack and took out a rubber band and the empty grain bag with the label saying “Cranberry.”

At the last moment my father got inside the bag, knapsack and all, folded the top of the bag inside, and put the rubber band around the top.

He didn’t look just exactly like the other bags but it was the best he could do.

Soon the sailors came to unload.

They lowered a big net into the hold and began moving the bags of wheat.

Suddenly one sailor yelled, “Great Scott! This is the queerest bag of wheat I’ve ever seen! It’s all lumpy -like, but the label says it’s to go to Cranberry.”

The other sailors looked at the bag too, and my father, who was in the bag, of course, tried even harder to look like a bag of wheat.

Then another sailor felt the bag and he just happened to get hold of my father’s elbow. “I know what this is,” he said. “This is a bag of dried corn on the cob,” and he dumped my father into the big net along with the bags of wheat.

This all happened in the late afternoon, so late that the merchant in Cranberry who had ordered the wheat didn’t count his bags until the next morning.

(He was a very punctual man, and never late for dinner.)

The sailors told the captain, and the captain wrote down on a piece of paper, that they had delivered one hundred and sixty bags of wheat and one bag of dried corn on the cob. They left the piece of paper for the merchant and sailed away that evening.

My father heard later that the merchant spent the whole next day counting and recounting the bags and feeling each one trying to find the bag of dried corn on the cob.

He never found it because as soon as it was dark my father climbed out of the bag, folded it up and put it back in his knapsack. He walked along the shore to a nice sandy place and lay down to sleep.

My father was very hungry when he woke up the next morning. Just as he was looking to see if he had anything left to eat, so mething hit him on the head. It was a tangerine.

He had been sleeping right under a tree full of big, fat tangerines. And then he remembered that this was the Island of Tangerina. Tangerine trees grew wild everywhere.

My father picked as many as he had room for, which was thirty-one, and started off to find WildIsland.

He walked and walked and walked along the shore, looking for the rocks that joined the two islands.

He walked all day, and once when he met a fisherman and asked him about Wild Island, the fisherman began to shake and couldn’t talk for a long while. It scared him that much, just thinking about it. Finally he said, “Many people have tried to explore Wild Island, but not one has come back alive.

We think they were eaten by the wild animals.”

This didn’t bother my father.He kept walking and slept on the beach again that night.

It was beautifully clear the next day, and way down the shore my father could see a long line of rocks leading out into the ocean, and way, way out at the end he could just see a tiny patch of green.

He quickly ate seven tangerines and started down the beach.

It was almost dark when he came to the rocks, but there, way out in the ocean, was the patch of green.

He sat down and rested a while, remembering that the cat had said, “If you can, go out to the island at night, because then the wild animals won’t see you coming along the rocks and you can hide when you get there.”

So my father picked seven more tangerines, put on his black rubber boots, and waited for dark.

It was a very black night and my father could hardly see the rocks ahead of him.

Sometimes they were quite high and sometimes the waves almost covered them, and they were slippery and hard to walk on. Sometimes the rocks were far apart and my father had to get a running start and leap from one to the next.

After a while he began to hear a rumbling noise.

It grew louder and louder as he got nearer to the island.

At last it seemed as if he was right on top of the noise, and he was.

He had jumped from a rock onto the back of a small whale who was fast asleep and cuddled up between two rocks.

The whale was snoring and making more noise than a steam shovel, so it never heard my father say, “Oh, I didn’t know that was you!”

And it never knew my father had jumped on its back by mistake.

For seven hours my father climbed and slipped and leapt from rock to rock, but while it was still dark he finally reached the very last rock and stepped off onto Wild Island.

Chapter Four

MY FATHER FINDS THE RIVER

The jungle began just beyond a narrow strip of beach; thick, dark, damp, scary jungle.

My father hardly knew where to go, so he crawled under a wahoo bush to think, and ate eight tangerines.

The first thing to do, he decided, was to find the river, because the dragon was tied somewhere along its bank.

Then he thought, “If the river flows into the ocean, I ought to be able to find it quite easily if I just walk along the beach far enough.”

So my father walked until the sun rose and he was quite far from the Ocean Rocks. It was dangerous to stay near them because they might be guarded in the daytime.

He found a clump of tall grass and sat down. Then he took off his rubber boots and ate three more tangerines.

He could have eaten twelve but he hadn’t seen any tangerines on this island and he could not risk running out of something to eat.

My father slept all that day and only woke up late in the afternoon when he heard a funny little voice saying, “Queer, queer, what a dear little dock! I mean, dear, dear, what a queer little rock!” My father saw a tiny paw rubbing itself on his knapsack.

He lay very still and the mouse, for it was a mouse, hurried away muttering to itself, “I must smell tumduddy. I mean, I must tell somebody.”

My father waited a few minutes and then started d own the beach because it was almost dark now, and he was afraid the mouse really would tell somebody.

He walked all night and two scary things happened.

First, he just had to sneeze, so he did, and somebody close by said, “Is that you, Monkey?” My father said, “Yes.”

Then the voice said, “You must have something on your back, Monkey,” and my father said “Yes,” because he did. He had his knapsack on his back. “What do you have on your back, Monkey?” asked the voice.

My father didn’t know what to say because what would a monkey have on its back, and how would it sound telling someone about it if it did have something? Just then another voice said, “I bet you’re taking your sick grandmother to the doctor’s.”

My father said “Yes” and hurried on.

Quite by accident he found out later that he had been talking to a pair of tortoises.

The second thing that happened was that he nearly walked right between two wild boars who were talking in low solemn whispers. When he first saw the dark shapes he thought they were boulders. Just in time he heard one of them say, “There are three signs of a recent invasion. First, fresh tangerine peels were found under the wahoo bush near the Ocean Rocks. Second, a mouse reported an extraordinary rock some distance from the Ocean Rocks which upon further investigation simply wasn’t there. However, more fresh tangerine peels were found in the same spot, which is the third sign of invasion. Since tangerines do not grow on our island, somebody must have brought them across the Ocean Rocks from the other island, which may, or may not, have something to do with the appearance and/or disappearance of the extraordinary rock reported by the mouse.”

After a long silence the other boar said, “You know, I think we’re taking all this too seriously. Those peels probably floated over here all by themselves, and you know how unreliable mice are. Besides, if there had been an invasion, I would have seen it!”

“Perhaps you’re right,” said the first boar. “Shall we retire?” Whereupon they both trundled back into the jungle.

Well, that taught my father a lesson, and after that he saved all his tangerine peels.

He walked all night and toward morning came to the river.

Then his troubles really began.

Chapter Five

MY FATHER MEETS SOME TIGERS

The river was very wide and muddy, and the jungle was very gloomy and dense.

The trees grew close to each other, and what room there was between them was taken up by great high ferns with sticky leaves.

My father hated to leave the beach, but he decided to start along the river bank where at least the jungle wasn’t quite so thick.

He ate three tangerines, making sure to keep all the peels this time, and put on his rubber boots.

My father tried to follow the river bank but it was very swampy, and as he went farther the swamp became deeper. When it was almost as deep as his boot tops he got stuck in the oozy, mucky mud. My father tugged and tugged, and nearly pulled his boots right off, but at last he managed to wade to a drier place.

Here the jungle was so thick that he could hardly see where the river was.

He unpacked his compass and figured out the direction he should walk in order to stay near the river. But he didn’t know that the river made a very sharp curve away from him just a little way beyond, and so as he walked straight ahead he was getting farther and farther away from the river. It was very hard to walk in the jungle. The sticky leaves of the ferns caught at my father’s hair, and he kept tripping over roots and rotten logs. Sometimes the trees were clumped so closely together that he couldn’t squeeze between them and had to walk a long way around.

He began to hear whispery noises, but he couldn’t see any animals anywhere. The deeper into the jungle he went the surer he was that something was following him, and then he thought he heard whispery noises on both sides of him as well as behind. He tried to run, but he tripped over more roots, and the noises only came nearer.

Once or twice he thought he heard something laughing at him.

At last he came out into a clearing and ran right into the middle of it so that he could see anything that might try to attack him. Was he surprised when he looked and saw fourteen green eyes coming out of the jungle all around the clearing, and when the green eyes turned into seven tigers! The tigers walked around him in a big circle, looking hungrier all the time, and then they sat down and began to talk.

“I suppose you thought we didn’t know you were trespassing in our jungle!”

Then the next tiger spoke.

“I suppose you’re goin g to say you didn’t know it was our jungle!”

“Did you know that not one explorer has ever left this island alive?” said the third tiger.

My father thought of the cat and knew this wasn’t true.

But of course he had too much sense to say so.

One doesn’t contradict a hungry tiger.

The tigers went on talking in turn.

“You’re our first little boy, you know.

I’m curious to know if you’re especially tender.”

“Maybe you think we have regular meal-times, but we don’t. We just eat whenever we’re feeling hungry,” said the fifth tiger.

“And we’re very hungry right now.

In fact, I can hardly wait,” said the sixth.

“I can’t wait!” said the seventh tiger.

And then all the tigers said together in a loud roar, “Let’s begin right now!” and they moved in closer.

My father looked at those seven hungry tigers, and then he had an idea.

He quickly opened his knapsack and took out the chewing gum. The cat had told him that tigers were especially fond of chewing gum, which was very scarce on the island.

So he threw them each a piece but they only growled, “As fond as we are of chewing gum, we’re sure we’d like you even better!” and they moved so close that he could feel them breathing on his face.

“But this is very special chewing gum,” said my father.

“If you keep on chewing it long enough it will turn green, and then if you plant it, it will grow more chewing gum, and the sooner you start chewing the sooner you’ll have more.”

The tigers said, “Why,you don’t say! Isn’t that fine!” And as each one wanted to be the first to plant the chewing gum, they all unwrapped their pieces and began chewing as hard as they could. Every once in a while one tiger would look into another’s mouth and say, “Nope, it’s not done yet,” until finally they were all so busy looking into each other’s mout hs to make sure that no one was getting ahead that they forgot all about my father.

Chapter Six

MY FATHER MEETS A RHINOCEROS

My father soon found a trail leading away from the clearing.

All sorts of animals might be using it too, but he decided to follow the trail no matter what he met because it might lead to the dragon.

He kept a sharp lookout in front and behind and went on.

Just as he was feeling quite safe, he came around a curve right behind the two wild boars.

One of them was saying to the other, “Did you know that the tortoises thought they saw Monkey carrying his sick grandmother to the doctor’s last night? But Monkey’s grandmother died a week ago, so they must have seen something else.

I wonder what it was.”

“I told you that there was an invasion afoot,” said the other boar, “and I intend to find out what it is.

I simply can’t stand invasions.”

“Nee meither,” said a tiny little voice.

“I mean, me neither,” and my father knew that the mouse was there, too.

“Well,” said the first boar, “you search the trail up this way to the dragon.

I’ll go back down the other way through the big clearing, and we’ll send Mouse to watch the Ocean Rocks in case the invasion should decide to go away before we find it.”

My father hid behind a mahogany tree ju st in time, and the first boar walked right past him.

My father waited for the other boar to get a head start on him, but he didn’t wait very long because he knew that when the first boar saw the tigers chewing gum in the clearing, he’d be even more suspicious.

Soon the trail crossed a little brook and my father, who by this time was very thirsty, stopped to get a drink of water.

He still had on his rubber boots, so he waded into a little pool of water and was stooping down when something quite sharp picked him up by the seat of the pants and shook him very hard. “Don’t you know that’smy private weeping pool?” said a deep angry voice.

My father couldn’t see who was talking because he was hanging in the air right over the pool, but he said, “Oh, no, I’m so sorry.

I didn’t know that everybody had a private weeping pool.”

“Everybody doesn’t!” said the angry voice, “but I do because I have such a big thing to weep about, and I drown everybody I find using my weeping pool.”

With that the animal tossed my father up and down over thewater.

“What—is it—that—you—weep about—so much?” asked my father, trying to get his breath, and he thought over all the things he had in his pack.

“Oh, I have many things to weep about, but the biggest thing is the color of my tusk.” My father squirmed every which way trying to see the tusk, but it was through the seat of his pants where he couldn’t possibly see it.

“When I was a young rhinoceros, my tusk was pearly white,” said the animal (and then my father knew that he was hanging by the seat of his pants from a rhinoceros’ tusk!), “but it has turned a nasty yellow-gray in my old age, and I find it very ugly.

You see, everything else about me is ugly, but when I had a beautiful tusk I didn’t worry so much about the rest.

Now that my tusk isugly too, I can’t sleep nights just thinking about how completely ugly I am, and I weep all the time. But why should I be telling you these things? I caught you using my pool and now I’m going to drown you.”

“Oh, wait a minute, Rhinoceros,” said my father.

“I have some things that will make your tusk all white and beautiful again. Just let me down and I’ll give them to you.”

The rhinoceros said, “You do? I can hardly believe it! Why, I’m so excited!” He put my father down and danced around in a cir cle while my father got out the tube of tooth paste and the toothbrush.

“Now,” said my father, “just move your tusk a little nearer, please, and I’ll show you how to begin.”

My father wet the brush in the pool, squeezed on a dab of tooth paste, and scrubbed very hard in one tiny spot. Then he told the rhinoceros to wash it off, and when the pool was calm again, he told the rhinoceros to look in the water and see how white the little spot was. It was hard to see in the dim light of the jungle, but sure enough, the spot shone pearly white, just like new. The rhinoceros was so pleased that he grabbed the toothbrush and began scrubbing violently, forgetting all about my father. Just then my father heard hoofsteps and he jumped behind the rhinoceros.

It was the boar coming back from the big clearing where the tigers were chewing gum. The boar looked at the rhinoceros, and at the toothbrush, and at the tube of tooth paste, and then he scratched his ear on a tree.

“Tell me, Rhinoceros,” he said, “where did you get that fine tube of tooth paste and that toothbrush?”

“Too busy!” said the rhinoceros, and he went on brushing as hard as he could.

The boar sniffed angrily and trotted down the trail toward the dragon, muttering to himself, “Very suspicious—tigers too busy chewing gum, Rhinoceros too busy brushing his tusk—must get hold of that invasion. Don’t like it one bit, not one bit! It’s upsetting everybody terribly—wonder what it’s doing here, anyway.”

Chapter Seven

MY FATHER MEETS A LION

My father waved goodbye to the rhinoceros, who was much too busy to notice, got a drink farther down the brook, and waded back to the trail.

He hadn’t gone very far when he heard an angry animal roaring, “Ding blast it! I told you not to go blackberrying yesterday.

Won’t you ever learn? What will your mother say!”

My father crept along and peered into a small clearing just ahead.

A lion was prancing about clawing at his mane, which was all snarled and full of blackberry twigs. The more he clawed the worse it became and the madderhe grew and the more he yelled at himself, because it was himself he was yelling at all the time.

My father could see that the trail went through the clearing, so he decided to crawl around the edge in the underbrush and not disturb the lion.

He crawled and crawled, and the yelling grew louder and louder.

Just as he was about to reach the trail on the other side the yelling suddenly stopped.

My father looked around and saw the lion glaring at him.

The lion charged and skidded to a stop a few inches away.

“Who are you?” the lion yelled at my father.

“My name is Elmer Elevator.”

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“I’m going home,” said my father.

“That’s what you think!” said the lion.

“Ordinarily I’d save you for afternoon tea, but I happen to be upset enough and hungry enough to eat you right now.”

And he picked up my father in his front paws to feel how fat he was. My father said, “Oh, please, Lion, before you eat me, tell me why you are so particularly upset today.”

“It’s my mane,” said the lion, as he was figuring how many bites a little boy would make.

“You see what a dreadful mess it is, and I don’t seem to be able to do anything about it.

My mother is coming over on the dragon this afternoon, and if she sees me this way I’m afraid she’ll stop my allowance.

She can’t stand messy manes! But I’m going to eat you now,so it won’t make any difference to you.”

“Oh, wait a minute,” said my father, “and I’ll give you just the things you need to make your mane all tidy and beautiful. I have them here i n my pack.”

“You do?” said the lion. “Well, give them to me, and perhaps I’ll save you for afternoon tea after all,” and he put my father down on the ground.

My father opened the pack and took out the comb and the brush and the seven hair ribbons of different colors.

“Look,” he said, “I’ll show you what to do on your forelock, where you can watch me. First you brush a while, and then you comb, and then you brush again until all the twigs and snarls are gone. Then you divide it up in three and braid it like this and tie a ribbon around the end.”

As my father was doing this, the lion watched very carefully and began to look much happier.When my father tied on the ribbon he was all smiles. “Oh, that’s wonderful, really wonderful!” said the lion. “Let me have t he comb and brush and see if I can do it.” So my father gave him the comb and brush and the lion began busily grooming his mane. As a matter of fact, he was so busy that he didn’t even know when my father left.

Chapter Eight

MY FATHER MEETS A GORILLA

My father was very hungry so he sat down under a baby banyan tree on the side of the trail and ate four tangerines.

He wanted to eat eight or ten, but he had only thirteen left and it might be a long time before he could get more.

He packed away all the peels and was about to get up when he heard the familiar voices of the boars.

“I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen them with my own eyes, but wait and see for yourself.

All the tigers are sitting around chewing gum to beat the band.

Old Rhinoceros is so busy brushing his tusk that he doesn’t even look around to see who’s going by, and they’re all so busy they won’t even talk to me!”

“Horsefeathers!” said the other boar, now very close to my father. “They’ll talk to me! I’m going to get to the bottom of this if it’s the last thing I do!” The voices passed my father and went around a curve, and he hurried on because he knew how much more upset the boars would be when they saw the lion’s mane tied up in hair ribbons.

Before long my father came to a crossroads and he stopped to read the signs.

Straight ahead an arrow pointed to the Beginning of the River; to the left, the Ocean Rocks; and to the right, to the Dragon Ferry.

My father was reading all these signs when he heard pawsteps and ducked behind the signpost.

A beautiful lioness paraded past and turned down toward the clearings.

Although she could have seen my father if she had bothered to glance at the post, she was much too occupied looking dignified to see anything but the tip of her own nose. It was the lion’s mother, of course, and that, thought my father, must mean that the dragon was on this side of the river. He hurried on but it was farther away than he had judged. He finally came to the river bank in the late afternoon and looked all around, but there was no dragon anywhere in sight. He must have gone back to the other side.

My father sat down under a palm tree and was trying to have a good idea when something big and black and hairy jumped out of the tree and landed with a loud crash at his feet.

“Well?” said a huge voice.

“Well what?” said my father, for which he was very sorry when he looked up and discovered he was talking to an enormous and very fierce gorilla. “Well, explain yourself,” said the gorilla. “I’ll give you till t en to tell me your name, business, your age and what’s in that pack,” and he began counting to ten as fast as he could.

My father didn’t even have time to say “Elmer Elevator, explorer” before the gorilla interrupted, “Too slow! I’ll twist your arms the way I twist that dragon’s wings, and then we’ll see if you can’t hurry up a bit.” He grabbed my father’s arms, one in each fist, and was just about to twist them when he suddenly let go and began scratching his chest with both hands.

“Blast those fleas!” he raged.

“They won’t give you a moment’s peace, and the worst of it is that you can’t even get a good look at them.

Rosie! Rhoda! Rachel! Ruthie! Ruby! Roberta! Come here and get rid of this flea on my chest.

It’s driving me crazy!”

Six little monkeys tumbled out of the palm tree, dashed to the gorilla, and began combing the hair on his chest.

“Well,” said the gorilla, “it’s still there!”

“We’re looking, we’re looking,” said the six little monkeys, “but they’re awfully hard to see, you know.”

“I know,” said the gorilla, “but hurry. I’ve got work to do,” and he winked at my father.

“Oh, Gorilla,” said my father, “in my knapsack I have six magnifying glasses.

They’d be just the thing for hunting fleas.” My father unpacked them and gave one to Rosie, one to Rhoda, one to Rachel, one to Ruthie, one to Ruby, and one to Roberta.

“Why, they’re miraculous!” said the six little monkeys.

“It’s easy to see the fleas now, only there are hundreds of them!” And they went on hunting frantically.

A moment later many more monkeys appeared out of a near-by clump of mangroves and began crowding around to get a look at the fleas through the magnifying glasses.

They completely surrounded the gorilla, and he could not see my father nor did he remember to twist his arms.

Chapter Nine

MY FATHER MAKES A BRIDGE

My father walked back and forth along the bank trying to think of some way to cross the river.

He found a high flagpole with a rope going over to the other side.

The rope went through a loop at the top of the pole and then down the pole and around a large crank. A sign on the crank said:

TO SUMMON DRAGON, YANK THE CRANK

REPORT DISORDERLY CONDUCT

TO GORILLA

From what the cat had told my father, he knew that the other end of the rope was tied around the dragon’s neck, and he felt sorrier than ever for the poor dragon.

If he were on this side, the gorilla would twist his wings until it hurt so much that he’d have to fly to the other side.

If he were on the other side, the gorilla would crank the rope until the dragon would either choke to death or fly back to this side.

What a life for a baby dragon!

My father knew that if he called to the dragon to come across the river, the gorilla would surely hear him, so he thought about climbing the pole and going across on the rope. The pole was very high, and even if he could get to the top without being seen he’d have to go all the way across hand over hand. The river was very muddy, and all sorts of unfriendly things might live in it, but my father could think of no other way to get across.

He was about to start up the pole when, despite all the noise the monkeys were making, he heard a loud splash behind him.

He looked all around in the water but it was dusk now, and he couldn’t see anything there.

“It’s me, Crocodile,” said a voice to the left.

“The water’s lovely, and I have such a craving for something sweet. Won’t you come in for a swim?”

A pale moon came out from behind the clouds and my father could see where the voice was coming from.

The crocodile’s head was just peeping out of the water.

“Oh, no thank you,” said my father.

“I never swim after sundown, but I do have something sweet to offer you.

Perhaps you’d like a lollipop, and perhaps you have friends who would like lollipops, too?”

“Lollipops!” said the crocodile.

“Why, that is a treat! How about it, boys?” A whole chorus of voices shouted, “Hurrah! Lollipops!” and my father counted as many as seventeen crocodiles with their heads just peeping out of the water.

“That’s fine,” said my father as he got out the two dozen pink lollipops and the rubber bands. “I’ll stick one here in the bank. Lollipops last longer if you keep them out of the water, you know.

Now, one of you can have this one.”

The crocodile who had first spoken swam up and tasted it. “Delicious, mighty delicious!” he said.

“Now if you don’t mind,” said my father, “I’ll just walk along your back and fasten another lollipop to the tip of your tail with a rubber band.

You don’t mind, do you?”

“Oh no, not in the least,” said the crocodile.

“Can you get your tail out of the water just a bit?” asked my father.

“Yes, of course,” said the crocodile, and he lifted up his tail. Then my father ran along his back and fastened another lollipop with a rubber band.

“Who’s next?” said my father, and a second crocodile swam up and began sucking on that lollipop.

“Now, you gentlemen can save a lot of time if you just line up across the river,” said my father, “and I’ll be along to give you each a lollipop.”

So the crocodiles lined up right across the river with their tails in the air, waiting for my father to fasten on the rest of the lollipops.

The tail of the seventeenth crocodile just reached the other bank.

Chapter Ten

MY FATHER FINDS THE DRAGON

When my father was crossing the back of the fifteenth crocodile with two more lollipops to go, the noise of the monkeys suddenly stopped, and he could hear a much bigger noise getting louder every second.

Then he could hear seven furious tigers and one raging rhinoceros and two seething lions and one ranting gorilla along with countless screeching monkeys, led by two extremely irate wild boars, all yelling, “It’s a trick! It’s a trick! There’s an invasion and it must be after our dragon. Kill it! Kill it!” The whole crowd stampeded down to the bank.

As my father was fixing the seventeenth lollipop for the last crocodile he heard a wild boar scream, “Look, it came this way! It’s over there now, see! The crocodiles made a bridge for it,” and just as my father leapt onto the other bank one of the wild boars jumped onto the back of the first crocodile. My father didn’t have a moment to spare.

By now the dragon realized that my father was coming to rescue him.

He ran out of the bushes and jumped up and down yelling. “Here I am! I’m right here! Can you see me? Hurry, the boar is coming over on the crocodiles, too.

They’re all coming over! Oh, please hurry, hurry!” The noise was simply terrific.

My father ran up to the dragon, and took out his very sharp jackknife.

“Steady, old boy, steady. We’ll make it. Just stand still,” he told the dragon as he began to saw through the big rope.

By this time both boars, all seven tigers, the two lions, the rhinoceros, and the gorilla, along with the countless screeching monkeys, were all on their way across the crocodiles and there was still a lot of rope to cut through. “Oh, hurry,” the dragon kept saying, and my father again told him to stand still.

“If I don’t think I can make it,” said my father, “we’ll fly over to the other side of the river and I can finish cutting the rope there.”

Suddenly the screaming grew louder and madder and my father thought the animals must have crossed the river. He looked around, and saw something which surprised and delighted him.

Partly because he had finished his lollipop, and partly because, as I told you before, crocodiles are very moody and not the least bit dependable and are always looking for something to eat, the first crocodile had turned away from the bank and started swimming down the river. The second crocodile hadn’t finished yet, so he followed right after the first, still sucking his lollipop. All the rest did the same thing, one right after the other, until they were all swimming away in a line.

The two wild boars, the seven tigers, the rhinoceros, the two lions, the gorilla, along with the countless screeching monkeys, were all riding down the middle of the river on the train of crocodiles sucking pink lollipops, and all yelling and screaming and getting their feet wet.

My father and the dragon laughed themselves weak because it was such a silly sight. As soon as they had recovered, my father finished cutting the rope and the dragon raced around in circles and tried to turn a somersault. He was the most excited baby dragon that ever lived. My father was in a hurry to fly away, and when the dragon finally calmed down a bit my father climbed up onto his back.

“All aboard!” said the dragon. “Where shall we go?”

“We’ll spend the night on the beach, and tomorrow we’ll start on the long journey home. So, it’s off to the shores of Tangerina!” shouted my father as the dragon soared above the dark jungle and the muddy river and all the animals bellowing at them and all the crocodiles licking pink lollipops and grinning wide grins. After all, what did the crocodiles care about a way to cross the river, and what a fine feast they were carrying on their backs! As my father and the dragon passed over the Ocean Rocks they heard a tiny excited voice scream, “Bum cack! Bum cack! We dreed our nagon! I mean, we need our dragon!”

But my father and the dragon knew that nothing in the world would ever make them go back to Wild Island.

THE END

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Novels Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

2019-03-15T21:53:00.000-07:00

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

by Lewis Carroll

CHAPTER I: Down the Rabbit-Hole

Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, ‘and what is the use of a book,’ thought Alice ‘without pictures or conversation?’

So she was considering in her own mind (as well as she could, for the hot day made her feel very sleepy and stupid), whether the pleasure of making a daisy-chain would be worth the trouble of getting up and picking the daisies, when suddenly a White Rabbit with pink eyes ran close by her.

There was nothing so very remarkable in that; nor did Alice think it so very much out of the way to hear the Rabbit say to itself, ‘Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be late!’ (when she thought it over afterwards, it occurred to her that she ought to have wondered at this, but at the time it all seemed quite natural); but when the Rabbit actually took a watch out of its waistcoat-pocket, and looked at it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and burning with curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and fortunately was just in time to see it pop down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge.

In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in the world she was to get out again.

The rabbit-hole went straight on like a tunnel for some way, and then dipped suddenly down, so suddenly that Alice had not a moment to think about stopping herself before she found herself falling down a very deep well.

Either the well was very deep, or she fell very slowly, for she had plenty of time as she went down to look about her and to wonder what was going to happen next. First, she tried to look down and make out what she was coming to, but it was too dark to see anything; then she looked at the sides of the well, and noticed that they were filled with cupboards and book-shelves; here and there she saw maps and pictures hung upon pegs. She took down a jar from one of the shelves as she passed; it was labelled ‘ORANGE MARMALADE’, but to her great disappointment it was empty: she did not like to drop the jar for fear of killing somebody, so managed to put it into one of the cupboards as she fell past it.

’Well!’ thought Alice to herself, ‘after such a fall as this, I shall think nothing of tumbling down stairs! How brave they’ll all think me at home! Why, I wouldn’t say anything about it, even if I fell off the top of the house!’ (Which was very likely true.)

Down, down, down. Would the fall never come to an end! ‘I wonder how many miles I’ve fallen by this time?’ she said aloud. ‘I must be getting somewhere near the centre of the earth. Let me see: that would be four thousand miles down, I think—’ (for, you see, Alice had learnt several things of this sort in her lessons in the schoolroom, and though this was not a VERY good opportunity for showing off her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to her, still it was good practice to say it over) ‘—yes, that’s about the right distance—but then I wonder what Latitude or Longitude I’ve got to?’ (Alice had no idea what Latitude was, or Longitude either, but thought they were nice grand words to say.)

Presently she began again. ‘I wonder if I shall fall right through the earth! How funny it’ll seem to come out among the people that walk with their heads downward! The Antipathies, I think—’ (she was rather glad there WAS no one listening, this time, as it didn’t sound at all the right word) ‘—but I shall have to ask them what the name of the country is, you know. Please, Ma’am, is this New Zealand or Australia?’ (and she tried to curtsey as she spoke—fancy curtseying as you’re falling through the air! Do you think you could manage it?) ‘And what an ignorant little girl she’ll think me for asking! No, it’ll never do to ask: perhaps I shall see it written up somewhere.’

Down, down, down. There was nothing else to do, so Alice soon began talking again. ‘Dinah’ll miss me very much to-night, I should think!’ (Dinah was the cat.) ‘I hope they’ll remember her saucer of milk at tea-time. Dinah my dear! I wish you were down here with me! There are no mice in the air, I’m afraid, but you might catch a bat, and that’s very like a mouse, you know. But do cats eat bats, I wonder?’ And here Alice began to get rather sleepy, and went on saying to herself, in a dreamy sort of way, ‘Do cats eat bats? Do cats eat bats?’ and sometimes, ‘Do bats eat cats?’ for, you see, as she couldn’t answer either question, it didn’t much matter which way she put it. She felt that she was dozing off, and had just begun to dream that she was walking hand in hand with Dinah, and saying to her very earnestly, ‘Now, Dinah, tell me the truth: did you ever eat a bat?’ when suddenly, thump! thump! down she came upon a heap of sticks and dry leaves, and the fall was over.

Alice was not a bit hurt, and she jumped up on to her feet in a moment: she looked up, but it was all dark overhead; before her was another long passage, and the White Rabbit was still in sight, hurrying down it. There was not a moment to be lost: away went Alice like the wind, and was just in time to hear it say, as it turned a corner, ‘Oh my ears and whiskers, how late it’s getting!’ She was close behind it when she turned the corner, but the Rabbit was no longer to be seen: she found herself in a long, low hall, which was lit up by a row of lamps hanging from the roof.

There were doors all round the hall, but they were all locked; and when Alice had been all the way down one side and up the other, trying every door, she walked sadly down the middle, wondering how she was ever to get out again.

Suddenly she came upon a little three-legged table, all made of solid glass; there was nothing on it except a tiny golden key, and Alice’s first thought was that it might belong to one of the doors of the hall; but, alas! either the locks were too large, or the key was too small, but at any rate it would not open any of them. However, on the second time round, she came upon a low curtain she had not noticed before, and behind it was a little door about fifteen inches high: she tried the little golden key in the lock, and to her great delight it fitted!

Alice opened the door and found that it led into a small passage, not much larger than a rat-hole: she knelt down and looked along the passage into the loveliest garden you ever saw. How she longed to get out of that dark hall, and wander about among those beds of bright flowers and those cool fountains, but she could not even get her head though the doorway; ‘and even if my head would go through,’ thought poor Alice, ‘it would be of very little use without my shoulders. Oh, how I wish I could shut up like a telescope! I think I could, if I only know how to begin.’ For, you see, so many out-of-the-way things had happened lately, that Alice had begun to think that very few things indeed were really impossible.

There seemed to be no use in waiting by the little door, so she went back to the table, half hoping she might find another key on it, or at any rate a book of rules for shutting people up like telescopes: this time she found a little bottle on it, (’which certainly was not here before,’ said Alice,) and round the neck of the bottle was a paper label, with the words ‘DRINK ME’ beautifully printed on it in large letters.

It was all very well to say ‘Drink me,’ but the wise little Alice was not going to do that in a hurry. ‘No, I’ll look first,’ she said, ‘and see whether it’s marked ‘poison’ or not’; for she had read several nice little histories about children who had got burnt, and eaten up by wild beasts and other unpleasant things, all because they would not remember the simple rules their friends had taught them: such as, that a red-hot poker will burn you if you hold it too long; and that if you cut your finger very deeply with a knife, it usually bleeds; and she had never forgotten that, if you drink much from a bottle marked ‘poison,’ it is almost certain to disagree with you, sooner or later.

However, this bottle was not marked ‘poison,’ so Alice ventured to taste it, and finding it very nice, (it had, in fact, a sort of mixed flavour of cherry-tart, custard, pine- apple, roast turkey, toffee, and hot buttered toast,) she very soon finished it off.

* * * *

’What a curious feeling!’ said Alice; ‘I must be shutting up like a telescope.’

And so it was indeed: she was now only ten inches high, and her face brightened up at the thought that she was now the right size for going through the little door into that lovely garden. First, however, she waited for a few minutes to see if she was going to shrink any further: she felt a little nervous about this; ‘for it might end, you know,’ said Alice to herself, ‘in my going out altogether, like a candle. I wonder what I should be like then?’ And she tried to fancy what the flame of a candle is like after the candle is blown out, for she could not remember ever having seen such a thing.

After a while, finding that nothing more happened, she decided on going into the garden at once; but, alas for poor Alice! when she got to the door, she found she had forgotten the little golden key, and when she went back to the table for it, she found she could not possibly reach it: she could see it quite plainly through the glass, and she tried her best to climb up one of the legs of the table, but it was too slippery; and when she had tired herself out with trying, the poor little thing sat down and cried.

’Come, there’s no use in crying like that!’ said Alice to herself, rather sharply; ‘I advise you to leave off this minute!’ She generally gave herself very good advice, (though she very seldom followed it), and sometimes she scolded herself so severely as to bring tears into her eyes; and once she remembered trying to box her own ears for having cheated herself in a game of croquet she was playing against herself, for this curious child was very fond of pretending to be two people. ‘But it’s no use now,’ thought poor Alice, ‘to pretend to be two people! Why, there’s hardly enough of me left to make ONE respectable person!’

Soon her eye fell on a little glass box that was lying under the table: she opened it, and found in it a very small cake, on which the words ‘EAT ME’ were beautifully marked in currants. ‘Well, I’ll eat it,’ said Alice, ‘and if it makes me grow larger, I can reach the key; and if it makes me grow smaller, I can creep under the door; so either way I’ll get into the garden, and I don’t care which happens!’

She ate a little bit, and said anxiously to herself, ‘Which way? Which way?’, holding her hand on the top of her head to feel which way it was growing, and she was quite surprised to find that she remained the same size: to be sure, this generally happens when one eats cake, but Alice had got so much into the way of expecting nothing but out-of-the-way things to happen, that it seemed quite dull and stupid for life to go on in the common way.

So she set to work, and very soon finished off the cake.

CHAPTER II: The Pool of Tears

’Curiouser and curiouser!’ cried Alice (she was so much surprised, that for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English); ‘now I’m opening out like the largest telescope that ever was! Good-bye, feet!’ (for when she looked down at her feet, they seemed to be almost out of sight, they were getting so far off).

‘Oh, my poor little feet, I wonder who will put on your shoes and stockings for you now, dears? I’m sure I shan’t be able! I shall be a great deal too far off to trouble myself about you: you must manage the best way you can; —but I must be kind to them,’ thought Alice, ‘or perhaps they won’t walk the way I want to go! Let me see: I’ll give them a new pair of boots every Christmas.’

And she went on planning to herself how she would manage it. ‘They must go by the carrier,’ she thought; ‘and how funny it’ll seem, sending presents to one’s own feet! And how odd the directions will look!

ALICE’S RIGHT FOOT, ESQ.

HEARTHRUG,

NEAR THE FENDER,

(WITH ALICE’S LOVE).

Oh dear, what nonsense I’m talking!’

Just then her head struck against the roof of the hall: in fact she was now more than nine feet high, and she at once took up the little golden key and hurried off to the garden door.

Poor Alice! It was as much as she could do, lying down on one side, to look through into the garden with one eye; but to get through was more hopeless than ever: she sat down and began to cry again.

’You ought to be ashamed of yourself,’ said Alice, ‘a great girl like you,’ (she might well say this), ‘to go on crying in this way! Stop this moment, I tell you!’ But she went on all the same, shedding gallons of tears, until there was a large pool all round her, about four inches deep and reaching half down the hall.

After a time she heard a little pattering of feet in the distance, and she hastily dried her eyes to see what was coming. It was the White Rabbit returning, splendidly dressed, with a pair of white kid gloves in one hand and a large fan in the other: he came trotting along in a great hurry, muttering to himself as he came, ‘Oh! the Duchess, the Duchess! Oh! won’t she be savage if I’ve kept her waiting!’ Alice felt so desperate that she was ready to ask help of any one; so, when the Rabbit came near her, she began, in a low, timid voice, ‘If you please, sir—’ The Rabbit started violently, dropped the white kid gloves and the fan, and skurried away into the darkness as hard as he could go.

Alice took up the fan and gloves, and, as the hall was very hot, she kept fanning herself all the time she went on talking: ‘Dear, dear! How queer everything is to-day! And yesterday things went on just as usual. I wonder if I’ve been changed in the night? Let me think: was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I’m not the same, the next question is, Who in the world am I? Ah, that’s the great puzzle!’ And she began thinking over all the children she knew that were of the same age as herself, to see if she could have been changed for any of them.

’I’m sure I’m not Ada,’ she said, ‘for her hair goes in such long ringlets, and mine doesn’t go in ringlets at all; and I’m sure I can’t be Mabel, for I know all sorts of things, and she, oh! she knows such a very little! Besides, she’s she, and I’m I, and—oh dear, how puzzling it all is! I’ll try if I know all the things I used to know. Let me see: four times five is twelve, and four times six is thirteen, and four times seven is—oh dear! I shall never get to twenty at that rate! However, the Multiplication Table doesn’t signify: let’s try Geography. London is the capital of Paris, and Paris is the capital of Rome, and Rome—no, that’s all wrong, I’m certain! I must have been changed for Mabel! I’ll try and say ‘How doth the little—‘‘ and she crossed her hands on her lap as if she were saying lessons, and began to repeat it, but her voice sounded hoarse and strange, and the words did not come the same as they used to do:—

’How doth the little crocodile

Improve his shining tail,

And pour the waters of the Nile

On every golden scale!

‘How cheerfully he seems to grin,

How neatly spread his claws,

And welcome little fishes in

With gently smiling jaws!’

’I’m sure those are not the right words,’ said poor Alice, and her eyes filled with tears again as she went on, ‘I must be Mabel after all, and I shall have to go and live in that poky little house, and have next to no toys to play with, and oh! ever so many lessons to learn! No, I’ve made up my mind about it; if I’m Mabel, I’ll stay down here! It’ll be no use their putting their heads down and saying ‘Come up again, dear!’ I shall only look up and say ‘Who am I then? Tell me that first, and then, if I like being that person, I’ll come up: if not, I’ll stay down here till I’m somebody else’—but, oh dear!’ cried Alice, with a sudden burst of tears, ‘I do wish they would put their heads down! I am so very tired of being all alone here!’

As she said this she looked down at her hands, and was surprised to see that she had put on one of the Rabbit’s little white kid gloves while she was talking. ‘How can I have done that?’ she thought. ‘I must be growing small again.’ She got up and went to the table to measure herself by it, and found that, as nearly as she could guess, she was now about two feet high, and was going on shrinking rapidly: she soon found out that the cause of this was the fan she was holding, and she dropped it hastily, just in time to avoid shrinking away altogether.

’That was a narrow escape!’ said Alice, a good deal frightened at the sudden change, but very glad to find herself still in existence; ‘and now for the garden!’ and she ran with all speed back to the little door: but, alas! the little door was shut again, and the little golden key was lying on the glass table as before, ‘and things are worse than ever,’ thought the poor child, ‘for I never was so small as this before, never! And I declare it’s too bad, that it is!’

As she said these words her foot slipped, and in another moment, splash! she was up to her chin in salt water. Her first idea was that she had somehow fallen into the sea, ‘and in that case I can go back by railway,’ she said to herself.

(Alice had been to the seaside once in her life, and had come to the general conclusion, that wherever you go to on the English coast you find a number of bathing machines in the sea, some children digging in the sand with wooden spades, then a row of lodging houses, and behind them a railway station.)

However, she soon made out that she was in the pool of tears which she had wept when she was nine feet high.

’I wish I hadn’t cried so much!’ said Alice, as she swam about, trying to find her way out. ‘I shall be punished for it now, I suppose, by being drowned in my own tears! That will be a queer thing, to be sure! However, everything is queer to-day.’

Just then she heard something splashing about in the pool a little way off, and she swam nearer to make out what it was: at first she thought it must be a walrus or hippopotamus, but then she remembered how small she was now, and she soon made out that it was only a mouse that had slipped in like herself.

’Would it be of any use, now,’ thought Alice, ‘to speak to this mouse? Everything is so out-of-the-way down here, that I should think very likely it can talk: at any rate, there’s no harm in trying.’ So she began: ‘O Mouse, do you know the way out of this pool? I am very tired of swimming about here, O Mouse!’ (Alice thought this must be the right way of speaking to a mouse: she had never done such a thing before, but she remembered having seen in her brother’s Latin Grammar, ‘A mouse—of a mouse— to a mouse—a mouse—O mouse!’ The Mouse looked at her rather inquisitively, and seemed to her to wink with one of its little eyes, but it said nothing.

’Perhaps it doesn’t understand English,’ thought Alice;

‘I daresay it’s a French mouse, come over with William the Conqueror.’ (For, with all her knowledge of history, Alice had no very clear notion how long ago anything had happened.) So she began again: ‘Ou est ma chatte?’ which was the first sentence in her French lesson-book. The Mouse gave a sudden leap out of the water, and seemed to quiver all over with fright. ‘Oh, I beg your pardon!’ cried Alice hastily, afraid that she had hurt the poor animal’s feelings. ‘I quite forgot you didn’t like cats.’

’Not like cats!’ cried the Mouse, in a shrill, passionate voice. ‘Would you like cats if you were me?’

’Well, perhaps not,’ said Alice in a soothing tone: ‘don’t be angry about it. And yet I wish I could show you our cat Dinah: I think you’d take a fancy to cats if you could only see her. She is such a dear quiet thing,’ Alice went on, half to herself, as she swam lazily about in the pool, ‘and she sits purring so nicely by the fire, licking her paws and washing her face—and she is such a nice soft thing to nurse—and she’s such a capital one for catching mice—oh, I beg your pardon!’ cried Alice again, for this time the Mouse was bristling all over, and she felt certain it must be really offended. ‘We won’t talk about her any more if you’d rather not.’

’We indeed!’ cried the Mouse, who was trembling down to the end of his tail. ‘As if I would talk on such a subject! Our family always hated cats: nasty, low, vulgar things! Don’t let me hear the name again!’

’I won’t indeed!’ said Alice, in a great hurry to change the subject of conversation. ‘Are you—are you fond— of—of dogs?’ The Mouse did not answer, so Alice went on eagerly: ‘There is such a nice little dog near our house I should like to show you! A little bright-eyed terrier, you know, with oh, such long curly brown hair! And it’ll fetch things when you throw them, and it’ll sit up and beg for its dinner, and all sorts of things—I can’t remember half of them—and it belongs to a farmer, you know, and he says it’s so useful, it’s worth a hundred pounds! He says it kills all the rats and—oh dear!’ cried Alice in a sorrowful tone, ‘I’m afraid I’ve offended it again!’ For the Mouse was swimming away from her as hard as it could go, and making quite a commotion in the pool as it went.

So she called softly after it, ‘Mouse dear! Do come back again, and we won’t talk about cats or dogs either, if you don’t like them!’ When the Mouse heard this, it turned round and swam slowly back to her: its face was quite pale (with passion, Alice thought), and it said in a low trembling voice, ‘Let us get to the shore, and then I’ll tell you my history, and you’ll understand why it is I hate cats and dogs.’

It was high time to go, for the pool was getting quite crowded with the birds and animals that had fallen into it: there were a Duck and a Dodo, a Lory and an Eaglet, and several other curious creatures. Alice led the way, and the whole party swam to the shore.

CHAPTER III: A Caucus-Race and a Long Tale

They were indeed a queer-looking party that assembled on the bank—the birds with draggled feathers, the animals with their fur clinging close to them, and all dripping wet, cross, and uncomfortable.

The first question of course was, how to get dry again: they had a consultation about this, and after a few minutes it seemed quite natural to Alice to find herself talking familiarly with them, as if she had known them all her life.

Indeed, she had quite a long argument with the Lory, who at last turned sulky, and would only say, ‘I am older than you, and must know better’; and this Alice would not allow without knowing how old it was, and, as the Lory positively refused to tell its age, there was no more to be said.

At last the Mouse, who seemed to be a person of authority among them, called out, ‘Sit down, all of you, and listen to me! I’ll soon make you dry enough!’ They all sat down at once, in a large ring, with the Mouse in the middle. Alice kept her eyes anxiously fixed on it, for she felt sure she would catch a bad cold if she did not get dry very soon.

’Ahem!’ said the Mouse with an important air, ‘are you all ready? This is the driest thing I know. Silence all round, if you please! ‘William the Conqueror, whose cause was favoured by the pope, was soon submitted to by the English, who wanted leaders, and had been of late much accustomed to usurpation and conquest. Edwin and Morcar, the earls of Mercia and Northumbria—‘‘

’Ugh!’ said the Lory, with a shiver.

’I beg your pardon!’ said the Mouse, frowning, but very politely: ‘Did you speak?’

’Not I!’ said the Lory hastily.

’I thought you did,’ said the Mouse. ‘—I proceed. ‘Edwin and Morcar, the earls of Mercia and Northumbria, declared for him: and even Stigand, the patriotic archbishop of Canterbury, found it advisable—‘‘

’Found what?’ said the Duck.

’Found it,’ the Mouse replied rather crossly: ‘of course you know what ‘it’ means.’

’I know what ‘it’ means well enough, when I find a thing,’ said the Duck: ‘it’s generally a frog or a worm. The question is, what did the archbishop find?’

The Mouse did not notice this question, but hurriedly went on, ‘’—found it advisable to go with Edgar Atheling to meet William and offer him the crown.

William’s conduct at first was moderate.

But the insolence of his Normans—’ How are you getting on now, my dear?’ it continued, turning to Alice as it spoke.

’As wet as ever,’ said Alice in a melancholy tone: ‘it doesn’t seem to dry me at all.’

’In that case,’ said the Dodo solemnly, rising to its feet, ‘I move that the meeting adjourn, for the immediate adoption of more energetic remedies—’ ’Speak English!’ said the Eaglet. ‘I don’t know the meaning of half those long words, and, what’s more, I don’t believe you do either!’ And the Eaglet bent down its head to hide a smile: some of the other birds tittered audibly.

’What I was going to say,’ said the Dodo in an offended tone, ‘was, that the best thing to get us dry would be a Caucus-race.’

’What is a Caucus-race?’ said Alice; not that she wanted much to know, but the Dodo had paused as if it thought that somebody ought to speak, and no one else seemed inclined to say anything.

’Why,’ said the Dodo, ‘the best way to explain it is to do it.’ (And, as you might like to try the thing yourself, some winter day, I will tell you how the Dodo managed it.)

First it marked out a race-course, in a sort of circle, (’the exact shape doesn’t matter,’ it said,) and then all the party were placed along the course, here and there.

There was no ‘One, two, three, and away,’ but they began running when they liked, and left off when they liked, so that it was not easy to know when the race was over.

However, when they had been running half an hour or so, and were quite dry again, the Dodo suddenly called out ‘The race is over!’ and they all crowded round it, panting, and asking, ‘But who has won?’

This question the Dodo could not answer without a great deal of thought, and it sat for a long time with one finger pressed upon its forehead (the position in which you usually see Shakespeare, in the pictures of him), while the rest waited in silence. At last the Dodo said, ‘everybody has won, and all must have prizes.’

’But who is to give the prizes?’ quite a chorus of voices asked.

’Why, she, of course,’ said the Dodo, pointing to Alice with one finger; and the whole party at once crowded round her, calling out in a confused way, ‘Prizes! Prizes!’

Alice had no idea what to do, and in despair she put her hand in her pocket, and pulled out a box of comfits, (luckily the salt water had not got into it), and handed them round as prizes. There was exactly one a-piece all round.

’But she must have a prize herself, you know,’ said the Mouse.

’Of course,’ the Dodo replied very gravely. ‘What else have you got in your pocket?’ he went on, turning to Alice.

’Only a thimble,’ said Alice sadly.

’Hand it over here,’ said the Dodo.

Then they all crowded round her once more, while the Dodo solemnly presented the thimble, saying ‘We beg your acceptance of this elegant thimble’; and, when it had finished this short speech, they all cheered.

Alice thought the whole thing very absurd, but they all looked so grave that she did not dare to laugh; and, as she could not think of anything to say, she simply bowed, and took the thimble, looking as solemn as she could.

The next thing was to eat the comfits: this caused some noise and confusion, as the large birds complained that they could not taste theirs, and the small ones choked and had to be patted on the back. However, it was over at last, and they sat down again in a ring, and begged the Mouse to tell them something more.

’You promised to tell me your history, you know,’ said Alice, ‘and why it is you hate—C and D,’ she added in a whisper, half afraid that it would be offended again.

’Mine is a long and a sad tale!’ said the Mouse, turning to Alice, and sighing.

’It IS a long tail, certainly,’ said Alice, looking down with wonder at the Mouse’s tail; ‘but why do you call it sad?’ And she kept on puzzling about it while the Mouse was speaking, so that her idea of the tale was something like this:— ’Fury said to a mouse, That he met in the house, ‘Let us both go to law: I will prosecute you. —Come, I’ll take no denial; We must have a trial: For really this morning I’ve nothing to do.’ Said the mouse to the cur, ‘Such a trial, dear Sir,With no jury or judge, would be wasting our breath.’ ‘I’ll be judge, I’ll be jury,’ said cunning old Fury:"I’ll try the whole cause, and condemn you to death.‘‘

’You are not attending!’ said the Mouse to Alice severely. ‘What are you thinking of?’

’I beg your pardon,’ said Alice very humbly: ‘you had got to the fifth bend, I think?’

’I had not!’ cried the Mouse, sharply and very angrily.

’A knot!’ said Alice, always ready to make herself useful, and looking anxiously about her. ‘Oh, do let me help to undo it!’

’I shall do nothing of the sort,’ said the Mouse, getting up and walking away. ‘You insult me by talking such nonsense!’

’I didn’t mean it!’ pleaded poor Alice. ‘But you’re so easily offended, you know!’

The Mouse only growled in reply.

’Please come back and finish your story!’ Alice called after it; and the others all joined in chorus, ‘Yes, please do!’ but the Mouse only shook its head impatiently, and walked a little quicker.

’What a pity it wouldn’t stay!’ sighed the Lory, as soon as it was quite out of sight; and an old Crab took the opportunity of saying to her daughter ‘Ah, my dear! Let this be a lesson to you never to lose your temper!’ ‘Hold your tongue, Ma!’ said the young Crab, a little snappishly. ‘You’re enough to try the patience of an oyster!’

’I wish I had our Dinah here, I know I do!’ said Alice aloud, addressing nobody in particular. ‘She’d soon fetch it back!’

’And who is Dinah, if I might venture to ask the question?’ said the Lory.

Alice replied eagerly, for she was always ready to talk about her pet: ‘Dinah’s our cat. And she’s such a capital one for catching mice you can’t think! And oh, I wish you could see her after the birds! Why, she’ll eat a little bird as soon as look at it!’

This speech caused a remarkable sensation among the party. Some of the birds hurried off at once: one old Magpie began wrapping itself up very carefully, remarking, ‘I really must be getting home; the night-air doesn’t suit my throat!’ and a Canary called out in a trembling voice to its children, ‘Come away, my dears! It’s high time you were all in bed!’ On various pretexts they all moved off, and Alice was soon left alone.

’I wish I hadn’t mentioned Dinah!’ she said to herself in a melancholy tone. ‘Nobody seems to like her, down here, and I’m sure she’s the best cat in the world! Oh, my dear Dinah! I wonder if I shall ever see you any more!’ And here poor Alice began to cry again, for she felt very lonely and low-spirited. In a little while, however, she again heard a little pattering of footsteps in the distance, and she looked up eagerly, half hoping that the Mouse had changed his mind, and was coming back to finish his story.

CHAPTER IV: The Rabbit Sends in a Little Bill

It was the White Rabbit, trotting slowly back again, and looking anxiously about as it went, as if it had lost something; and she heard it muttering to itself ‘The Duchess! The Duchess! Oh my dear paws! Oh my fur and whiskers! She’ll get me executed, as sure as ferrets are ferrets! Where can I have dropped them, I wonder?’ Alice guessed in a moment that it was looking for the fan and the pair of white kid gloves, and she very good-naturedly began hunting about for them, but they were nowhere to be seen—everything seemed to have changed since her swim in the pool, and the great hall, with the glass table and the little door, had vanished completely.

Very soon the Rabbit noticed Alice, as she went hunting about, and called out to her in an angry tone, ‘Why, Mary Ann, what are you doing out here? Run home this moment, and fetch me a pair of gloves and a fan! Quick, now!’ And Alice was so much frightened that she ran off at once in the direction it pointed to, without trying to explain the mistake it had made.

’He took me for his housemaid,’ she said to herself as she ran. ‘How surprised he’ll be when he finds out who I am! But I’d better take him his fan and gloves—that is, if I can find them.’ As she said this, she came upon a neat little house, on the door of which was a bright brass plate with the name ‘W. RABBIT’ engraved upon it. She went in without knocking, and hurried upstairs, in great fear lest she should meet the real Mary Ann, and be turned out of the house before she had found the fan and gloves.

’How queer it seems,’ Alice said to herself, ‘to be going messages for a rabbit! I suppose Dinah’ll be sending me on messages next!’ And she began fancying the sort of thing that would happen: ‘"Miss Alice! Come here directly, and get ready for your walk!’ ‘Coming in a minute, nurse! But I’ve got to see that the mouse doesn’t get out.’ Only I don’t think,’ Alice went on, ‘that they’d let Dinah stop in the house if it began ordering people about like that!’

By this time she had found her way into a tidy little room with a table in the window, and on it (as she had hoped) a fan and two or three pairs of tiny white kid gloves: she took up the fan and a pair of the gloves, and was just going to leave the room, when her eye fell upon a little bottle that stood near the looking- glass. There was no label this time with the words ‘DRINK ME,’ but nevertheless she uncorked it and put it to her lips. ‘I know something interesting is sure to happen,’ she said to herself, ‘whenever I eat or drink anything; so I’ll just see what this bottle does. I do hope it’ll make me grow large again, for really I’m quite tired of being such a tiny little thing!’

It did so indeed, and much sooner than she had expected: before she had drunk half the bottle, she found her head pressing against the ceiling, and had to stoop to save her neck from being broken. She hastily put down the bottle, saying to herself ‘That’s quite enough—I hope I shan’t grow any more—As it is, I can’t get out at the door—I do wish I hadn’t drunk quite so much!’

Alas! it was too late to wish that! She went on growing, and growing, and very soon had to kneel down on the floor: in another minute there was not even room for this, and she tried the effect of lying down with one elbow against the door, and the other arm curled round her head. Still she went on growing, and, as a last resource, she put one arm out of the window, and one foot up the chimney, and said to herself ‘Now I can do no more, whatever happens. What will become of me?’

Luckily for Alice, the little magic bottle had now had its full effect, and she grew no larger: still it was very uncomfortable, and, as there seemed to be no sort of chance of her ever getting out of the room again, no wonder she felt unhappy.

’It was much pleasanter at home,’ thought poor Alice, ‘when one wasn’t always growing larger and smaller, and being ordered about by mice and rabbits. I almost wish I hadn’t gone down that rabbit-hole—and yet—and yet— it’s rather curious, you know, this sort of life! I do wonder what can have happened to me! When I used to read fairy- tales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one! There ought to be a book written about me, that there ought! And when I grow up, I’ll write one—but I’m grown up now,’ she added in a sorrowful tone; ‘at least there’s no room to grow up any more here.’

’But then,’ thought Alice, ‘shall I never get any older than I am now? That’ll be a comfort, one way—never to be an old woman— but then—always to have lessons to learn! Oh, I shouldn’t like that!’

’Oh, you foolish Alice!’ she answered herself. ‘How can you learn lessons in here? Why, there’s hardly room for you, and no room at all for any lesson-books!’

And so she went on, taking first one side and then the other, and making quite a conversation of it altogether; but after a few minutes she heard a voice outside, and stopped to listen.

’Mary Ann! Mary Ann!’ said the voice. ‘Fetch me my gloves this moment!’ Then came a little pattering of feet on the stairs. Alice knew it was the Rabbit coming to look for her, and she trembled till she shook the house, quite forgetting that she was now about a thousand times as large as the Rabbit, and had no reason to be afraid of it.

Presently the Rabbit came up to the door, and tried to open it; but, as the door opened inwards, and Alice’s elbow was pressed hard against it, that attempt proved a failure. Alice heard it say to itself ‘Then I’ll go round and get in at the window.’

’That you won’t’ thought Alice, and, after waiting till she fancied she heard the Rabbit just under the window, she suddenly spread out her hand, and made a snatch in the air. She did not get hold of anything, but she heard a little shriek and a fall, and a crash of broken glass, from which she concluded that it was just possible it had fallen into a cucumber-frame, or something of the sort.

Next came an angry voice—the Rabbit’s—’Pat! Pat! Where are you?’ And then a voice she had never heard before, ‘Sure then I’m here! Digging for apples, yer honour!’

’Digging for apples, indeed!’ said the Rabbit angrily. ‘Here! Come and help me out of this!’ (Sounds of more broken glass.)

’Now tell me, Pat, what’s that in the window?’

’Sure, it’s an arm, yer honour!’ (He pronounced it ‘arrum.’)

’An arm, you goose! Who ever saw one that size? Why, it fills the whole window!’

’Sure, it does, yer honour: but it’s an arm for all that.’

’Well, it’s got no business there, at any rate: go and take it away!’

There was a long silence after this, and Alice could only hear whispers now and then; such as, ‘Sure, I don’t like it, yer honour, at all, at all!’ ‘Do as I tell you, you coward!’ and at last she spread out her hand again, and made another snatch in the air. This time there were two little shrieks, and more sounds of broken glass. ‘What a number of cucumber-frames there must be!’ thought Alice. ‘I wonder what they’ll do next! As for pulling me out of the window, I only wish they could! I’m sure I don’t want to stay in here any longer!’

She waited for some time without hearing anything more: at last came a rumbling of little cartwheels, and the sound of a good many voices all talking together: she made out the words: ‘Where’s the other ladder?—Why, I hadn’t to bring but one; Bill’s got the other—Bill! fetch it here, lad!—Here, put ‘em up at this corner—No, tie ‘em together first—they don’t reach half high enough yet— Oh! they’ll do well enough; don’t be particular— Here, Bill! catch hold of this rope—Will the roof bear?—Mind that loose slate—Oh, it’s coming down! Heads below!’ (a loud crash)—’Now, who did that?—It was Bill, I fancy— Who’s to go down the chimney?—Nay, I shan’t! you do it!—That I won’t, then!—Bill’s to go down—Here, Bill! the master says you’re to go down the chimney!’

’Oh! So Bill’s got to come down the chimney, has he?’ said Alice to herself. ‘Shy, they seem to put everything upon Bill! I wouldn’t be in Bill’s place for a good deal: this fireplace is narrow, to be sure; but I think I can kick a little!’

She drew her foot as far down the chimney as she could, and waited till she heard a little animal (she couldn’t guess of what sort it was) scratching and scrambling about in the chimney close above her: then, saying to herself ‘This is Bill,’ she gave one sharp kick, and waited to see what would happen next.

The first thing she heard was a general chorus of ‘There goes Bill!’ then the Rabbit’s voice along—’Catch him, you by the hedge!’ then silence, and then another confusion of voices—’Hold up his head—Brandy now— Don’t choke him—How was it, old fellow? What happened to you? Tell us all about it!’

Last came a little feeble, squeaking voice, (’That’s Bill,’ thought Alice,) ‘Well, I hardly know—No more, thank ye; I’m better now—but I’m a deal too flustered to tell you—all I know is, something comes at me like a Jack-in- the-box, and up I goes like a sky-rocket!’

’So you did, old fellow!’ said the others.

’We must burn the house down!’ said the Rabbit’s voice; and Alice called out as loud as she could, ‘If you do. I’ll set Dinah at you!’

There was a dead silence instantly, and Alice thought to herself, ‘I wonder what they will do next! If they had any sense, they’d take the roof off.’ After a minute or two, they began moving about again, and Alice heard the Rabbit say, ‘A barrowful will do, to begin with.’

’A barrowful of what?’ thought Alice; but she had not long to doubt, for the next moment a shower of little pebbles came rattling in at the window, and some of them hit her in the face. ‘I’ll put a stop to this,’ she said to herself, and shouted out, ‘You’d better not do that again!’ which produced another dead silence.

Alice noticed with some surprise that the pebbles were all turning into little cakes as they lay on the floor, and a bright idea came into her head. ‘If I eat one of these cakes,’ she thought, ‘it’s sure to make some change in my size; and as it can’t possibly make me larger, it must make me smaller, I suppose.’

So she swallowed one of the cakes, and was delighted to find that she began shrinking directly. As soon as she was small enough to get through the door, she ran out of the house, and found quite a crowd of little animals and birds waiting outside. The poor little Lizard, Bill, was in the middle, being held up by two guinea-pigs, who were giving it something out of a bottle. They all made a rush at Alice the moment she appeared; but she ran off as hard as she could, and soon found herself safe in a thick wood.

’The first thing I’ve got to do,’ said Alice to herself, as she wandered about in the wood, ‘is to grow to my right size again; and the second thing is to find my way into that lovely garden. I think that will be the best plan.’

It sounded an excellent plan, no doubt, and very neatly and simply arranged; the only difficulty was, that she had not the smallest idea how to set about it; and while she was peering about anxiously among the trees, a little sharp bark just over her head made her look up in a great hurry.

An enormous puppy was looking down at her with large round eyes, and feebly stretching out one paw, trying to touch her. ‘Poor little thing!’ said Alice, in a coaxing tone, and she tried hard to whistle to it; but she was terribly frightened all the time at the thought that it might be hungry, in which case it would be very likely to eat her up in spite of all her coaxing.

Hardly knowing what she did, she picked up a little bit of stick, and held it out to the puppy; whereupon the puppy jumped into the air off all its feet at once, with a yelp of delight, and rushed at the stick, and made believe to worry it; then Alice dodged behind a great thistle, to keep herself from being run over; and the moment she appeared on the other side, the puppy made another rush at the stick, and tumbled head over heels in its hurry to get hold of it; then Alice, thinking it was very like having a game of play with a cart-horse, and expecting every moment to be trampled under its feet, ran round the thistle again; then the puppy began a series of short charges at the stick, running a very little way forwards each time and a long way back, and barking hoarsely all the while, till at last it sat down a good way off, panting, with its tongue hanging out of its mouth, and its great eyes half shut.

This seemed to Alice a good opportunity for making her escape; so she set off at once, and ran till she was quite tired and out of breath, and till the puppy’s bark sounded quite faint in the distance.

’And yet what a dear little puppy it was!’ said Alice, as she leant against a buttercup to rest herself, and fanned herself with one of the leaves: ‘I should have liked teaching it tricks very much, if—if I’d only been the right size to do it! Oh dear! I’d nearly forgotten that I’ve got to grow up again! Let me see—how IS it to be managed? I suppose I ought to eat or drink something or other; but the great question is, what?’

The great question certainly was, what? Alice looked all round her at the flowers and the blades of grass, but she did not see anything that looked like the right thing to eat or drink under the circumstances. There was a large mushroom growing near her, about the same height as herself; and when she had looked under it, and on both sides of it, and behind it, it occurred to her that she might as well look and see what was on the top of it.

She stretched herself up on tiptoe, and peeped over the edge of the mushroom, and her eyes immediately met those of a large caterpillar, that was sitting on the top with its arms folded, quietly smoking a long hookah, and taking not the smallest notice of her or of anything else.

CHAPTER V: Advice from a Caterpillar

The Caterpillar and Alice looked at each other for some time in silence: at last the Caterpillar took the hookah out of its mouth, and addressed her in a languid, sleepy voice.

’Who are you?’ said the Caterpillar.

This was not an encouraging opening for a conversation. Alice replied, rather shyly, ‘I—I hardly know, sir, just at present— at least I know who I WAS when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then.’

’What do you mean by that?’ said the Caterpillar sternly.

‘Explain yourself!’

’I can’t explain myself, I’m afraid, sir’ said Alice, ‘because I’m not myself, you see.’

’I don’t see,’ said the Caterpillar.

’I’m afraid I can’t put it more clearly,’ Alice replied very politely, ‘for I can’t understand it myself to begin with; and being so many different sizes in a day is very confusing.’

’It isn’t,’ said the Caterpillar.

’Well, perhaps you haven’t found it so yet,’ said Alice; ‘but when you have to turn into a chrysalis—you will some day, you know—and then after that into a butterfly, I should think you’ll feel it a little queer, won’t you?’

’Not a bit,’ said the Caterpillar.

’Well, perhaps your feelings may be different,’ said Alice; ‘all I know is, it would feel very queer to me.’

’You!’ said the Caterpillar contemptuously. ‘Who are you?’

Which brought them back again to the beginning of the conversation. Alice felt a little irritated at the Caterpillar’s making such very short remarks, and she drew herself up and said, very gravely, ‘I think, you ought to tell me who you are, first.’

’Why?’ said the Caterpillar.

Here was another puzzling question; and as Alice could not think of any good reason, and as the Caterpillar seemed to be in a very unpleasant state of mind, she turned away.

’Come back!’ the Caterpillar called after her. ‘I’ve something important to say!’

This sounded promising, certainly: Alice turned and came back again.

’Keep your temper,’ said the Caterpillar.

’Is that all?’ said Alice, swallowing down her anger as well as she could.

’No,’ said the Caterpillar.

Alice thought she might as well wait, as she had nothing else to do, and perhaps after all it might tell her something worth hearing. For some minutes it puffed away without speaking, but at last it unfolded its arms, took the hookah out of its mouth again, and said, ‘So you think you’re changed, do you?’

’I’m afraid I am, sir,’ said Alice; ‘I can’t remember things as I used—and I don’t keep the same size for ten minutes together!’

’Can’t remember what things?’ said the Caterpillar.

’Well, I’ve tried to say ‘How doth the little busy bee,’ but it all came different!’ Alice replied in a very melancholy voice.

’Repeat, ‘you are old, Father William,‘‘ said the Caterpillar.

Alice folded her hands, and began:—

’You are old, Father William,’ the young man said, ‘And your hair has become very white; And yet you incessantly stand on your head— Do you think, at your age, it is right?’

’In my youth,’ Father William replied to his son, ‘I feared it might injure the brain; But, now that I’m perfectly sure I have none, Why, I do it again and again.’

’You are old,’ said the youth, ‘as I mentioned before, And have grown most uncommonly fat; Yet you turned a back- somersault in at the door— Pray, what is the reason of that?’

’In my youth,’ said the sage, as he shook his grey locks, ‘I kept all my limbs very supple By the use of this ointment—one shilling the box— Allow me to sell you a couple?’

’You are old,’ said the youth, ‘and your jaws are too weak For anything tougher than suet; Yet you finished the goose, with the bones and the beak— Pray how did you manage to do it?’

’In my youth,’ said his father, ‘I took to the law, And argued each case with my wife; And the muscular strength, which it gave to my jaw, Has lasted the rest of my life.’

’You are old,’ said the youth, ‘one would hardly suppose That your eye was as steady as ever; Yet you balanced an eel on the end of your nose— What made you so awfully clever?’

’I have answered three questions, and that is enough,’ Said his father; ‘don’t give yourself airs! Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff? Be off, or I’ll kick you down stairs!’

’That is not said right,’ said the Caterpillar.

’Not quite right, I’m afraid,’ said Alice, timidly; ‘some of the words have got altered.’

’It is wrong from beginning to end,’ said the Caterpillar decidedly, and there was silence for some minutes.

The Caterpillar was the first to speak.

’What size do you want to be?’ it asked.

’Oh, I’m not particular as to size,’ Alice hastily replied; ‘only one doesn’t like changing so often, you know.’

’I don’t know,’ said the Caterpillar.

Alice said nothing: she had never been so much contradicted in her life before, and she felt that she was losing her temper.

’Are you content now?’ said the Caterpillar.

’Well, I should like to be a little larger, sir, if you wouldn’t mind,’ said Alice: ‘three inches is such a wretched height to be.’

’It is a very good height indeed!’ said the Caterpillar angrily, rearing itself upright as it spoke (it was exactly three inches high).

’But I’m not used to it!’ pleaded poor Alice in a piteous tone. And she thought of herself, ‘I wish the creatures wouldn’t be so easily offended!’

’You’ll get used to it in time,’ said the Caterpillar; and it put the hookah into its mouth and began smoking again.

This time Alice waited patiently until it chose to speak again. In a minute or two the Caterpillar took the hookah out of its mouth and yawned once or twice, and shook itself. Then it got down off the mushroom, and crawled away in the grass, merely remarking as it went, ‘One side will make you grow taller, and the other side will make you grow shorter.’

’One side of what? The other side of what?’ thought Alice to herself.

’Of the mushroom,’ said the Caterpillar, just as if she had asked it aloud; and in another moment it was out of sight.

Alice remained looking thoughtfully at the mushroom for a minute, trying to make out which were the two sides of it; and as it was perfectly round, she found this a very difficult question. However, at last she stretched her arms round it as far as they would go, and broke off a bit of the edge with each hand.

’And now which is which?’ she said to herself, and nibbled a little of the right-hand bit to try the effect: the next moment she felt a violent blow underneath her chin: it had struck her foot!

She was a good deal frightened by this very sudden change, but she felt that there was no time to be lost, as she was shrinking rapidly; so she set to work at once to eat some of the other bit.

Her chin was pressed so closely against her foot, that there was hardly room to open her mouth; but she did it at last, and managed to swallow a morsel of the lefthand bit.

’Come, my head’s free at last!’ said Alice in a tone of delight, which changed into alarm in another moment, when she found that her shoulders were nowhere to be found: all she could see, when she looked down, was an immense length of neck, which seemed to rise like a stalk out of a sea of green leaves that lay far below her.

’What can all that green stuff be?’ said Alice. ‘And where have my shoulders got to? And oh, my poor hands, how is it I can’t see you?’ She was moving them about as she spoke, but no result seemed to follow, except a little shaking among the distant green leaves.

As there seemed to be no chance of getting her hands up to her head, she tried to get her head down to them, and was delighted to find that her neck would bend about easily in any direction, like a serpent. She had just succeeded in curving it down into a graceful zigzag, and was going to dive in among the leaves, which she found to be nothing but the tops of the trees under which she had been wandering, when a sharp hiss made her draw back in a hurry: a large pigeon had flown into her face, and was beating her violently with its wings.

’Serpent!’ screamed the Pigeon.

’I’m not a serpent!’ said Alice indignantly. ‘Let me alone!’

’Serpent, I say again!’ repeated the Pigeon, but in a more subdued tone, and added with a kind of sob, ‘I’ve tried every way, and nothing seems to suit them!’

’I haven’t the least idea what you’re talking about,’ said Alice.

’I’ve tried the roots of trees, and I’ve tried banks, and I’ve tried hedges,’ the Pigeon went on, without attending to her; ‘but those serpents! There’s no pleasing them!’

Alice was more and more puzzled, but she thought there was no use in saying anything more till the Pigeon had finished.

’As if it wasn’t trouble enough hatching the eggs,’ said the Pigeon; ‘but I must be on the look-out for serpents night and day! Why, I haven’t had a wink of sleep these three weeks!’

’I’m very sorry you’ve been annoyed,’ said Alice, who was beginning to see its meaning.

’And just as I’d taken the highest tree in the wood,’ continued the Pigeon, raising its voice to a shriek, ‘and just as I was thinking I should be free of them at last, they must needs come wriggling down from the sky! Ugh, Serpent!’

’But I’m not a serpent, I tell you!’ said Alice. ‘I’m a— I’m a—’ ’Well! what are you?’ said the Pigeon. ‘I can see you’re trying to invent something!’

’I—I’m a little girl,’ said Alice, rather doubtfully, as she remembered the number of changes she had gone through that day.

’A likely story indeed!’ said the Pigeon in a tone of the deepest contempt. ‘I’ve seen a good many little girls in my time, but never one with such a neck as that! No, no! You’re a serpent; and there’s no use denying it. I suppose you’ll be telling me next that you never tasted an egg!’

’I have tasted eggs, certainly,’ said Alice, who was a very truthful child; ‘but little girls eat eggs quite as much as serpents do, you know.’

’I don’t believe it,’ said the Pigeon; ‘but if they do, why then they’re a kind of serpent, that’s all I can say.’

This was such a new idea to Alice, that she was quite silent for a minute or two, which gave the Pigeon the opportunity of adding, ‘You’re looking for eggs, I know

that well enough; and what does it matter to me whether you’re a little girl or a serpent?’

’It matters a good deal to me,’ said Alice hastily; ‘but I’m not looking for eggs, as it happens; and if I was, I shouldn’t want yours: I don’t like them raw.’

’Well, be off, then!’ said the Pigeon in a sulky tone, as it settled down again into its nest. Alice crouched down among the trees as well as she could, for her neck kept getting entangled among the branches, and every now and then she had to stop and untwist it. After a while she remembered that she still held the pieces of mushroom in her hands, and she set to work very carefully, nibbling first at one and then at the other, and growing sometimes taller and sometimes shorter, until she had succeeded in bringing herself down to her usual height.

It was so long since she had been anything near the right size, that it felt quite strange at first; but she got used to it in a few minutes, and began talking to herself, as usual. ‘Come, there’s half my plan done now! How puzzling all these changes are! I’m never sure what I’m going to be, from one minute to another! However, I’ve got back to my right size: the next thing is, to get into that beautiful garden—how is that to be done, I wonder?’ As she said this, she came suddenly upon an open place, with a little house in it about four feet high.

‘Whoever lives there,’ thought Alice, ‘it’ll never do to come upon them this size: why, I should frighten them out of their wits!’ So she began nibbling at the righthand bit again, and did not venture to go near the house till she had brought herself down to nine inches high.

CHAPTER VI: Pig and Pepper

For a minute or two she stood looking at the house, and wondering what to do next, when suddenly a footman in livery came running out of the wood—(she considered him to be a footman because he was in livery: otherwise, judging by his face only, she would have called him a fish)—and rapped loudly at the door with his knuckles. It was opened by another footman in livery, with a round face, and large eyes like a frog; and both footmen, Alice noticed, had powdered hair that curled all over their heads. She felt very curious to know what it was all about, and crept a little way out of the wood to listen.

The Fish-Footman began by producing from under his arm a great letter, nearly as large as himself, and this he handed over to the other, saying, in a solemn tone, ‘For the Duchess. An invitation from the Queen to play croquet.’ The Frog-Footman repeated, in the same solemn tone, only changing the order of the words a little, ‘From the Queen. An invitation for the Duchess to play croquet.’

Then they both bowed low, and their curls got entangled together.

Alice laughed so much at this, that she had to run back into the wood for fear of their hearing her; and when she next peeped out the Fish-Footman was gone, and the other was sitting on the ground near the door, staring stupidly up into the sky.

Alice went timidly up to the door, and knocked.

’There’s no sort of use in knocking,’ said the Footman, ‘and that for two reasons. First, because I’m on the same side of the door as you are; secondly, because they’re making such a noise inside, no one could possibly hear you.’ And certainly there was a most extraordinary noise going on within—a constant howling and sneezing, and every now and then a great crash, as if a dish or kettle had been broken to pieces.

’Please, then,’ said Alice, ‘how am I to get in?’

’There might be some sense in your knocking,’ the Footman went on without attending to her, ‘if we had the door between us. For instance, if you were inside, you might knock, and I could let you out, you know.’ He was looking up into the sky all the time he was speaking, and this Alice thought decidedly uncivil. ‘But perhaps he can’t help it,’ she said to herself; ‘his eyes are so very nearly at the top of his head. But at any rate he might answer questions.—How am I to get in?’ she repeated, aloud.

’I shall sit here,’ the Footman remarked, ‘till tomorrow—’

At this moment the door of the house opened, and a large plate came skimming out, straight at the Footman’s head: it just grazed his nose, and broke to pieces against one of the trees behind him.

’—or next day, maybe,’ the Footman continued in the same tone, exactly as if nothing had happened.

’How am I to get in?’ asked Alice again, in a louder tone.

’Are you to get in at all?’ said the Footman. ‘That’s the first question, you know.’

It was, no doubt: only Alice did not like to be told so. ‘It’s really dreadful,’ she muttered to herself, ‘the way all the creatures argue. It’s enough to drive one crazy!’

The Footman seemed to think this a good opportunity for repeating his remark, with variations. ‘I shall sit here,’ he said, ‘on and off, for days and days.’

’But what am I to do?’ said Alice.

’Anything you like,’ said the Footman, and began whistling.

’Oh, there’s no use in talking to him,’ said Alice desperately: ‘he’s perfectly idiotic!’ And she opened the door and went in.

The door led right into a large kitchen, which was full of smoke from one end to the other: the Duchess was sitting on a three-legged stool in the middle, nursing a baby; the cook was leaning over the fire, stirring a large cauldron which seemed to be full of soup.

’There’s certainly too much pepper in that soup!’ Alice said to herself, as well as she could for sneezing.

There was certainly too much of it in the air. Even the Duchess sneezed occasionally; and as for the baby, it was sneezing and howling alternately without a moment’s pause. The only things in the kitchen that did not sneeze, were the cook, and a large cat which was sitting on the hearth and grinning from ear to ear.

’Please would you tell me,’ said Alice, a little timidly, for she was not quite sure whether it was good manners for her to speak first, ‘why your cat grins like that?’

’It’s a Cheshire cat,’ said the Duchess, ‘and that’s why. Pig!’

She said the last word with such sudden violence that Alice quite jumped; but she saw in another moment that it was addressed to the baby, and not to her, so she took courage, and went on again:— ’I didn’t know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn’t know that cats could grin.’

’They all can,’ said the Duchess; ‘and most of ‘em do.’

’I don’t know of any that do,’ Alice said very politely, feeling quite pleased to have got into a conversation.

’You don’t know much,’ said the Duchess; ‘and that’s a fact.’

Alice did not at all like the tone of this remark, and thought it would be as well to introduce some other subject of conversation. While she was trying to fix on one, the cook took the cauldron of soup off the fire, and at once set to work throwing everything within her reach at the Duchess and the baby —the fire-irons came first; then followed a shower of saucepans, plates, and dishes. The Duchess took no notice of them even when they hit her; and the baby was howling so much already, that it was quite impossible to say whether the blows hurt it or not.

’Oh, please mind what you’re doing!’ cried Alice, jumping up and down in an agony of terror. ‘Oh, there goes his precious nose’; as an unusually large saucepan flew close by it, and very nearly carried it off.

’If everybody minded their own business,’ the Duchess said in a hoarse growl, ‘the world would go round a deal faster than it does.’

’Which would not be an advantage,’ said Alice, who felt very glad to get an opportunity of showing off a little of her knowledge. ‘Just think of what work it would make with the day and night! You see the earth takes twenty- four hours to turn round on its axis—’ ’Talking of axes,’ said the Duchess, ‘chop off her head!’

Alice glanced rather anxiously at the cook, to see if she meant to take the hint; but the cook was busily stirring the soup, and seemed not to be listening, so she went on again: ‘Twenty-four hours, I think; or is it twelve? I—’ ’Oh, don’t bother ME,’ said the Duchess; ‘I never could abide figures!’And with that she began nursing her child again, singing a sort of lullaby to it as she did so, and giving it a violent shake at the end of every line:

’Speak roughly to your little boy,

And beat him when he sneezes:

He only does it to annoy,

Because he knows it teases.’

CHORUS

(In which the cook and the baby joined):— ’Wow! wow! wow!’ While the Duchess sang the second verse of the song, she kept tossing the baby violently up and down, and the poor little thing howled so, that Alice could hardly hear the words:—

’I speak severely to my boy,

I beat him when he sneezes;

For he can thoroughly enjoy

The pepper when he pleases!’

CHORUS

’Wow! wow! wow!’

’Here! you may nurse it a bit, if you like!’ the Duchess said to Alice, flinging the baby at her as she spoke. ‘I must go and get ready to play croquet with the Queen,’ and she hurried out of the room. The cook threw a frying-pan after her as she went out, but it just missed her.

Alice caught the baby with some difficulty, as it was a queer- shaped little creature, and held out its arms and legs in all directions, ‘just like a star-fish,’ thought Alice. The poor little thing was snorting like a steam-engine when she caught it, and kept doubling itself up and straightening itself out again, so that altogether, for the first minute or two, it was as much as she could do to hold it.

As soon as she had made out the proper way of nursing it, (which was to twist it up into a sort of knot, and then keep tight hold of its right ear and left foot, so as to prevent its undoing itself,) she carried it out into the open air. ‘If I don’t take this child away with me,’ thought Alice, ‘they’re sure to kill it in a day or two: wouldn’t it be murder to leave it behind?’ She said the last words out loud, and the little thing grunted in reply (it had left off sneezing by this time). ‘Don’t grunt,’ said Alice; ‘that’s not at all a proper way of expressing yourself.’

The baby grunted again, and Alice looked very anxiously into its face to see what was the matter with it. There could be no doubt that it had a very turn-up nose, much more like a snout than a real nose; also its eyes were getting extremely small for a baby: altogether Alice did not like the look of the thing at all. ‘But perhaps it was only sobbing,’ she thought, and looked into its eyes again, to see if there were any tears.

No, there were no tears. ‘If you’re going to turn into a pig, my dear,’ said Alice, seriously, ‘I’ll have nothing more to do with you. Mind now!’ The poor little thing sobbed again (or grunted, it was impossible to say which), and they went on for some while in silence.

Alice was just beginning to think to herself, ‘Now, what am I to do with this creature when I get it home?’ when it grunted again, so violently, that she looked down into its face in some alarm. This time there could be no mistake about it: it was neither more nor less than a pig, and she felt that it would be quite absurd for her to carry it further.

So she set the little creature down, and felt quite relieved to see it trot away quietly into the wood. ‘If it had grown up,’ she said to herself, ‘it would have made a dreadfully ugly child: but it makes rather a handsome pig, I think.’ And she began thinking over other children she knew, who might do very well as pigs, and was just saying to herself, ‘if one only knew the right way to change them—’ when she was a little startled by seeing the Cheshire Cat sitting on a bough of a tree a few yards off.

The Cat only grinned when it saw Alice. It looked good- natured, she thought: still it had very long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt that it ought to be treated with respect.

’Cheshire Puss,’ she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. ‘Come, it’s pleased so far,’ thought Alice, and she went on. ‘Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?’

’That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,’ said the Cat.

’I don’t much care where—’ said Alice.

’Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,’ said the Cat.

’—so long as I get somewhere,’ Alice added as an explanation.

’Oh, you’re sure to do that,’ said the Cat, ‘if you only walk long enough.’

Alice felt that this could not be denied, so she tried another question. ‘What sort of people live about here?’

’In that direction,’ the Cat said, waving its right paw round, ‘lives a Hatter: and in that direction,’ waving the other paw, ‘lives a March Hare. Visit either you like: they’re both mad.’

’But I don’t want to go among mad people,’ Alice remarked.

’Oh, you can’t help that,’ said the Cat: ‘we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.’

’How do you know I’m mad?’ said Alice.

’You must be,’ said the Cat, ‘or you wouldn’t have come here.’

Alice didn’t think that proved it at all; however, she went on ‘And how do you know that you’re mad?’

’To begin with,’ said the Cat, ‘a dog’s not mad. You grant that?’

’I suppose so,’ said Alice.

’Well, then,’ the Cat went on, ‘you see, a dog growls when it’s angry, and wags its tail when it’s pleased. Now I growl when I’m pleased, and wag my tail when I’m angry. Therefore I’m mad.’

’I call it purring, not growling,’ said Alice.

’Call it what you like,’ said the Cat. ‘Do you play croquet with the Queen to-day?’

’I should like it very much,’ said Alice, ‘but I haven’t been invited yet.’

’You’ll see me there,’ said the Cat, and vanished.

Alice was not much surprised at this, she was getting so used to queer things happening. While she was looking at the place where it had been, it suddenly appeared again.

’By-the-bye, what became of the baby?’ said the Cat. ‘I’d nearly forgotten to ask.’

’It turned into a pig,’ Alice quietly said, just as if it had come back in a natural way.

’I thought it would,’ said the Cat, and vanished again.

Alice waited a little, half expecting to see it again, but it did not appear, and after a minute or two she walked on in the direction in which the March Hare was said to live. ‘I’ve seen hatters before,’ she said to herself; ‘the March Hare will be much the most interesting, and perhaps as this is May it won’t be raving mad—at least not so mad as it was in March.’ As she said this, she looked up, and there was the Cat again, sitting on a branch of a tree.

’Did you say pig, or fig?’ said the Cat.

’I said pig,’ replied Alice; ‘and I wish you wouldn’t keep appearing and vanishing so suddenly: you make one quite giddy.’

’All right,’ said the Cat; and this time it vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone.

’Well! I’ve often seen a cat without a grin,’ thought Alice; ‘but a grin without a cat! It’s the most curious thing I ever saw in my life!’

She had not gone much farther before she came in sight of the house of the March Hare: she thought it must be the right house, because the chimneys were shaped like ears and the roof was thatched with fur. It was so large a house, that she did not like to go nearer till she had nibbled some more of the lefthand bit of mushroom, and raised herself to about two feet high: even then she walked up towards it rather timidly, saying to herself ‘Suppose it should be raving mad after all! I almost wish I’d gone to see the Hatter instead!’

CHAPTER VII: A Mad Tea-Party

There was a table set out under a tree in front of the house, and the March Hare and the Hatter were having tea at it: a Dormouse was sitting between them, fast asleep, and the other two were using it as a cushion, resting their elbows on it, and talking over its head. ‘Very uncomfortable for the Dormouse,’ thought Alice; ‘only, as it’s asleep, I suppose it doesn’t mind.’

The table was a large one, but the three were all crowded together at one corner of it: ‘No room! No room!’ they cried out when they saw Alice coming. ‘There’s plenty of room!’ said Alice indignantly, and she sat down in a large arm-chair at one end of the table.

’Have some wine,’ the March Hare said in an encouraging tone.

Alice looked all round the table, but there was nothing on it but tea. ‘I don’t see any wine,’ she remarked.

’There isn’t any,’ said the March Hare.

’Then it wasn’t very civil of you to offer it,’ said Alice angrily.

’It wasn’t very civil of you to sit down without being invited,’ said the March Hare.

’I didn’t know it was your table,’ said Alice; ‘it’s laid for a great many more than three.’

’Your hair wants cutting,’ said the Hatter. He had been looking at Alice for some time with great curiosity, and this was his first speech.

’You should learn not to make personal remarks,’ Alice said with some severity; ‘it’s very rude.’

The Hatter opened his eyes very wide on hearing this; but all he said was, ‘Why is a raven like a writing-desk?’

’Come, we shall have some fun now!’ thought Alice. ‘I’m glad they’ve begun asking riddles.—I believe I can guess that,’ she added aloud.

’Do you mean that you think you can find out the answer to it?’ said the March Hare.

’Exactly so,’ said Alice.

’Then you should say what you mean,’ the March Hare went on.

’I do,’ Alice hastily replied; ‘at least—at least I mean what I say—that’s the same thing, you know.’

’Not the same thing a bit!’ said the Hatter. ‘You might just as well say that ‘I see what I eat’ is the same thing as ‘I eat what I see’!’

’You might just as well say,’ added the March Hare, ‘that ‘I like what I get’ is the same thing as ‘I get what I like’!’

’You might just as well say,’ added the Dormouse, who seemed to be talking in his sleep, ‘that ‘I breathe when I sleep’ is the same thing as ‘I sleep when I breathe’!’

’It is the same thing with you,’ said the Hatter, and here the conversation dropped, and the party sat silent for a minute, while Alice thought over all she could remember about ravens and writing-desks, which wasn’t much.

The Hatter was the first to break the silence. ‘What day of the month is it?’ he said, turning to Alice: he had taken his watch out of his pocket, and was looking at it uneasily, shaking it every now and then, and holding it to his ear.

Alice considered a little, and then said ‘The fourth.’

’Two days wrong!’ sighed the Hatter. ‘I told you butter wouldn’t suit the works!’ he added looking angrily at the March Hare.

’It was the best butter,’ the March Hare meekly replied.

’Yes, but some crumbs must have got in as well,’ the Hatter grumbled: ‘you shouldn’t have put it in with the bread-knife.’

The March Hare took the watch and looked at it gloomily: then he dipped it into his cup of tea, and looked at it again: but he could think of nothing better to say than his first remark, ‘It was the best butter, you know.’

Alice had been looking over his shoulder with some curiosity. ‘What a funny watch!’ she remarked. ‘It tells the day of the month, and doesn’t tell what o’clock it is!’

’Why should it?’ muttered the Hatter. ‘Does your watch tell you what year it is?’

’Of course not,’ Alice replied very readily: ‘but that’s because it stays the same year for such a long time together.’

’Which is just the case with mine,’ said the Hatter.

Alice felt dreadfully puzzled. The Hatter’s remark seemed to have no sort of meaning in it, and yet it was certainly English. ‘I don’t quite understand you,’ she said, as politely as she could.

’The Dormouse is asleep again,’ said the Hatter, and he poured a little hot tea upon its nose.

The Dormouse shook its head impatiently, and said, without opening its eyes, ‘Of course, of course; just what I was going to remark myself.’

’Have you guessed the riddle yet?’ the Hatter said, turning to Alice again.

’No, I give it up,’ Alice replied: ‘what’s the answer?’

’I haven’t the slightest idea,’ said the Hatter.

’Nor I,’ said the March Hare.

Alice sighed wearily. ‘I think you might do something better with the time,’ she said, ‘than waste it in asking riddles that have no answers.’

’If you knew Time as well as I do,’ said the Hatter, ‘you wouldn’t talk about wasting it. It’s him.’

’I don’t know what you mean,’ said Alice.

’Of course you don’t!’ the Hatter said, tossing his head contemptuously. ‘I dare say you never even spoke to Time!’

’Perhaps not,’ Alice cautiously replied: ‘but I know I have to beat time when I learn music.’

’Ah! that accounts for it,’ said the Hatter. ‘He won’t stand beating. Now, if you only kept on good terms with him, he’d do almost anything you liked with the clock. For instance, suppose it were nine o’clock in the morning, just time to begin lessons: you’d only have to whisper a hint to Time, and round goes the clock in a twinkling! Half-past one, time for dinner!’

(’I only wish it was,’ the March Hare said to itself in a whisper.) ’That would be grand, certainly,’ said Alice thoughtfully: ‘but then—I shouldn’t be hungry for it, you know.’

’Not at first, perhaps,’ said the Hatter: ‘but you could keep it to half-past one as long as you liked.’

’Is that the way you manage?’ Alice asked.

The Hatter shook his head mournfully. ‘Not I!’ he replied. ‘We quarrelled last March—just before he went mad, you know—’ (pointing with his tea spoon at the March Hare,) ‘—it was at the great concert given by the Queen of Hearts, and I had to sing

"Twinkle, twinkle, little bat!

How I wonder what you’re at!’

You know the song, perhaps?’

’I’ve heard something like it,’ said Alice.

’It goes on, you know,’ the Hatter continued, ‘in this way:—

"Up above the world you fly,

Like a tea-tray in the sky.

Twinkle, twinkle—‘‘

Here the Dormouse shook itself, and began singing in its sleep ‘Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle—’ and went on so long that they had to pinch it to make it stop.

’Well, I’d hardly finished the first verse,’ said the Hatter, ‘when the Queen jumped up and bawled out, ‘He’s murdering the time! Off with his head!‘‘

’How dreadfully savage!’ exclaimed Alice.

’And ever since that,’ the Hatter went on in a mournful tone, ‘he won’t do a thing I ask! It’s always six o’clock now.’

A bright idea came into Alice’s head. ‘Is that the reason so many tea-things are put out here?’ she asked.

’Yes, that’s it,’ said the Hatter with a sigh: ‘it’s always tea-time, and we’ve no time to wash the things between whiles.’

’Then you keep moving round, I suppose?’ said Alice.

’Exactly so,’ said the Hatter: ‘as the things get used up.’

’But what happens when you come to the beginning again?’ Alice ventured to ask.

’Suppose we change the subject,’ the March Hare interrupted, yawning. ‘I’m getting tired of this. I vote the young lady tells us a story.’

’I’m afraid I don’t know one,’ said Alice, rather alarmed at the proposal.

’Then the Dormouse shall!’ they both cried. ‘Wake up, Dormouse!’ And they pinched it on both sides at once.

The Dormouse slowly opened his eyes. ‘I wasn’t asleep,’ he said in a hoarse, feeble voice: ‘I heard every word you fellows were saying.’

’Tell us a story!’ said the March Hare.

’Yes, please do!’ pleaded Alice.

’And be quick about it,’ added the Hatter, ‘or you’ll be asleep again before it’s done.’

’Once upon a time there were three little sisters,’ the Dormouse began in a great hurry; ‘and their names were Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie; and they lived at the bottom of a well—’ ’What did they live on?’ said Alice, who always took a great interest in questions of eating and drinking.

’They lived on treacle,’ said the Dormouse, after thinking a minute or two.

’They couldn’t have done that, you know,’ Alice gently remarked; ‘they’d have been ill.’

’So they were,’ said the Dormouse; ‘very ill.’

Alice tried to fancy to herself what such an extraordinary ways of living would be like, but it puzzled her too much, so she went on: ‘But why did they live at the bottom of a well?’

’Take some more tea,’ the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly.

’I’ve had nothing yet,’ Alice replied in an offended tone, ‘so I can’t take more.’

’You mean you can’t take less,’ said the Hatter: ‘it’s very easy to take more than nothing.’

’Nobody asked your opinion,’ said Alice.

’Who’s making personal remarks now?’ the Hatter asked triumphantly.

Alice did not quite know what to say to this: so she helped herself to some tea and bread-and-butter, and then turned to the Dormouse, and repeated her question. ‘Why did they live at the bottom of a well?’

The Dormouse again took a minute or two to think about it, and then said, ‘It was a treacle-well.’

’There’s no such thing!’ Alice was beginning very angrily, but the Hatter and the March Hare went ‘Sh! sh!’ and the Dormouse sulkily remarked, ‘If you can’t be civil, you’d better finish the story for yourself.’

’No, please go on!’ Alice said very humbly; ‘I won’t interrupt again. I dare say there may be one.’

’One, indeed!’ said the Dormouse indignantly. However, he consented to go on. ‘And so these three little sisters—they were learning to draw, you know—’ ’What did they draw?’ said Alice, quite forgetting her promise.

’Treacle,’ said the Dormouse, without considering at all this time.

’I want a clean cup,’ interrupted the Hatter: ‘let’s all move one place on.’

He moved on as he spoke, and the Dormouse followed him: the March Hare moved into the Dormouse’s place, and Alice rather unwillingly took the place of the March Hare. The Hatter was the only one who got any advantage from the change: and Alice was a good deal worse off than before, as the March Hare had just upset the milk-jug into his plate.

Alice did not wish to offend the Dormouse again, so she began very cautiously: ‘But I don’t understand. Where did they draw the treacle from?’

’You can draw water out of a water-well,’ said the Hatter; ‘so I should think you could draw treacle out of a treacle-well—eh, stupid?’

’But they were in the well,’ Alice said to the Dormouse, not choosing to notice this last remark.

’Of course they were’, said the Dormouse; ‘—well in.’

This answer so confused poor Alice, that she let the Dormouse go on for some time without interrupting it.

’They were learning to draw,’ the Dormouse went on, yawning and rubbing its eyes, for it was getting very sleepy; ‘and they drew all manner of things—everything that begins with an M—’

’Why with an M?’ said Alice.

’Why not?’ said the March Hare.

Alice was silent.

The Dormouse had closed its eyes by this time, and was going off into a doze; but, on being pinched by the Hatter, it woke up again with a little shriek, and went on: ‘—that begins with an M, such as mouse-traps, and the moon, and memory, and muchness— you know you say things are ‘much of a muchness’—did you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a muchness?’

’Really, now you ask me,’ said Alice, very much confused, ‘I don’t think—’ ’Then you shouldn’t talk,’ said the Hatter.

This piece of rudeness was more than Alice could bear: she got up in great disgust, and walked off; the Dormouse fell asleep instantly, and neither of the others took the least notice of her going, though she looked back once or twice, half hoping that they would call after her: the last time she saw them, they were trying to put the Dormouse into the teapot.

’At any rate I’ll never go there again!’ said Alice as she picked her way through the wood. ‘It’s the stupidest tea- party I ever was at in all my life!’

Just as she said this, she noticed that one of the trees had a door leading right into it. ‘That’s very curious!’ she thought. ‘But everything’s curious today. I think I may as well go in at once.’ And in she went.

Once more she found herself in the long hall, and close to the little glass table. ‘Now, I’ll manage better this time,’ she said to herself, and began by taking the little golden key, and unlocking the door that led into the garden. Then she went to work nibbling at the mushroom (she had kept a piece of it in her pocket) till she was about a foot high: then she walked down the little passage: and then—she found herself at last in the beautiful garden, among the bright flower-beds and the cool fountains.

CHAPTER VIII: The Queen’s Croquet- Ground

A large rose-tree stood near the entrance of the garden: the roses growing on it were white, but there were three gardeners at it, busily painting them red. Alice thought this a very curious thing, and she went nearer to watch them, and just as she came up to them she heard one of them say, ‘Look out now, Five! Don’t go splashing paint over me like that!’

’I couldn’t help it,’ said Five, in a sulky tone; ‘Seven jogged my elbow.’

On which Seven looked up and said, ‘That’s right, Five! Always lay the blame on others!’

You’d better not talk!’ said Five. ‘I heard the Queen say only yesterday you deserved to be beheaded!’

’What for?’ said the one who had spoken first.

’That’s none of your business, Two!’ said Seven.

’Yes, it is his business!’ said Five, ‘and I’ll tell him—it was for bringing the cook tulip-roots instead of onions.’

Seven flung down his brush, and had just begun ‘Well, of all the unjust things—’ when his eye chanced to fall upon Alice, as she stood watching them, and he checked himself suddenly: the others looked round also, and all of them bowed low.

’Would you tell me,’ said Alice, a little timidly, ‘why you are painting those roses?’

Five and Seven said nothing, but looked at Two. Two began in a low voice, ‘Why the fact is, you see, Miss, this here ought to have been a red rose-tree, and we put a white one in by mistake; and if the Queen was to find it out, we should all have our heads cut off, you know. So you see, Miss, we’re doing our best, afore she comes, to— ’ At this moment Five, who had been anxiously looking across the garden, called out ‘The Queen! The Queen!’ and the three gardeners instantly threw themselves flat upon their faces. There was a sound of many footsteps, and Alice looked round, eager to see the Queen.

First came ten soldiers carrying clubs; these were all shaped like the three gardeners, oblong and flat, with their hands and feet at the corners: next the ten courtiers; these were ornamented all over with diamonds, and walked two and two, as the soldiers did. After these came the royal children; there were ten of them, and the little dears came jumping merrily along hand in hand, in couples: they were all ornamented with hearts. Next came the guests, mostly Kings and Queens, and among them Alice recognised the White Rabbit: it was talking in a hurried nervous manner, smiling at everything that was said, and went by without noticing her. Then followed the Knave of Hearts, carrying the King’s crown on a crimson velvet cushion; and, last of all this grand procession, came THE KING AND QUEEN OF HEARTS.

Alice was rather doubtful whether she ought not to lie down on her face like the three gardeners, but she could not remember ever having heard of such a rule at processions; ‘and besides, what would be the use of a procession,’ thought she, ‘if people had all to lie down upon their faces, so that they couldn’t see it?’ So she stood still where she was, and waited.

When the procession came opposite to Alice, they all stopped and looked at her, and the Queen said severely ‘Who is this?’ She said it to the Knave of Hearts, who only bowed and smiled in reply.

’Idiot!’ said the Queen, tossing her head impatiently; and, turning to Alice, she went on, ‘What’s your name, child?’

’My name is Alice, so please your Majesty,’ said Alice very politely; but she added, to herself, ‘Why, they’re only a pack of cards, after all. I needn’t be afraid of them!’

’And who are these?’ said the Queen, pointing to the three gardeners who were lying round the rosetree; for, you see, as they were lying on their faces, and the pattern on their backs was the same as the rest of the pack, she could not tell whether they were gardeners, or soldiers, or courtiers, or three of her own children.

’How should I know?’ said Alice, surprised at her own courage. ‘It’s no business of mine.’

The Queen turned crimson with fury, and, after glaring at her for a moment like a wild beast, screamed ‘Off with her head! Off—’

’Nonsense!’ said Alice, very loudly and decidedly, and the Queen was silent.

The King laid his hand upon her arm, and timidly said ‘Consider, my dear: she is only a child!’

The Queen turned angrily away from him, and said to the Knave ‘Turn them over!’

The Knave did so, very carefully, with one foot.

’Get up!’ said the Queen, in a shrill, loud voice, and the three gardeners instantly jumped up, and began bowing to the King, the Queen, the royal children, and everybody else.

’Leave off that!’ screamed the Queen. ‘You make me giddy.’ And then, turning to the rose-tree, she went on, ‘What have you been doing here?’

’May it please your Majesty,’ said Two, in a very humble tone, going down on one knee as he spoke, ‘we were trying—’

’I see!’ said the Queen, who had meanwhile been examining the roses. ‘Off with their heads!’ and the procession moved on, three of the soldiers remaining behind to execute the unfortunate gardeners, who ran to Alice for protection.

’You shan’t be beheaded!’ said Alice, and she put them into a large flower-pot that stood near. The three soldiers wandered about for a minute or two, looking for them, and then quietly marched off after the others.

’Are their heads off?’ shouted the Queen.

’Their heads are gone, if it please your Majesty!’ the soldiers shouted in reply.

’That’s right!’ shouted the Queen. ‘Can you play croquet?’

The soldiers were silent, and looked at Alice, as the question was evidently meant for her.

’Yes!’ shouted Alice.

’Come on, then!’ roared the Queen, and Alice joined the procession, wondering very much what would happen next.

’It’s—it’s a very fine day!’ said a timid voice at her side. She was walking by the White Rabbit, who was peeping anxiously into her face.

’Very,’ said Alice: ‘—where’s the Duchess?’

’Hush! Hush!’ said the Rabbit in a low, hurried tone. He looked anxiously over his shoulder as he spoke, and then raised himself upon tiptoe, put his mouth close to her ear, and whispered ‘She’s under sentence of execution.’

’What for?’ said Alice.

’Did you say ‘What a pity!’?’ the Rabbit asked.

’No, I didn’t,’ said Alice: ‘I don’t think it’s at all a pity. I said ‘What for?‘‘

’She boxed the Queen’s ears—’ the Rabbit began. Alice gave a little scream of laughter. ‘Oh, hush!’ the Rabbit whispered in a frightened tone. ‘The Queen will hear you! You see, she came rather late, and the Queen said—’

’Get to your places!’ shouted the Queen in a voice of thunder, and people began running about in all directions, tumbling up against each other; however, they got settled down in a minute or two, and the game began. Alice thought she had never seen such a curious croquet-ground in her life; it was all ridges and furrows; the balls were live hedgehogs, the mallets live flamingoes, and the soldiers had to double themselves up and to stand on their hands and feet, to make the arches.

The chief difficulty Alice found at first was in managing her flamingo: she succeeded in getting its body tucked away, comfortably enough, under her arm, with its legs hanging down, but generally, just as she had got its neck nicely straightened out, and was going to give the hedgehog a blow with its head, it would twist itself round and look up in her face, with such a puzzled expression that she could not help bursting out laughing: and when she had got its head down, and was going to begin again, it was very provoking to find that the hedgehog had unrolled itself, and was in the act of crawling away: besides all this, there was generally a ridge or furrow in the way wherever she wanted to send the hedgehog to, and, as the doubled-up soldiers were always getting up and walking off to other parts of the ground, Alice soon came to the conclusion that it was a very difficult game indeed.

The players all played at once without waiting for turns, quarrelling all the while, and fighting for the hedgehogs; and in a very short time the Queen was in a furious passion, and went stamping about, and shouting ‘Off with his head!’ or ‘Off with her head!’ about once in a minute.

Alice began to feel very uneasy: to be sure, she had not as yet had any dispute with the Queen, but she knew that it might happen any minute, ‘and then,’ thought she, ‘what would become of me? They’re dreadfully fond of beheading people here; the great wonder is, that there’s any one left alive!’

She was looking about for some way of escape, and wondering whether she could get away without being seen, when she noticed a curious appearance in the air: it puzzled her very much at first, but, after watching it a minute or two, she made it out to be a grin, and she said to herself ‘It’s the Cheshire Cat: now I shall have somebody to talk to.’

’How are you getting on?’ said the Cat, as soon as there was mouth enough for it to speak with.

Alice waited till the eyes appeared, and then nodded. ‘It’s no use speaking to it,’ she thought, ‘till its ears have come, or at least one of them.’ In another minute the whole head appeared, and then Alice put down her flamingo, and began an account of the game, feeling very glad she had someone to listen to her. The Cat seemed to think that there was enough of it now in sight, and no more of it appeared.

’I don’t think they play at all fairly,’ Alice began, in rather a complaining tone, ‘and they all quarrel so dreadfully one can’t hear oneself speak—and they don’t seem to have any rules in particular; at least, if there are, nobody attends to them—and you’ve no idea how confusing it is all the things being alive; for instance, there’s the arch I’ve got to go through next walking about at the other end of the ground—and I should have croqueted the Queen’s hedgehog just now, only it ran away when it saw mine coming!’

’How do you like the Queen?’ said the Cat in a low voice.

’Not at all,’ said Alice: ‘she’s so extremely—’ Just then she noticed that the Queen was close behind her, listening: so she went on, ‘—likely to win, that it’s hardly worth while finishing the game.’

The Queen smiled and passed on.

’Who are you talking to?’ said the King, going up to Alice, and looking at the Cat’s head with great curiosity.

’It’s a friend of mine—a Cheshire Cat,’ said Alice: ‘allow me to introduce it.’

’I don’t like the look of it at all,’ said the King: ‘however, it may kiss my hand if it likes.’

’I’d rather not,’ the Cat remarked.

’Don’t be impertinent,’ said the King, ‘and don’t look at me like that!’ He got behind Alice as he spoke.

’A cat may look at a king,’ said Alice. ‘I’ve read that in some book, but I don’t remember where.’

’Well, it must be removed,’ said the King very decidedly, and he called the Queen, who was passing at the moment, ‘My dear! I wish you would have this cat removed!’

The Queen had only one way of settling all difficulties, great or small. ‘Off with his head!’ she said, without even looking round.

’I’ll fetch the executioner myself,’ said the King eagerly, and he hurried off.

Alice thought she might as well go back, and see how the game was going on, as she heard the Queen’s voice in the distance, screaming with passion. She had already heard her sentence three of the players to be executed for having missed their turns, and she did not like the look of things at all, as the game was in such confusion that she never knew whether it was her turn or not. So she went in search of her hedgehog.

The hedgehog was engaged in a fight with another hedgehog, which seemed to Alice an excellent opportunity for croqueting one of them with the other: the only difficulty was, that her flamingo was gone across to the other side of the garden, where Alice could see it trying in a helpless sort of way to fly up into a tree.

By the time she had caught the flamingo and brought it back, the fight was over, and both the hedgehogs were out of sight: ‘but it doesn’t matter much,’ thought Alice, ‘as all the arches are gone from this side of the ground.’ So she tucked it away under her arm, that it might not escape again, and went back for a little more conversation with her friend.

When she got back to the Cheshire Cat, she was surprised to find quite a large crowd collected round it: there was a dispute going on between the executioner, the King, and the Queen, who were all talking at once, while all the rest were quite silent, and looked very uncomfortable.

The moment Alice appeared, she was appealed to by all three to settle the question, and they repeated their arguments to her, though, as they all spoke at once, she found it very hard indeed to make out exactly what they said.

The executioner’s argument was, that you couldn’t cut off a head unless there was a body to cut it off from: that he had never had to do such a thing before, and he wasn’t going to begin at his time of life.

The King’s argument was, that anything that had a head could be beheaded, and that you weren’t to talk nonsense.

The Queen’s argument was, that if something wasn’t done about it in less than no time she’d have everybody executed, all round. (It was this last remark that had made the whole party look so grave and anxious.)

Alice could think of nothing else to say but ‘It belongs to the Duchess: you’d better ask her about it.’

’She’s in prison,’ the Queen said to the executioner: ‘fetch her here.’ And the executioner went off like an arrow.

The Cat’s head began fading away the moment he was gone, and, by the time he had come back with the Dutchess, it had entirely disappeared; so the King and the executioner ran wildly up and down looking for it, while the rest of the party went back to the game.

CHAPTER IX: The Mock Turtle’s Story

’You can’t think how glad I am to see you again, you dear old thing!’ said the Duchess, as she tucked her arm affectionately into Alice’s, and they walked off together.

Alice was very glad to find her in such a pleasant temper, and thought to herself that perhaps it was only the pepper that had made her so savage when they met in the kitchen.

’When I’m a Duchess,’ she said to h erself, (not in a very hopeful tone though), ‘I won’t have any pepper in my kitchen at all. Soup does very well without—Maybe it’s always pepper that makes people hot-tempered,’ she went on, very much pleased at having found out a new kind of rule, ‘and vinegar that makes them sour—and camomile that makes them bitter—and—and barley-sugar and such things that make children sweet-tempered. I only wish people knew that: then they wouldn’t be so stingy about it, you know—’

She had quite forgotten the Duchess by this time, and was a little startled when she heard her voice close to her ear. ‘You’re thinking about something, my dear, and that makes you forget to talk. I can’t tell you just now what the moral of that is, but I shall remember it in a bit.’

’Perhaps it hasn’t one,’ Alice ventured to remark.

’Tut, tut, child!’ said the Duchess. ‘Everything’s got a moral, if only you can find it.’ And she squeezed herself up closer to Alice’s side as she spoke.

Alice did not much like keeping so close to her: first, because the Duchess was VERY ugly; and secondly, because she was exactly the right height to rest her chin upon Alice’s shoulder, and it was an uncomfortably sharp chin. However, she did not like to be rude, so she bore it as well as she could.

’The game’s going on rather better now,’ she said, by way of keeping up the conversation a little.

’’Tis so,’ said the Duchess: ‘and the moral of that is— ‘Oh, ‘tis love, ‘tis love, that makes the world go round!‘‘

’Somebody said,’ Alice whispered, ‘that it’s done by everybody minding their own business!’

’Ah, well! It means much the same thing,’ said the Duchess, digging her sharp little chin into Alice’s shoulder as she added, ‘and the moral of that is—‘Take care of the sense, and the sounds will take care of themselves.‘‘

’How fond she is of finding morals in things!’ Alice thought to herself.

’I dare say you’re wondering why I don’t put my arm round your waist,’ the Duchess said after a pause: ‘the reason is, that I’m doubtful about the temper of your flamingo. Shall I try the experiment?’

’He might bite,’ Alice cautiously replied, not feeling at all anxious to have the experiment tried.

’Very true,’ said the Duchess: ‘flamingoes and mustard both bite. And the moral of that is—‘Birds of a feather flock together.‘‘

’Only mustard isn’t a bird,’ Alice remarked.

’Right, as usual,’ said the Duchess: ‘what a clear way you have of putting things!’

’It’s a mineral, I think,’ said Alice.

’Of course it is,’ said the Duchess, who seemed ready to agree to everything that Alice said; ‘there’s a large mustard-mine near here. And the moral of that is—‘The more there is of mine, the less there is of yours.‘‘

’Oh, I know!’ exclaimed Alice, who had not attended to this last remark, ‘it’s a vegetable. It doesn’t look like one, but it is.’

’I quite agree with you,’ said the Duchess; ‘and the moral of that is—‘Be what you would seem to be’—or if you’d like it put more simply—‘Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise.‘‘

’I think I should understand that better,’ Alice said very politely, ‘if I had it written down: but I can’t quite follow it as you say it.’

’That’s nothing to what I could say if I chose,’ the Duchess replied, in a pleased tone.

’Pray don’t trouble yourself to say it any longer than that,’ said Alice.

’Oh, don’t talk about trouble!’ said the Duchess. ‘I make you a present of everything I’ve said as yet.’

’A cheap sort of present!’ thought Alice. ‘I’m glad they don’t give birthday presents like that!’ But she did not venture to say it out loud.

’Thinking again?’ the Duchess asked, with another dig of her sharp little chin.

’I’ve a right to think,’ said Alice sharply, for she was beginning to feel a little worried.

’Just about as much right,’ said the Duchess, ‘as pigs have to fly; and the m—’ But here, to Alice’s great surprise, the Duchess’s voice died away, even in the middle of her favourite word ‘moral,’ and the arm that was linked into hers began to tremble. Alice looked up, and there stood the Queen in front of them, with her arms folded, frowning like a thunderstorm.

’A fine day, your Majesty!’ the Duchess began in a low, weak voice.

’Now, I give you fair warning,’ shouted the Queen, stamping on the ground as she spoke; ‘either you or your head must be off, and that in about half no time! Take your choice!’

The Duchess took her choice, and was gone in a moment.

’Let’s go on with the game,’ the Queen said to Alice; and Alice was too much frightened to say a word, but slowly followed her back to the croquet-ground.

The other guests had taken advantage of the Queen’s absence, and were resting in the shade: however, the moment they saw her, they hurried back to the game, the Queen merely remarking that a moment’s delay would cost them their lives.

All the time they were playing the Queen never left off quarrelling with the other players, and shouting ‘Off with his head!’ or ‘Off with her head!’ Those whom she sentenced were taken into custody by the soldiers, who of course had to leave off being arches to do this, so that by the end of half an hour or so there were no arches left, and all the players, except the King, the Queen, and Alice, were in custody and under sentence of execution.

Then the Queen left off, quite out of breath, and said to Alice, ‘Have you seen the Mock Turtle yet?’

’No,’ said Alice. ‘I don’t even know what a Mock Turtle is.’

’It’s the thing Mock Turtle Soup is made from,’ said the Queen.

’I never saw one, or heard of one,’ said Alice.

’Come on, then,’ said the Queen, ‘and he shall tell you his history,’

As they walked off together, Alice heard the King say in a low voice, to the company generally, ‘You are all pardoned.’ ‘Come, that’s a good thing!’ she said to herself, for she had felt quite unhappy at the number of executions the Queen had ordered.

They very soon came upon a Gryphon, lying fast asleep in the sun. (IF you don’t know what a Gryphon is, look at the picture.) ‘Up, lazy thing!’ said the Queen, ‘and take this young lady to see the Mock Turtle, and to hear his history. I must go back and see after some executions I have ordered’; and she walked off, leaving Alice alone with the Gryphon. Alice did not quite like the look of the creature, but on the whole she thought it would be quite as safe to stay with it as to go after that savage Queen: so she waited.

The Gryphon sat up and rubbed its eyes: then it watched the Queen till she was out of sight: then it chuckled. ‘What fun!’ said the Gryphon, half to itself, half to Alice.

’What IS the fun?’ said Alice.

’Why, she,’ said the Gryphon. ‘It’s all her fancy, that: they never executes nobody, you know. Come on!’

’Everybody says ‘come on!’ here,’ thought Alice, as she went slowly after it: ‘I never was so ordered about in all my life, never!’

They had not gone far before they saw the Mock Turtle in the distance, sitting sad and lonely on a little ledge of rock, and, as they came nearer, Alice could hear him sighing as if his heart would break. She pitied him deeply. ‘What is his sorrow?’ she asked the Gryphon, and the Gryphon answered, very nearly in the same words as before, ‘It’s all his fancy, that: he hasn’t got no sorrow, you know. Come on!’

So they went up to the Mock Turtle, who looked at them with large eyes full of tears, but said nothing.

’This here young lady,’ said the Gryphon, ‘she wants for to know your history, she do.’

’I’ll tell it her,’ said the Mock Turtle in a deep, hollow tone: ‘sit down, both of you, and don’t speak a word till I’ve finished.’

So they sat down, and nobody spoke for some minutes. Alice thought to herself, ‘I don’t see how he can even finish, if he doesn’t begin.’ But she waited patiently.

’Once,’ said the Mock Turtle at last, with a deep sigh, ‘I was a real Turtle.’

These words were followed by a very long silence, broken only by an occasional exclamation of ‘Hjckrrh!’ from the Gryphon, and the constant heavy sobbing of the Mock Turtle. Alice was very nearly getting up and saying, ‘Thank you, sir, for your interesting story,’ but she could not help thinking there must be more to come, so she sat still and said nothing.

’When we were little,’ the Mock Turtle went on at last, more calmly, though still sobbing a little now and then, ‘we went to school in the sea. The master was an old Turtle—we used to call him Tortoise—’

’Why did you call him Tortoise, if he wasn’t one?’ Alice asked.

’We called him Tortoise because he taught us,’ said the Mock Turtle angrily: ‘really you are very dull!’

’You ought to be ashamed of yourself for asking such a simple question,’ added the Gryphon; and then they both sat silent and looked at poor Alice, who felt ready to sink into the earth. At last the Gryphon said to the Mock Turtle, ‘Drive on, old fellow! Don’t be all day about it!’ and he went on in these words:

’Yes, we went to school in the sea, though you mayn’t believe it—’ ’I never said I didn’t!’ interrupted Alice.

’You did,’ said the Mock Turtle.

’Hold your tongue!’ added the Gryphon, before Alice could speak again. The Mock Turtle went on.

’We had the best of educations—in fact, we went to school every day—’ ’I’ve been to a day-school, too,’ said Alice; ‘you needn’t be so proud as all that.’

’With extras?’ asked the Mock Turtle a little anxiously.

’Yes,’ said Alice, ‘we learned French and music.’

’And washing?’ said the Mock Turtle.

’Certainly not!’ said Alice indignantly.

’Ah! then yours wasn’t a really good school,’ said the Mock Turtle in a tone of great relief. ‘Now at ours they had at the end of the bill, ‘French, music, and washing— extra.‘‘

’You couldn’t have wanted it much,’ said Alice; ‘living at the bottom of the sea.’

’I couldn’t afford to learn it.’ said the Mock Turtle with a sigh. ‘I only took the regular course.’

’What was that?’ inquired Alice.

’Reeling and Writhing, of course, to begin with,’ the Mock Turtle replied; ‘and then the different branches of Arithmetic— Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision.’

’I never heard of ‘Uglification,‘‘ Alice ventured to say. ‘What is it?’

The Gryphon lifted up both its paws in surprise. ‘What! Never heard of uglifying!’ it exclaimed. ‘You know what to beautify is, I suppose?’

’Yes,’ said Alice doubtfully: ‘it means—to—make— anything—prettier.’

’Well, then,’ the Gryphon went on, ‘if you don’t know what to uglify is, you are a simpleton.’

Alice did not feel encouraged to ask any more questions about it, so she turned to the Mock Turtle, and said ‘What else had you to learn?’

’Well, there was Mystery,’ the Mock Turtle replied, counting off the subjects on his flappers, ‘—Mystery, ancient and modern, with Seaography: then Drawling— the Drawling-master was an old conger-eel, that used to come once a week: He taught us Drawling, Stretching, and Fainting in Coils.’

’What was that like?’ said Alice.

’Well, I can’t show it you myself,’ the Mock Turtle said: ‘I’m too stiff. And the Gryphon never learnt it.’

’Hadn’t time,’ said the Gryphon: ‘I went to the Classics master, though. He was an old crab, he was.’

’I never went to him,’ the Mock Turtle said with a sigh: ‘he taught Laughing and Grief, they used to say.’

’So he did, so he did,’ said the Gryphon, sighing in his turn; and both creatures hid their faces in their paws.

’And how many hours a day did you do lessons?’ said Alice, in a hurry to change the subject.

’Ten hours the first day,’ said the Mock Turtle: ‘nine the next, and so on.’

’What a curious plan!’ exclaimed Alice.

’That’s the reason they’re called lessons,’ the Gryphon remarked: ‘because they lessen from day to day.’

This was quite a new idea to Alice, and she thought it over a little before she made her next remark. ‘Then the eleventh day must have been a holiday?’

’Of course it was,’ said the Mock Turtle.

’And how did you manage on the twelfth?’ Alice went on eagerly.

’That’s enough about lessons,’ the Gryphon interrupted in a very decided tone: ‘tell her something about the games now.’

CHAPTER X: The Lobster Quadrille

The Mock Turtle sighed deeply, and drew the back of one flapper across his eyes. He looked at Alice, and tried to speak, but for a minute or two sobs choked his voice. ‘Same as if he had a bone in his throat,’ said the Gryphon: and it set to work shaking him and punching him in the back. At last the Mock Turtle recovered his voice, and, with tears running down his cheeks, he went on again:—

’You may not have lived much under the sea—’ (’I haven’t,’ said Alice)— ‘and perhaps you were never even introduced to a lobster—’ (Alice began to say ‘I once tasted—’ but checked herself hastily, and said ‘No, never’) ‘—so you can have no idea what a delightful thing a Lobster Quadrille is!’

’No, indeed,’ said Alice. ‘What sort of a dance is it?’

’Why,’ said the Gryphon, ‘you first form into a line along the sea-shore—’ ’Two lines!’ cried the Mock Turtle. ‘Seals, turtles, salmon, and so on; then, when you’ve cleared all the jelly- fish out of the way—’ ’THAT generally takes some time,’ interrupted the Gryphon.

’—you advance twice—’

’Each with a lobster as a partner!’ cried the Gryphon.

’Of course,’ the Mock Turtle said: ‘advance twice, set to partners—’

’—change lobsters, and retire in same order,’ continued the Gryphon.

’Then, you know,’ the Mock Turtle went on, ‘you throw the—’

’The lobsters!’ shouted the Gryphon, with a bound into the air.

’—as far out to sea as you can—’

’Swim after them!’ screamed the Gryphon.

’Turn a somersault in the sea!’ cried the Mock Turtle, capering wildly about.

’Change lobster’s again!’ yelled the Gryphon at the top of its voice.

’Back to land again, and that’s all the first figure,’ said the Mock Turtle, suddenly dropping his voice; and the two creatures, who had been jumping about like mad things all this time, sat down again very sadly and quietly, and looked at Alice.

’It must be a very pretty dance,’ said Alice timidly.

’Would you like to see a little of it?’ said the Mock Turtle.

’Very much indeed,’ said Alice.

’Come, let’s try the first figure!’ said the Mock Turtle to the Gryphon. ‘We can do without lobsters, you know. Which shall sing?’

’Oh, YOU sing,’ said the Gryphon. ‘I’ve forgotten the words.’

So they began solemnly dancing round and round Alice, every now and then treading on her toes when they passed too close, and waving their forepaws to mark the time, while the Mock Turtle sang this, very slowly and sadly:—

’’Will you walk a little faster?’ said a whiting to a snail. ‘There’s a porpoise close behind us, and he’s treading on my tail. See how eagerly the lobsters and the turtles all advance! They are waiting on the shingle—will you come and join the dance?

Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance? Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance?

"You can really have no notion how delightful it will be When they take us up and throw us, with the lobsters, out to sea!’ But the snail replied ‘Too far, too far!’ and gave a look askance— Said he thanked the whiting kindly, but he would not join the dance. Would not, could not, would not, could not, would not join the dance. Would not, could not, would not, could not, could not join the dance.

’’What matters it how far we go?’ his scaly friend replied. ‘There is another shore, you know, upon the other side. The further off from England the nearer is to France— Then turn not pale, beloved snail, but come and join the dance.

Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance? Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance?‘‘

’Thank you, it’s a very interesting dance to watch,’ said Alice, feeling very glad that it was over at last: ‘and I do so like that curious song about the whiting!’

’Oh, as to the whiting,’ said the Mock Turtle, ‘they— you’ve seen them, of course?’

’Yes,’ said Alice, ‘I’ve often seen them at dinn—’ she checked herself hastily.

’I don’t know where Dinn may be,’ said the Mock Turtle, ‘but if you’ve seen them so often, of course you know what they’re like.’

’I believe so,’ Alice replied thoughtfully. ‘They have their tails in their mouths—and they’re all over crumbs.’

’You’re wrong about the crumbs,’ said the Mock Turtle: ‘crumbs would all wash off in the sea. But they have their tails in their mouths; and the reason is—’ here the Mock Turtle yawned and shut his eyes.—’Tell her about the reason and all that,’ he said to the Gryphon.

’The reason is,’ said the Gryphon, ‘that they would go with the lobsters to the dance. So they got thrown out to sea. So they had to fall a long way. So they got their tails fast in their mouths. So they couldn’t get them out again. That’s all.’

’Thank you,’ said Alice, ‘it’s very interesting. I never knew so much about a whiting before.’

’I can tell you more than that, if you like,’ said the Gryphon. ‘Do you know why it’s called a whiting?’

’I never thought about it,’ said Alice. ‘Why?’

’It does the boots and shoes.’ the Gryphon replied very solemnly.

Alice was thoroughly puzzled. ‘Does the boots and shoes!’ she repeated in a wondering tone.

’Why, what are your shoes done with?’ said the Gryphon. ‘I mean, what makes them so shiny?’

Alice looked down at them, and considered a little before she gave her answer. ‘They’re done with blacking, I believe.’

’Boots and shoes under the sea,’ the Gryphon went on in a deep voice, ‘are done with a whiting. Now you know.’

’And what are they made of?’ Alice asked in a tone of great curiosity.

’Soles and eels, of course,’ the Gryphon replied rather impatiently: ‘any shrimp could have told you that.’

’If I’d been the whiting,’ said Alice, whose thoughts were still running on the song, ‘I’d have said to the porpoise, ‘Keep back, please: we don’t want you with us!‘‘

’They were obliged to have him with them,’ the Mock Turtle said: ‘no wise fish would go anywhere without a porpoise.’

’Wouldn’t it really?’ said Alice in a tone of great surprise.

’Of course not,’ said the Mock Turtle: ‘why, if a fish came to me, and told me he was going a journey, I should say ‘With what porpoise?‘‘

’Don’t you mean ‘purpose’?’ said Alice.

’I mean what I say,’ the Mock Turtle replied in an offended tone. And the Gryphon added ‘Come, let’s hear some of your adventures.’

’I could tell you my adventures—beginning from this morning,’ said Alice a little timidly: ‘but it’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.’

’Explain all that,’ said the Mock Turtle.

’No, no! The adventures first,’ said the Gryphon in an impatient tone: ‘explanations take such a dreadful time.’

So Alice began telling them her adventures from the time when she first saw the White Rabbit. She was a little nervous about it just at first, the two creatures got so close to her, one on each side, and opened their eyes and mouths so very wide, but she gained courage as she went on. Her listeners were perfectly quiet till she got to the part about her repeating ’You are old, Father William,’ to the Caterpillar, and the words all coming different, and then the Mock Turtle drew a long breath, and said ‘That’s very curious.’

’It’s all about as curious as it can be,’ said the Gryphon.

’It all came different!’ the Mock Turtle repeated thoughtfully. ‘I should like to hear her try and repeat something now. Tell her to begin.’ He looked at the Gryphon as if he thought it had some kind of authority over Alice.

’Stand up and repeat ‘‘Tis the voice of the sluggard,‘‘ said the Gryphon.

’How the creatures order one about, and make one repeat lessons!’ thought Alice; ‘I might as well be at school at once.’ However, she got up, and began to repeat it, but her head was so full of the Lobster Quadrille, that she hardly knew what she was saying, and the words came very queer indeed:—

’’Tis the voice of the Lobster; I heard him declare, ‘You have baked me too brown, I must sugar my hair.’ As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose Trims his belt and his buttons, and turns out his toes.’

[later editions continued as follows When the sands are all dry, he is gay as a lark, And will talk in contemptuous tones of the Shark, But, when the tide rises and sharks are around, His voice has a timid and tremulous sound.]

’That’s different from what I used to say when I was a child,’ said the Gryphon.

’Well, I never heard it before,’ said the Mock Turtle; ‘but it sounds uncommon nonsense.’

Alice said nothing; she had sat down with her face in her hands, wondering if anything would ever happen in a natural way again.

’I should like to have it explained,’ said the Mock Turtle.

’She can’t explain it,’ said the Gryphon hastily. ‘Go on with the next verse.’

’But about his toes?’ the Mock Turtle persisted. ‘How could he turn them out with his nose, you know?’

’It’s the first position in dancing.’ Alice said; but was dreadfully puzzled by the whole thing, and longed to change the subject.

’Go on with the next verse,’ the Gryphon repeated impatiently: ‘it begins ‘I passed by his garden.‘‘

Alice did not dare to disobey, though she felt sure it would all come wrong, and she went on in a trembling voice:—

’I passed by his garden, and marked, with one eye, How the Owl and the Panther were sharing a pie—’

[later editions continued as follows: The Panther took pie-crust, and gravy, and meat, While the Owl had the dish as its share of the treat. When the pie was all finished, the Owl, as a boon, Was kindly permitted to pocket the spoon: While the Panther received knife and fork with a growl, And concluded the banquet—]

’What IS the use of repeating all that stuff,’ the Mock Turtle interrupted, ‘if you don’t explain it as you go on? It’s by far the most confusing thing I ever heard!’

’Yes, I think you’d better leave off,’ said the Gryphon: and Alice was only too glad to do so.

’Shall we try another figure of the Lobster Quadrille?’ the Gryphon went on. ‘Or would you like the Mock Turtle to sing you a song?’

’Oh, a song, please, if the Mock Turtle would be so kind,’ Alice replied, so eagerly that the Gryphon said, in a rather offended tone, ‘Hm! No accounting for tastes! Sing her ‘Turtle Soup,’ will you, old fellow?’

The Mock Turtle sighed deeply, and began, in a voice sometimes choked with sobs, to sing this:—

’Beautiful Soup, so rich and green, Waiting in a hot tureen! Who for such dainties would not stoop? Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup! Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup! Beau— ootiful Soo—oop! Beau—ootiful Soo—oop! Soo—oop of the e—e—evening, Beautiful, beautiful Soup!

’Beautiful Soup! Who cares for fish, Game, or any other dish? Who would not give all else for two pennyworth only of beautiful Soup? Pennyworth only of beautiful Soup? Beau— ootiful Soo—oop! Beau—ootiful Soo—oop! Soo—oop of the e—e—evening, Beautiful, beauti—FUL SOUP!’

’Chorus again!’ cried the Gryphon, and the Mock Turtle had just begun to repeat it, when a cry of ‘The trial’s beginning!’ was heard in the distance.

’Come on!’ cried the Gryphon, and, taking Alice by the hand, it hurried off, without waiting for the end of the song.

’What trial is it?’ Alice panted as she ran; but the Gryphon only answered ‘Come on!’ and ran the faster, while more and more faintly came, carried on the breeze that followed them, the melancholy words:—

’Soo—oop of the e—e—evening, Beautiful, beautiful Soup!’

CHAPTER XI: Who Stole the Tarts?

The King and Queen of Hearts were seated on their throne when they arrived, with a great crowd assembled about them—all sorts of little birds and beasts, as well as the whole pack of cards: the Knave was standing before them, in chains, with a soldier on each side to guard him; and near the King was the White Rabbit, with a trumpet in one hand, and a scroll of parchment in the other. In the very middle of the court was a table, with a large dish of tarts upon it: they looked so good, that it made Alice quite hungry to look at them—’I wish they’d get the trial done,’ she thought, ‘and hand round the refreshments!’ But there seemed to be no chance of this, so she began looking at everything about her, to pass away the time.

Alice had never been in a court of justice before, but she had read about them in books, and she was quite pleased to find that she knew the name of nearly everything there. ‘That’s the judge,’ she said to herself, ‘because of his great wig.’

The judge, by the way, was the King; and as he wore his crown over the wig, (look at the frontispiece if you want to see how he did it,) he did not look at all comfortable, and it was certainly not becoming.

’And that’s the jury-box,’ thought Alice, ‘and those twelve creatures,’ (she was obliged to say ‘creatures,’ you see, because some of them were animals, and some were birds,) ‘I suppose they are the jurors.’ She said this last word two or three times over to herself, being rather proud of it: for she thought, and rightly too, that very few little girls of her age knew the meaning of it at all. However, ‘jury-men’ would have done just as well.

The twelve jurors were all writing very busily on slates. ‘What are they doing?’ Alice whispered to the Gryphon. ‘They can’t have anything to put down yet, before the trial’s begun.’

’They’re putting down their names,’ the Gryphon whispered in reply, ‘for fear they should forget them before the end of the trial.’

’Stupid things!’ Alice began in a loud, indignant voice, but she stopped hastily, for the White Rabbit cried out, ‘Silence in the court!’ and the King put on his spectacles and looked anxiously round, to make out who was talking.

Alice could see, as well as if she were looking over their shoulders, that all the jurors were writing down ‘stupid

things!’ on their slates, and she could even make out that one of them didn’t know how to spell ‘stupid,’ and that he had to ask his neighbour to tell him. ‘A nice muddle their slates’ll be in before the trial’s over!’ thought Alice.

One of the jurors had a pencil that squeaked. This of course, Alice could not stand, and she went round the court and got behind him, and very soon found an opportunity of taking it away. She did it so quickly that the poor little juror (it was Bill, the Lizard) could not make out at all what had become of it; so, after hunting all about for it, he was obliged to write with one finger for the rest of the day; and this was of very little use, as it left no mark on the slate.

’Herald, read the accusation!’ said the King.

On this the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the trumpet, and then unrolled the parchment scroll, and read as follows:—

’The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts, All on a summer day: The Knave of Hearts, he stole those tarts, And took them quite away!’

’Consider your verdict,’ the King said to the jury.

’Not yet, not yet!’ the Rabbit hastily interrupted. ‘There’s a great deal to come before that!’

’Call the first witness,’ said the King; and the White Rabbit blew three blasts on the trumpet, and called out, ‘First witness!’

The first witness was the Hatter. He came in with a teacup in one hand and a piece of bread-and-butter in the other. ‘I beg pardon, your Majesty,’ he began, ‘for bringing these in: but I hadn’t quite finished my tea when I was sent for.’

’You ought to have finished,’ said the King. ‘When did you begin?’

The Hatter looked at the March Hare, who had followed him into the court, arm-in-arm with the Dormouse. ‘Fourteenth of March, I think it was,’ he said.

’Fifteenth,’ said the March Hare.

’Sixteenth,’ added the Dormouse.

’Write that down,’ the King said to the jury, and the jury eagerly wrote down all three dates on their slates, and then added them up, and reduced the answer to shillings and pence.

’Take off your hat,’ the King said to the Hatter.

’It isn’t mine,’ said the Hatter.

’Stolen!’ the King exclaimed, turning to the jury, who instantly made a memorandum of the fact.

’I keep them to sell,’ the Hatter added as an explanation; ‘I’ve none of my own. I’m a hatter.’

Here the Queen put on her spectacles, and began staring at the Hatter, who turned pale and fidgeted.

’Give your evidence,’ said the King; ‘and don’t be nervous, or I’ll have you executed on the spot.’

This did not seem to encourage the witness at all: he kept shifting from one foot to the other, looking uneasily at the Queen, and in his confusion he bit a large piece out of his teacup instead of the bread-and-butter.

Just at this moment Alice felt a very curious sensation, which puzzled her a good deal until she made out what it was: she was beginning to grow larger again, and she thought at first she would get up and leave the court; but on second thoughts she decided to remain where she was as long as there was room for her.

’I wish you wouldn’t squeeze so.’ said the Dormouse, who was sitting next to her. ‘I can hardly breathe.’

’I can’t help it,’ said Alice very meekly: ‘I’m growing.’

’You’ve no right to grow here,’ said the Dormouse.

’Don’t talk nonsense,’ said Alice more boldly: ‘you know you’re growing too.’

’Yes, but I grow at a reasonable pace,’ said the Dormouse: ‘not in that ridiculous fashion.’ And he got up very sulkily and crossed over to the other side of the court.

All this time the Queen had never left off staring at the Hatter, and, just as the Dormouse crossed the court, she said to one of the officers of the court, ‘Bring me the list of the singers in the last concert!’ on which the wretched Hatter trembled so, that he shook both his shoes off.

’Give your evidence,’ the King repeated angrily, ‘or I’ll have you executed, whether you’re nervous or not.’

’I’m a poor man, your Majesty,’ the Hatter began, in a trembling voice, ‘—and I hadn’t begun my tea—not above a week or so—and what with the bread-and-butter getting so thin—and the twinkling of the tea—’

’The twinkling of the what?’ said the King.

’It began with the tea,’ the Hatter replied.

’Of course twinkling begins with a T!’ said the King sharply. ‘Do you take me for a dunce? Go on!’

’I’m a poor man,’ the Hatter went on, ‘and most things twinkled after that—only the March Hare said—’

’I didn’t!’ the March Hare interrupted in a great hurry.

’You did!’ said the Hatter.

’I deny it!’ said the March Hare.

’He denies it,’ said the King: ‘leave out that part.’

’Well, at any rate, the Dormouse said—’ the Hatter went on, looking anxiously round to see if he would deny it too: but the Dormouse denied nothing, being fast asleep.

’After that,’ continued the Hatter, ‘I cut some more bread- and-butter—’

’But what did the Dormouse say?’ one of the jury asked.

’That I can’t remember,’ said the Hatter.

’You must remember,’ remarked the King, ‘or I’ll have you executed.’

The miserable Hatter dropped his teacup and bread- and-butter, and went down on one knee. ‘I’m a poor man, your Majesty,’ he began.

’You’re a very poor speaker,’ said the King.

Here one of the guinea-pigs cheered, and was immediately suppressed by the officers of the court. (As that is rather a hard word, I will just explain to you how it was done. They had a large canvas bag, which tied up at the mouth with strings: into this they slipped the guinea- pig, head first, and then sat upon it.)

’I’m glad I’ve seen that done,’ thought Alice. ‘I’ve so often read in the newspapers, at the end of trials, ‘There was some attempts at applause, which was immediately suppressed by the officers of the court,’ and I never understood what it meant till now.’

’If that’s all you know about it, you may stand down,’ continued the King.

’I can’t go no lower,’ said the Hatter: ‘I’m on the floor, as it is.’ ’Then you may sit down,’ the King replied.

Here the other guinea-pig cheered, and was suppressed.

’Come, that finished the guinea-pigs!’ thought Alice. ‘Now we shall get on better.’

’I’d rather finish my tea,’ said the Hatter, with an anxious look at the Queen, who was reading the list of singers.

’You may go,’ said the King, and the Hatter hurriedly left the court, without even waiting to put his shoes on.

’—and just take his head off outside,’ the Queen added to one of the officers: but the Hatter was out of sight before the officer could get to the door.

’Call the next witness!’ said the King.

The next witness was the Duchess’s cook. She carried the pepper-box in her hand, and Alice guessed who it was, even before she got into the court, by the way the people near the door began sneezing all at once.

’Give your evidence,’ said the King.

’Shan’t,’ said the cook.

The King looked anxiously at the White Rabbit, who said in a low voice, ‘Your Majesty must cross-examine THIS witness.’

’Well, if I must, I must,’ the King said, with a melancholy air, and, after folding his arms and frowning at the cook till his eyes were nearly out of sight, he said in a deep voice, ‘What are tarts made of?’

’Pepper, mostly,’ said the cook.

’Treacle,’ said a sleepy voice behind her.

’Collar that Dormouse,’ the Queen shrieked out. ‘Behead that Dormouse! Turn that Dormouse out of court! Suppress him! Pinch him! Off with his whiskers!’

For some minutes the whole court was in confusion, getting the Dormouse turned out, and, by the time they had settled down again, the cook had disappeared.

’Never mind!’ said the King, with an air of great relief. ‘Call the next witness.’ And he added in an undertone to the Queen, ‘Really, my dear, you must cross-examine the next witness. It quite makes my forehead ache!’

Alice watched the White Rabbit as he fumbled over the list, feeling very curious to see what the next witness would be like, ‘—for they haven’t got much evidence yet,’ she said to herself. Imagine her surprise, when the White Rabbit read out, at the top of his shrill little voice, the name ‘Alice!’

CHAPTER XII: Alice’s Evidence

’Here!’ cried Alice, quite forgetting in the flurry of the moment how large she had grown in the last few minutes, and she jumped up in such a hurry that she tipped over the jury-box with the edge of her skirt, upsetting all the jurymen on to the heads of the crowd below, and there they lay sprawling about, reminding her very much of a globe of goldfish she had accidentally upset the week before.

’Oh, I beg your pardon!’ she exclaimed in a tone of great dismay, and began picking them up again as quickly as she could, for the accident of the goldfish kept running in her head, and she had a vague sort of idea that they must be collected at once and put back into the jury-box, or they would die.

’The trial cannot proceed,’ said the King in a very grave voice, ‘until all the jurymen are back in their proper places— all,’ he repeated with great emphasis, looking hard at Alice as he said do.

Alice looked at the jury-box, and saw that, in her haste, she had put the Lizard in head downwards, and the poor little thing was waving its tail about in a melancholy way,

being quite unable to move. She soon got it out again, and put it right; ‘not that it signifies much,’ she said to herself; ‘I should think it would be quite as much use in the trial one way up as the other.’

As soon as the jury had a little recovered from the shock of being upset, and their slates and pencils had been found and handed back to them, they set to work very diligently to write out a history of the accident, all except the Lizard, who seemed too much overcome to do anything but sit with its mouth open, gazing up into the roof of the court.

’What do you know about this business?’ the King said to Alice.

’Nothing,’ said Alice.

’Nothing whatever?’ persisted the King.

’Nothing whatever,’ said Alice.

’That’s very important,’ the King said, turning to the jury. They were just beginning to write this down on their slates, when the White Rabbit interrupted: ‘Unimportant, your Majesty means, of course,’ he said in a very respectful tone, but frowning and making faces at him as he spoke.

’Unimportant, of course, I meant,’ the King hastily said, and went on to himself in an undertone, ‘important— unimportant— unimportant—important—’ as if he were trying which word sounded best.

Some of the jury wrote it down ‘important,’ and some ‘unimportant.’ Alice could see this, as she was near enough to look over their slates; ‘but it doesn’t matter a bit,’ she thought to herself.

At this moment the King, who had been for some time busily writing in his note-book, cackled out ‘Silence!’ and read out from his book, ‘Rule Forty-two. All persons more than a mile hight to leave the court.’

Everybody looked at Alice.

’I’m not a mile high,’ said Alice.

’You are,’ said the King.

’Nearly two miles high,’ added the Queen.

’Well, I shan’t go, at any rate,’ said Alice: ‘besides, that’s not a regular rule: you invented it just now.’

’It’s the oldest rule in the book,’ said the King.

’Then it ought to be Number One,’ said Alice.

The King turned pale, and shut his note-book hastily. ‘Consider your verdict,’ he said to the jury, in a low, trembling voice.

’There’s more evidence to come yet, please your Majesty,’ said the White Rabbit, jumping up in a great hurry; ‘this paper has just been picked up.’

’What’s in it?’ said the Queen.

’I haven’t opened it yet,’ said the White Rabbit, ‘but it seems to be a letter, written by the prisoner to—to somebody.’

’It must have been that,’ said the King, ‘unless it was written to nobody, which isn’t usual, you know.’

’Who is it directed to?’ said one of the jurymen.

’It isn’t directed at all,’ said the White Rabbit; ‘in fact, there’s nothing written on the outside.’ He unfolded the paper as he spoke, and added ‘It isn’t a letter, after all: it’s a set of verses.’

’Are they in the prisoner’s handwriting?’ asked another of they jurymen.

’No, they’re not,’ said the White Rabbit, ‘and that’s the queerest thing about it.’ (The jury all looked puzzled.)

’He must have imitated somebody else’s hand,’ said the King. (The jury all brightened up again.)

’Please your Majesty,’ said the Knave, ‘I didn’t write it, and they can’t prove I did: there’s no name signed at the end.’

’If you didn’t sign it,’ said the King, ‘that only makes the matter worse. You must have meant some mischief, or else you’d have signed your name like an honest man.’

There was a general clapping of hands at this: it was the first really clever thing the King had said that day.

’That proves his guilt,’ said the Queen.

’It proves nothing of the sort!’ said Alice. ‘Why, you don’t even know what they’re about!’

’Read them,’ said the King.

The White Rabbit put on his spectacles. ‘Where shall I begin, please your Majesty?’ he asked.

’Begin at the beginning,’ the King said gravely, ‘and go on till you come to the end: then stop.’

These were the verses the White Rabbit read:—

’They told me you had been to her, And mentioned me to him: She gave me a good character, But said I could not swim.

He sent them word I had not gone (We know it to be true): If she should push the matter on, What would become of you?

I gave her one, they gave him two, You gave us three or more; They all returned from him to you, Though they were mine before.

If I or she should chance to be Involved in this affair, He trusts to you to set them free, Exactly as we were.

My notion was that you had been (Before she had this fit) An obstacle that came between Him, and ourselves, and it.

Don’t let him know she liked them best, For this must ever be A secret, kept from all the rest, Between yourself and me.’

’That’s the most important piece of evidence we’ve heard yet,’ said the King, rubbing his hands; ‘so now let the jury—’

’If any one of them can explain it,’ said Alice, (she had grown so large in the last few minutes that she wasn’t a bit afraid of interrupting him,) ‘I’ll give him sixpence. I don’t believe there’s an atom of meaning in it.’

The jury all wrote down on their slates, ‘She doesn’t believe there’s an atom of meaning in it,’ but none of them attempted to explain the paper.

’If there’s no meaning in it,’ said the King, ‘that saves a world of trouble, you know, as we needn’t try to find any. And yet I don’t know,’ he went on, spreading out the verses on his knee, and looking at them with one eye; ‘I seem to see some meaning in them, after all. ‘-said I could not swim—’ you can’t swim, can you?’ he added, turning to the Knave.

The Knave shook his head sadly. ‘Do I look like it?’ he said. (Which he certainly did not, being made entirely of cardboard.)

’All right, so far,’ said the King, and he went on muttering over the verses to himself: ‘"We know it to be true—’ that’s the jury, of course— ‘I gave her one, they gave him two—’ why, that must be what he did with the tarts, you know—’

’But, it goes on ‘they all returned from him to you,‘‘ said Alice.

’Why, there they are!’ said the King triumphantly, pointing to the tarts on the table. ‘Nothing can be clearer than that. Then again—‘before she had this fit--’ you never had fits, my dear, I think?’ he said to the Queen.

’Never!’ said the Queen furiously, throwing an inkstand at the Lizard as she spoke. (The unfortunate little Bill had left off writing on his slate with one finger, as he found it made no mark; but he now hastily began again, using the ink, that was trickling down his face, as long as it lasted.)

’Then the words don’t fit you,’ said the King, looking round the court with a smile. There was a dead silence.

’It’s a pun!’ the King added in an offended tone, and everybody laughed, ‘Let the jury consider their verdict,’ the King said, for about the twentieth time that day.

’No, no!’ said the Queen. ‘Sentence first—verdict afterwards.’

’Stuff and nonsense!’ said Alice loudly. ‘The idea of having the sentence first!’

’Hold your tongue!’ said the Queen, turning purple.

’I won’t!’ said Alice.

’Off with her head!’ the Queen shouted at the top of her voice. Nobody moved.

’Who cares for you?’ said Alice, (she had grown to her full size by this time.) ‘You’re nothing but a pack of cards!’

At this the whole pack rose up into the air, and came flying down upon her: she gave a little scream, half of fright and half of anger, and tried to beat them off, and found herself lying on the bank, with her head in the lap of her sister, who was gently brushing away some dead leaves that had fluttered down from the trees upon her face.

’Wake up, Alice dear!’ said her sister; ‘Why, what a long sleep you’ve had!’

’Oh, I’ve had such a curious dream!’ said Alice, and she told her sister, as well as she could remember them, all these strange Adventures of hers that you have just been reading about; and when she had finished, her sister kissed her, and said, ‘It was a curious dream, dear, certainly: but now run in to your tea; it’s getting late.’ So Alice got up and ran off, thinking while she ran, as well she might, what a wonderful dream it had been.

But her sister sat still just as she left her, leaning her head on her hand, watching the setting sun, and thinking of little Alice and all her wonderful Adventures, till she too began dreaming after a fashion, and this was her dream:—

First, she dreamed of little Alice herself, and once again the tiny hands were clasped upon her knee, and the bright eager eyes were looking up into hers—she could hear the very tones of her voice, and see that queer little toss of her head to keep back the wandering hair that would always get into her eyes—and still as she listened, or seemed to listen, the whole place around her became alive the strange creatures of her little sister’s dream.

The long grass rustled at her feet as the White Rabbit hurried by—the frightened Mouse splashed his way through the neighbouring pool—she could hear the rattle of the teacups as the March Hare and his friends shared their never-ending meal, and the shrill voice of the Queen ordering off her unfortunate guests to execution—once more the pig-baby was sneezing on the Duchess’s knee, while plates and dishes crashed around it—once more the shriek of the Gryphon, the squeaking of the Lizard’s slate- pencil, and the choking of the suppressed guinea-pigs, filled the air, mixed up with the distant sobs of the miserable Mock Turtle.

So she sat on, with closed eyes, and half believed herself in Wonderland, though she knew she had but to open them again, and all would change to dull reality—the grass would be only rustling in the wind, and the pool rippling to the waving of the reeds—the rattling teacups would change to tinkling sheep- bells, and the Queen’s shrill cries to the voice of the shepherd boy—and the sneeze of the baby, the shriek of the Gryphon, and all thy other queer noises, would change (she knew) to the confused clamour of the busy farm-yard—while the lowing of the cattle in the distance would take the place of the Mock Turtle’s heavy sobs.

Lastly, she pictured to herself how this same little sister of hers would, in the after-time, be herself a grown woman; and how she would keep, through all her riper years, the simple and loving heart of her childhood: and how she would gather about her other little children, and make THEIR eyes bright and eager with many a strange tale, perhaps even with the dream of Wonderland of long ago: and how she would feel with all their simple sorrows, and find a pleasure in all their simple joys, remembering her own child-life, and the happy summer days.

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THE END

Le Père Goriot by Honoré de Balzac

2019-03-14T18:03:00.001-07:00

Le Père Goriot

by Honoré de Balzac

L’effet de réel et l’intrusion du narrateur

Balzac est le maître de la description, il est capable de décrire les détails les plus précis d’une personne ou d’un lieu au point de le voir. Dans l’incipit du Père Goriot Balzac a préféré mettre le lecteur en garde en renforçant l’effet de réel : « Ainsi feriez-vous, vous qui tenez ce livre d’une main blanche. Vous qui vous enfoncez dans un moelleux fauteuil en vous disant : Peut-être ceci va-t-il m’amuser. Après avoir lu les secrètes infortunes du père Goriot ; vous dinerez avec appétit en mettant votre insensibilité sur le compte de l’auteur, en le taxant d’exagération, en l’accusant de poésie. Ah ! Sachez-le : ce drame n’est ni une fiction, ni un roman. All is true, il est si véritable, que chacun peut-en reconnaître les éléments chez soi, dans son cœur peut-être. » (p.12) Le lecteur réel que nous sommes, doit passer par l’identification au père Goriot en vivant pleinement l’ensemble des événements lus. Pourtant, il ne doit nullement oublier qu’il est un lecteur en chair et non un personnage de papiers. De là, il faut qu’il prenne du recul pour analyser l’ensemble des relations complexes qui gèrent le roman afin de réécrire sa propre version des faits. En effet, réécrire ce que ce père a dû faire pour prendre sa vie en main et pour éviter sa fin tragique.

L’intrusion de l’auteur au sein de l’incipit de l’œuvre montre son souci de classer son texte dans le cadre des genres réalistes. Juste après, il commence à préciser la maison, le lieu, les personnages ainsi que les dates quand cela est nécessaire. Ces précisions servent l’effet de réel et donnent à l’histoire un aspect vraisemblable.

La fonction présentative de l’incipit

L’incipit balzacien joue une fonction présentative, puisqu’il nous précise lieu et personnages avec leurs moindres vicissitudes et leurs particularités en donnant au cadre historique son poids et sa place. Cet incipit met en valeur la pension Vauquer ou la pension bourgeoise : Maison-Vauquer, Pension bourgeoise des deux sexes et autres, car cet espace sera la scène sur laquelle les événements les plus importants vont se dérouler. Balzac présente les actants essentiels et nécessaires à la dramatisation de son récit. Chaque détail est intéressant et aucune explication n’est gratuite.

Les particularités du personnage balzacien

Le père Goriot

Un personnage bizarre, riche qui passe son temps dans une pension ridicule et qui vit dans une parcimonie terrible. Un homme mystérieux qui suscite l’intérêt des autres puisqu’il fait l’objet préféré de leur discussion. Pour Vautrin : « Le père Goriot carottait sur les rentes après s’y être ruiné. » (p.29) Le père Goriot est très avare, mais il payait sa pension. « Chacun essayait sur lui sa bonne ou mauvaise humeur par les plaisanteries ou par des bourrades. » (p.29) Un vieux qui reçoit des visites désorganisées de la part de deux jolies dames jeunes et belles dont tout le monde parle, mais qui ne cesse de répéter qu’il s’agit de ses filles : « Les pensionnaires, occupés à causer dans le salon, purent voir en elle une jolie blonde, mince de taille, gracieuse, et beaucoup trop distinguée pour être la fille d’un père Goriot. » (p.30)

Le père Goriot est un misérable qui vit dans des conditions difficiles, dans une solitude mélancolique en supportant toutes les plaisanteries des pensionnaires et tous les sacrifices pour les yeux de ses deux filles. Un personnage porteur de signes. Un personnage qui présente une situation sociale confuse qui le met en question. Comme tous les personnages balzaciens, le père Goriot incarne une situation complexe d’un père négligé par ses filles, qui vit seul dans une pension tout en pensant à elles et à leur confort. Aussi belles et riches que les pensionnaires ont du mal à croire qu’il s’agit vraiment de ses filles. Le lecteur est aussi étonné que les autres. Il est du même avis que les pensionnaires. Il ne peut croire aux dires d’un vieux seul qui attend la visite des femmes belles et jeunes et qui les fait passer pour ses filles.

Seuls les événements qui viendront par la suite peuvent nous révéler la vérité de ces comportements. Le père Goriot trace le portrait tragique d’un vieux délaissé et méconnu, seul face à ses tristesses et ses maux à cause des caprices et des besoins matériels interminables de ses filles. Ces dernières le met dans une situation de malheur au point de provoquer son déclin final.

Le début de l’intrigue et le déclenchement des événements

Depuis l’incipit de l’œuvre, le père Goriot subit une transformation radicale surtout au niveau physique. Au bout de quelques années, il a changé d’étages ou de chambres au sein de La pension Vauquer trois fois, afin d’économiser son argent. Personne ne savait pourquoi ce monsieur change d’endroits et reçoit en même temps de très belles femmes. Ce qui suscite la curiosité et les interrogations interminables des pensionnaires et des lecteurs réels que nous sommes, dans la mesure où nous nous identifions aux pensionnaires, nous nous mettons à la place du père Goriot et nous donnons libre cours à notre imagination en faisant des hypothèses de lecture parfois incorrectes, mais utiles pour continuer notre lecture et vérifier nos pensées et nos réflexions. L’incipit de l’œuvre incarne déjà cette crise de conscience dont souffre la société française à l’époque. Le cas du père Goriot en est la preuve, une personne abandonnée, seule, surexploitée par ses propres filles, mise en dérision par tout le monde. Des jeunes qui se cherchent dans une grande ville où le pouvoir est donné à l’argent et non à la jeunesse comme Eugène de Rastignac. Une veuve insensée qui vit sur les économies de ses pensionnaires et qui ne peut vivre autrement. …

Les particularités du personnage balzacien

Rastignac

Eugène de Rastignac, un jeune étudiant qui vient à Paris pour étudier. Fasciné par Paris, il décide d’entrer dans le monde en entrant dans des projets qui croyait utiles pour faire carrière à Paris ou pour réussir. Eugène écrit à sa mère pour lui demander de l’argent. Toute la famille fait de son mieux pour lui envoyer l’argent dont-il a besoin.

Eugène est un jeune qui se trouve face à une ville où les apparences font la règle. Un monde des affaires, des entreprises, des projets…Eugène de Rastignac est l'exemple des jeunes qui veulent à tous prix trouver une place dans un monde des grands. Il a compris qu’il faut avoir de l’argent pour affronter ce monde, pour pouvoir le pénétrer. Les jeunes à l’époque souffraient énormément et doivent désormais travailler, étudier, chercher à faire carrière, car seuls les riches qui peuvent avoir toutes les chances de réussite. Rastignac est l’un des pauvres qui veulent réussir leurs projets dans le monde des grands. Pour lui Paris est un défi et non un simple endroit où il vient faire ses études. Pour commencer la réalisation de ses rêves il envoie des lettres à ses proches pour ramasser les fonds nécessaires à son entreprise.

Les lettres reçues par Eugène de Rastignac montrent cette capacité de Balzac, de changer de styles et de présenter les soucis d’une mère ou d’une sœur. Cette insertion des lettres dans un récit nous informe sur l’état d’âme des personnages, leurs sentiments, leurs secrets, leurs projets, leurs craintes, leurs rêves et leurs espérances, leurs situations sociale et économique...Les lettres donnent également au récit cet effet de réel, cette vie active qui nous pousse, nous lecteurs réels à croire à cette histoire et sa validité : « Ta lettre est venue bien à propos, cher frère. Agate et moi nous voulions employer notre argent de tant de manières différentes, que nous ne savions plus à quel achat nous résoudre. Tu as fait comme le domestique du roi d’Espagne quand il a renversé les montres de son maître, tu nous as mises d’accord. Vraiment, nous étions constamment en querelle pour celui de nos désirs auquel nous donnerions la préférence, et nous n’avions pas deviné, mon bon Eugène, l’emploi qui comprenait tous nos désirs…. » (p.83)

Le discours rapporté donne au récit son aspect réel et lui procure une vérité à part entière et une vraie vivacité. L’échange verbal entre les personnages nous pousse à suivre leur intervention, à imaginer leurs conversations comme si nous faisons partie de leur présence, de leurs idées. Le discours rapporté généralement relaté par présent de narration nous donne aussi cet aspect d’actualiser le récit, qui devient dans un certain sens le nôtre. A vrai dire Balzac emploie ces techniques pour travailler l’aspect réel de son roman et lui donner une vérité, une vie.

« - Vous aurez de quoi payer des leçons d’armes et des séances au tir, lui dit cet homme.

-Les galions sont arrivés, lui dit madame Vauquer en regardant les sacs.

Mademoiselle Michonneau craignait de jeter les yeux sur l’argent, de peur de montrer sa convoitise.

-Vous avez une bonne mère, dit madame Couture.

-Monsieur a une bonne mère, répéta Poiret… » (p.86)

L’évolution des personnages balzaciens

Eugène de Rastignac

Eugène de Rastignac a voulu avoir une place au sein de la société parisienne. Il a compris qu’il doit chercher un protecteur et soigner sa parure :« Il se permit des singeries enfantines autant qu’en aurait fait une jeune fille en s’habillant pour le bal. Il regarda complaisamment sa taille mince, en déplissant son habit. » (p.117)

Dans ce sens, Rastignac veut jouer le héros dans un monde des grands en passant par des aventures ou des affaires de cœurs pour arriver à pénétrer l’un des clans de la société bourgeoise grâce à une dame riche ou à une maîtresse fortunée. Un jeune étudiant au milieu de nulle part qui vient à Paris pour faire des études et qui les abandonne pour faire fortune ou pour réussir autrement. Eugène de Rastignac veut voir si sa jeunesse va lui servir à quelque chose mais pas à étudier. Ce personnage évolue au cours de l’histoire et nous étonne chaque fois par ses réflexions et son audace. Eugène dîne chez Mme. La baronne de Nucingen : l’une des filles de monsieur Goriot, mais ce dîner se transforme en un jeu d’amour et du hasard où le jeune doit tout perdre ou tout gagner.

En effet, Delphine ou Mme. La baronne de Nucingen est une femme malheureuse dont le mariage était : « La plus horrible des déceptions. » devient la complice d’Eugène. Le mariage pour la, plupart des femmes à l’époque était un luxe de l’extérieur et des soucis cruels dans l’âme.

Cela signifie qu’elles ne sont point heureuses et qu’elles se cherchent souvent dans des relations libertines hors du mariage, afin qu’elles puissent trouver l’amour perdu.

Rastignac entre sans le savoir dans un enjeu d’amour et du hasard où il devait jouer pour faire le bonheur d’une femme si malheureuse parce qu’il avait besoin d’argent. Cette relation qui commence à se nouer entre Rastignac et la fille du Père Goriot nous montre une autre réalité de la société française au XIXème siècle, qui ne se base que sur la trahison, l’adultère et les apparences. Une société qui ne donne aucune importance aux principes et qui vit dans une comédie féerique où les apparences cachent des mystères terribles. Des affaires de cœurs insensées, une envie de s’enrichir de toutes sortes et avec tous les moyens : mariages, vices, adultères, trahison, vol, exploitation, hypocrisie, corruption…Dans ce sens, la société devient un enjeu qu’il faut prendre au sérieux pour réussir. Les nobles ne peuvent plus survivre devant l’invasion économique des bourgeois. Les jeunes deviennent des arrivistes sans principes qui font le bonheur des femmes seules ou délaissées par leur maris. Lorsque l’argent devient le seul souci, les valeurs humaines n’ont plus de places dans une société de leurres et de duperies.

Balzac dénonce implicitement une société qui ne tient plus, une société qui se base sur la corruption et la dépravation. Cela veut dire que Le Père Goriot trace la réalité de la famille française au XIXème siècle afin d’illustrer son statut, ses souffrances et ses préoccupations les plus intimes ainsi que son évolution et ses transformations. Les jeunes devraient se vendre pour vivre. Il fallait qu’ils consolent les veuves ou les femmes délaissées ou désespérées, qu’ils jouent aux dandys pour plaire aux imbéciles, pour satisfaire la curiosité des uns ou le ridicule des autres.

La tragédie du père Goriot

Un père malade qui compte ses derniers jours et qui doit régler les problèmes financiers relatifs à ses deux filles, qui ne viennent le voir que pour demander de l’argent ou lui raconter leurs problèmes d’argent. Jamais l’une de ses filles n’est venue pour le voir ou pour un simple désir de savoir de ses nouvelles.

Le vieux ne supporte plus la situation de voir ses filles malheureuses et ruinées. Il souffre car il les a mariées à des hommes qui les surexploitent et qui continuent à abuser d’elles.

Le père Goriot prend les moindres soucis de ses filles au sérieux et essaye de faire de son mieux pour améliorer leur situation. Un père dévoué qui se tue pour ses enfants. Pourtant ses filles ne respectent pas les particularités de leur père âgé ni sa maladie ; elles ne cessent de se plaindre sans prendre leur responsabilité vis-à-vis de leur père. Comment un père se donne autant de mal pour ses enfants et comment les enfants sont si ingrats.

La dimension tragique de cette situation est due à ce dévouement non partagé, à cette affection paternelle sans limites qui aille jusqu’à l’autodestruction.

Dans Le Père Goriot nous remarquons que la relation père /fille est une relation douteuse qui ne se base pas sur l’affection. Les pensionnaires n’arrivent pas à croire que le père Goriot, ce veiux abandonné seul a des filles si riches et si élégantes. En effet, un vieux qui a des filles devait habiter chez l’une de ses filles au lieu de loger dans une pension. Pourtant, Monsieur Goriot doit payer sa location comme n’importe lequel : un solitaire qui habite une pension tel un orphelin.

Lorsque les filles du père Goriot lui rendaient visite, les pensionnaires croyaient qu’il s’agissait de ses maîtresses. Tout le monde le prenait pour un libertin qui a perdu son argent au jeu et aux plaisirs. En réalité, le pauvre père était un homme honnête et droit qui a donné son argent à ses filles, afin qu’elles vivent heureuses. Toutefois, les filles après leur mariage ne cessaient de demander plus d’argent et de mettre toute la responsabilité sur le dos de leurs maris. Jamais rassasiées, elles demandent encore et encore jusqu’à obliger leur pauvre père à faire autant d’économie et à donner à ses filles l’argent qui pouvait lui venir en aide dans ses derniers jours.

Des filles ingrates, qui adoraient l’argent et ne voyaient en leur père qu’une source inépuisable de livres et d’écus, une mine d’or qui s’ouvre chaque fois pour satisfaire leurs faux besoins. Elles qui sont des femmes du monde et qui ont tout pour vivre heureuses, pour prendre en mains leur situation. De là, la relation père/fille dans Le Père Goriot est une relation froide, matérielle, loin d’illustrer cette chaleur familiale dont on a l’habitude.

Le déclin d’un père

Le père Goriot fait l’exemple de toute une génération. Un père qui s’est donné pour ses enfants jusqu’à ses derniers moments. Vers la fin de sa vie, de ses sacrifices, de ses souffrances, il s’est trouvé seul dans une pension. Malade, mourant, ses filles ne cessent de gonfler leurs problèmes d’argent, de crier leurs malheur sans penser à ceux de leur père.

Les pensionnaires ont cru que Monsieur Goriot va mourir entre les bras de ses filles, qu’elles auront un peu de conscience pour venir chercher le corps de ce vieux qui s’est sacrifié pour elles jusqu’à son dernier souffle. Pourtant, ce sont des pauvres étudiants qui habitaient la pension avec Monsieur Goriot qui ont pris la responsabilité de l’enterrer. Les filles se contentaient de jeter quelques larmes, un peu de regret et de se retirer sans se soucier d’un vieux qui faisait tant de soucis pour elles.

La fin tragique du père montre la fin d’une affaire d’intérêts : lorsque l’amour d’un père ne vaut plus rien pour ses propres enfants et lorsque ses derniers deviennent des simples vampires, il n’est plus question de parler une relation familiale ou d’un devoir paternel ou infantile mais d’un drame tel que le drame du Père Goriot que nous pouvons rencontrer facilement dans le visage d’une mère ou d’un père abandonné par ses enfants.

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Story A Christmas Carol Author Charles Dickens

2019-03-10T17:23:00.002-07:00

Story A Christmas Carol

Author Charles Dickens

Stave 1: Marley’s Ghost

Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge’s name was good upon ‘Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to.

Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door- nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin- nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country’s done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did. How could it be otherwise? Scrooge and he were partners for I don’t know how many years. Scrooge was his sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole friend, and sole mourner. And even Scrooge was not so dreadfully cut up by the sad event, but that he was an excellent man of business on the very day of the funeral, and solemnised it with an undoubted bargain. The mention of Marley’s funeral brings me back to the point I started from. There is no doubt that Marley was dead. This must be distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate. If we were not perfectly convinced that Hamlet’s Father died before the play began, there would be nothing more remarkable in his taking a stroll at night, in an easterly wind, upon his own ramparts, than there would be in any other middle-aged gentleman rashly turning out after dark in a breezy spot — say Saint Paul’s Churchyard for instance — literally to astonish his son’s weak mind.

Scrooge never painted out Old Marley’s name. There it stood, years afterwards, above the warehouse door: Scrooge and Marley. The firm was known as Scrooge and Marley. Sometimes people new to the business called Scrooge Scrooge, and sometimes Marley, but he answered to both names. It was all the same to him.

Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grind- stone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime was on his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the dogdays; and didn’t thaw it one degree at Christmas.

External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could warm, no wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he, no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no pelting rain less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn’t know where to have him. The heaviest rain, and snow, and hail, and sleet, could boast of the advantage over him in only one respect. They often ‘came down’ handsomely, and Scrooge never did.

Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looks, ‘My dear Scrooge, how are you? When will you come to see me?’ No beggars implored him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him what it was o’clock, no man or woman ever once in all his life inquired the way to such and such a place, of Scrooge. Even the blind men’s dogs appeared to know him; and when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into doorways and up courts; and then would wag their tails as though they said, ‘No eye at all is better than an evil eye, dark master!’

But what did Scrooge care! It was the very thing he liked. To edge his way along the crowded paths of life, warning all human sympathy to keep its distance, was what the knowing ones call ‘nuts’ to Scrooge.

Once upon a time — of all the good days in the year, on Christmas Eve — old Scrooge sat busy in his counting- house. It was cold, bleak, biting weather: foggy withal: and he could hear the people in the court outside, go wheezing up and down, beating their hands upon their breasts, and stamping their feet upon the pavement stones to warm them. The city clocks had only just gone three, but it was quite dark already — it had not been light all day — and candles were flaring in the windows of the neighbouring offices, like ruddy smears upon the palpable brown air. The fog came pouring in at every chink and keyhole, and was so dense without, that although the court was of the narrowest, the houses opposite were mere phantoms. To see the dingy cloud come drooping down, obscuring everything, one might have thought that Nature lived hard by, and was brewing on a large scale.

The door of Scrooge’s counting-house was open that he might keep his eye upon his clerk, who in a dismal little cell beyond, a sort of tank, was copying letters. Scrooge had a very small fire, but the clerk’s fire was so very much smaller that it looked like one coal. But he couldn’t replenish it, for Scrooge kept the coal-box in his own room; and so surely as the clerk came in with the shovel, the master predicted that it would be necessary for them to part. Wherefore the clerk put on his white comforter, and tried to warm himself at the candle; in which effort, not being a man of a strong imagination, he failed.

‘A merry Christmas, uncle! God save you!’ cried a cheerful voice. It was the voice of Scrooge’s nephew, who came upon him so quickly that this was the first intimation he had of his approach.

‘Bah!’ said Scrooge, ‘Humbug!’

He had so heated himself with rapid walking in the fog and frost, this nephew of Scrooge’s, that he was all in a glow; his face was ruddy and handsome; his eyes sparkled, and his breath smoked again. ‘Christmas a humbug, uncle!’ said Scrooge’s nephew. ‘You don’t mean that, I am sure?’

‘I do,’ said Scrooge. ‘Merry Christmas! What right have you to be merry? What reason have you to be merry? You’re poor enough.’

‘Come, then,’ returned the nephew gaily. ‘What right have you to be dismal? What reason have you to be morose? You’re rich enough.’

Scrooge having no better answer ready on the spur of the moment, said ‘Bah!’ again; and followed it up with ‘Humbug.’

‘Don’t be cross, uncle!’ said the nephew.

‘What else can I be,’ returned the uncle, ‘when I live in such a world of fools as this? Merry Christmas! Out upon merry Christmas! What’s Christmas time to you but a time for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a year older, but not an hour richer; a time for balancing your books and having every item in ‘em through a round dozen of months presented dead against you? If I could work my will,’ said Scrooge indignantly, ‘every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry Christmas’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!’

‘Uncle!’ pleaded the nephew.

‘Nephew!’ returned the uncle sternly, ‘keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine.’

‘Keep it!’ repeated Scrooge’s nephew. ‘But you don’t keep it.’

‘Let me leave it alone, then,’ said Scrooge. ‘Much good may it do you! Much good it has ever done you!’

‘There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say,’ returned the nephew. ‘Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round — apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that — as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!’

The clerk in the Tank involuntarily applauded. Becoming immediately sensible of the impropriety, he poked the fire, and extinguished the last frail spark for ever.

‘Let me hear another sound from you,’ said Scrooge, ‘and you’ll keep your Christmas by losing your situation! You’re quite a powerful speaker, sir,’ he added, turning to his nephew. ‘I wonder you don’t go into Parliament.’

‘Don’t be angry, uncle. Come! Dine with us tomorrow.’

Scrooge said that he would see him — yes, indeed he did. He went the whole length of the expression, and said that he would see him in that extremity first.

‘But why?’ cried Scrooge’s nephew. ‘Why?’

‘Why did you get married?’ said Scrooge.

‘Because I fell in love.’

‘Because you fell in love!’ growled Scrooge, as if that were the only one thing in the world more ridiculous than a merry Christmas. ‘Good afternoon!’

‘Nay, uncle, but you never came to see me before that happened. Why give it as a reason for not coming now?’

‘Good afternoon,’ said Scrooge.

‘I want nothing from you; I ask nothing of you; why cannot we be friends?’

‘Good afternoon,’ said Scrooge.

‘I am sorry, with all my heart, to find you so resolute. We have never had any quarrel, to which I have been a party. But I have made the trial in homage to Christmas, and I’ll keep my Christmas humour to the last. So A Merry Christmas, uncle!’

‘Good afternoon,’ said Scrooge.

‘And A Happy New Year!’

‘Good afternoon,’ said Scrooge.

His nephew left the room without an angry word, notwithstanding. He stopped at the outer door to bestow the greetings of the season on the clerk, who cold as he was, was warmer than Scrooge; for he returned them cordially.

‘There’s another fellow,’ muttered Scrooge; who overheard him: ‘my clerk, with fifteen shillings a week, and a wife and family, talking about a merry Christmas. I’ll retire to Bedlam.’

This lunatic, in letting Scrooge’s nephew out, had let two other people in. They were portly gentlemen, pleasant to behold, and now stood, with their hats off, in Scrooge’s office. They had books and papers in their hands, and bowed to him.

‘Scrooge and Marley’s, I believe,’ said one of the gentlemen, referring to his list. ‘Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr. Scrooge, or Mr. Marley?’

‘Mr. Marley has been dead these seven years,’ Scrooge replied. ‘He died seven years ago, this very night.’

‘We have no doubt his liberality is well represented by his surviving partner,’ said the gentleman, presenting his credentials.

It certainly was; for they had been two kindred spirits. At the ominous word ‘liberality,’ Scrooge frowned, and shook his head, and handed the credentials back.

‘At this festive season of the year, Mr. Scrooge,’ said the gentleman, taking up a pen, ‘it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the Poor and Destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir.’

‘Are there no prisons?’ asked Scrooge.

‘Plenty of prisons,’ said the gentleman, laying down the pen again.

‘And the Union workhouses?’ demanded Scrooge. ‘Are they still in operation?’

‘They are. Still,’ returned the gentleman, ‘I wish I could say they were not.’

‘The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?’ said Scrooge.

‘Both very busy, sir.’

‘Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course,’ said Scrooge. ‘I’m very glad to hear it.’

‘Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude,’ returned the gentleman, ‘a few of us are endeavouring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink. and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?’

‘Nothing!’ Scrooge replied.

‘You wish to be anonymous?’

‘I wish to be left alone,’ said Scrooge. ‘Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. I don’t make merry myself at Christmas and I can’t afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned — they cost enough; and those who are badly off must go there.’

‘Many can’t go there; and many would rather die.’

‘If they would rather die,’ said Scrooge, ‘they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population. Besides — excuse me — I don’t know that.’

‘But you might know it,’ observed the gentleman.

‘It’s not my business,’ Scrooge returned. ‘It’s enough for a man to understand his own business, and not to interfere with other people’s. Mine occupies me constantly. Good afternoon, gentlemen!’

Seeing clearly that it would be useless to pursue their point, the gentlemen withdrew. Scrooge returned his labours with an improved opinion of himself, and in a more facetious temper than was usual with him.

Meanwhile the fog and darkness thickened so, that people ran about with flaring links, proffering their services to go before horses in carriages, and conduct them on their way. The ancient tower of a church, whose gruff old bell was always peeping slily down at Scrooge out of a Gothic window in the wall, became invisible, and struck the hours and quarters in the clouds, with tremulous vibrations afterwards as if its teeth were chattering in its frozen head up there. The cold became intense. In the main street at the corner of the court, some labourers were repairing the gas-pipes, and had lighted a great fire in a brazier, round which a party of ragged men and boys were gathered: warming their hands and winking their eyes before the blaze in rapture. The water-plug being left in solitude, its overflowing sullenly congealed, and turned to misanthropic ice. The brightness of the shops where holly sprigs and berries crackled in the lamp heat of the windows, made pale faces ruddy as they passed. Poulterers’ and grocers’ trades became a splendid joke; a glorious pageant, with which it was next to impossible to believe that such dull principles as bargain and sale had anything to do. The Lord Mayor, in the stronghold of the mighty Mansion House, gave orders to his fifty cooks and butlers to keep Christmas as a Lord Mayor’s household should; and even the little tailor, whom he had fined five shillings on the previous Monday for being drunk and bloodthirsty in the streets, stirred up to-morrow’s pudding in his garret, while his lean wife and the baby sallied out to buy the beef.

Foggier yet, and colder! Piercing, searching, biting cold. If the good Saint Dunstan had but nipped the Evil Spirit’s nose with a touch of such weather as that, instead of using his familiar weapons, then indeed he would have roared to lusty purpose. The owner of one scant young nose, gnawed and mumbled by the hungry cold as bones are gnawed by dogs, stooped down at Scrooge’s keyhole to regale him with a Christmas carol: but at the first sound of ‘God bless you, merry gentleman! May nothing you dismay!’

Scrooge seized the ruler with such energy of action, that the singer fled in terror, leaving the keyhole to the fog and even more congenial frost.

At length the hour of shutting up the counting- house arrived. With an ill-will Scrooge dismounted from his stool, and tacitly admitted the fact to the expectant clerk in the Tank, who instantly snuffed his candle out, and put on his hat.

‘You’ll want all day to-morrow, I suppose?’ said Scrooge.

‘If quite convenient, sir.’

‘It’s not convenient,’ said Scrooge, ‘and it’s not fair. If I was to stop half-a-crown for it, you’d think yourself ill- used, I’ll be bound?’

The clerk smiled faintly.

‘And yet,’ said Scrooge, ‘you don’t think me ill-used, when I pay a day’s wages for no work.’

The clerk observed that it was only once a year.

‘A poor excuse for picking a man’s pocket every twenty-fifth of December!’ said Scrooge, buttoning his great-coat to the chin. ‘But I suppose you must have the whole day. Be here all the earlier next morning.’

The clerk promised that he would; and Scrooge walked out with a growl. The office was closed in a twinkling, and the clerk, with the long ends of his white comforter dangling below his waist (for he boasted no great-coat), went down a slide on Cornhill, at the end of a lane of boys, twenty times, in honour of its being Christmas Eve, and then ran home to Camden Town as hard as he could pelt, to play at blindman’s-buff.

Scrooge took his melancholy dinner in his usual melancholy tavern; and having read all the newspapers, and beguiled the rest of the evening with his banker’s- book, went home to bed. He lived in chambers which had once belonged to his deceased partner. They were a gloomy suite of rooms, in a lowering pile of building up a yard, where it had so little business to be, that one could scarcely help fancying it must have run there when it was a young house, playing at hide-and-seek with other houses, and forgotten the way out again. It was old enough now, and dreary enough, for nobody lived in it but Scrooge, the other rooms being all let out as offices. The yard was so dark that even Scrooge, who knew its every stone, was fain to grope with his hands. The fog and frost so hung about the black old gateway of the house, that it seemed as if the Genius of the Weather sat in mournful meditation on the threshold.

Now, it is a fact, that there was nothing at all particular about the knocker on the door, except that it was very large. It is also a fact, that Scrooge had seen it, night and morning, during his whole residence in that place; also that Scrooge had as little of what is called fancy about him as any man in the city of London, even including — which is a bold word — the corporation, aldermen, and livery. Let it also be borne in mind that Scrooge had not bestowed one thought on Marley, since his last mention of his seven years’ dead partner that afternoon. And then let any man explain to me, if he can, how it happened that Scrooge, having his key in the lock of the door, saw in the knocker, without its undergoing any intermediate process of change — not a knocker, but Marley’s face.

Marley’s face. It was not in impenetrable shadow as the other objects in the yard were, but had a dismal light about it, like a bad lobster in a dark cellar. It was not angry or ferocious, but looked at Scrooge as Marley used to look: with ghostly spectacles turned up on its ghostly forehead. The hair was curiously stirred, as if by breath or hot air; and, though the eyes were wide open, they were perfectly motionless. That, and its livid colour, made it horrible; but its horror seemed to be in spite of the face and beyond its control, rather than a part or its own expression.

As Scrooge looked fixedly at this phenomenon, it was a knocker again.

To say that he was not startled, or that his blood was not conscious of a terrible sensation to which it had been a stranger from infancy, would be untrue. But he put his hand upon the key he had relinquished, turned it sturdily, walked in, and lighted his candle.

He did pause, with a moment’s irresolution, before he shut the door; and he did look cautiously behind it first, as if he half-expected to be terrified with the sight of Marley’s pigtail sticking out into the hall. But there was nothing on the back of the door, except the screws and nuts that held the knocker on, so he said ‘Pooh, pooh!’ and closed it with a bang.

The sound resounded through the house like thunder. Every room above, and every cask in the wine-merchant’s cellars below, appeared to have a separate peal of echoes of its own. Scrooge was not a man to be frightened by echoes. He fastened the door, and walked across the hall, and up the stairs; slowly too: trimming his candle as he went.

You may talk vaguely about driving a coach-and-six up a good old flight of stairs, or through a bad young Act of Parliament; but I mean to say you might have got a hearse up that staircase, and taken it broadwise, with the splinter- bar towards the wall and the door towards the balustrades: and done it easy. There was plenty of width for that, and room to spare; which is perhaps the reason why Scrooge thought he saw a locomotive hearse going on before him in the gloom. Half a dozen gas-lamps out of the street wouldn’t have lighted the entry too well, so you may suppose that it was pretty dark with Scrooge’s dip.

Up Scrooge went, not caring a button for that. Darkness is cheap, and Scrooge liked it. But before he shut his heavy door, he walked through his rooms to see that all was right. He had just enough recollection of the face to desire to do that.

Sitting-room, bedroom, lumber-room. All as they should be. Nobody under the table, nobody under the sofa; a small fire in the grate; spoon and basin ready; and the little saucepan of gruel (Scrooge had a cold in his head) upon the hob. Nobody under the bed; nobody in the closet; nobody in his dressing-gown, which was hanging up in a suspicious attitude against the wall. Lumber-room as usual. Old fire-guards, old shoes, two fish-baskets, washing-stand on three legs, and a poker.

Quite satisfied, he closed his door, and locked himself in; double-locked himself in, which was not his custom. Thus secured against surprise, he took off his cravat; put on his dressing-gown and slippers, and his nightcap; and sat down before the fire to take his gruel.

It was a very low fire indeed; nothing on such a bitter night. He was obliged to sit close to it, and brood over it, before he could extract the least sensation of warmth from such a handful of fuel. The fireplace was an old one, built by some Dutch merchant long ago, and paved all round with quaint Dutch tiles, designed to illustrate the Scriptures. There were Cains and Abels, Pharaohs’ daughters; Queens of Sheba, Angelic messengers descending through the air on clouds like feather-beds, Abrahams, Belshazzars, Apostles putting off to sea in butter-boats, hundreds of figures to attract his thoughts — and yet that face of Marley, seven years dead, came like the ancient Prophet’s rod, and swallowed up the whole. If each smooth tile had been a blank at first, with power to shape some picture on its surface from the disjointed fragments of his thoughts, there would have been a copy of old Marley’s head on every one.

‘Humbug!’ said Scrooge; and walked across the room.

After several turns, he sat down again. As he threw his head back in the chair, his glance happened to rest upon a bell, a disused bell, that hung in the room, and communicated for some purpose now forgotten with a chamber in the highest story of the building. It was with great astonishment, and with a strange, inexplicable dread, that as he looked, he saw this bell begin to swing. It swung so softly in the outset that it scarcely made a sound; but soon it rang out loudly, and so did every bell in the house.

This might have lasted half a minute, or a minute, but it seemed an hour. The bells ceased as they had begun, together. They were succeeded by a clanking noise, deep down below; as if some person were dragging a heavy chain over the casks in the wine merchant’s cellar. Scrooge then remembered to have heard that ghosts in haunted houses were described as dragging chains.

The cellar-door flew open with a booming sound, and then he heard the noise much louder, on the floors below; then coming up the stairs; then coming straight towards his door.

‘It’s humbug still!’ said Scrooge. ‘I won’t believe it.’

His colour changed though, when, without a pause, it came on through the heavy door, and passed into the room before his eyes. Upon its coming in, the dying flame leaped up, as though it cried ‘I know him; Marley’s Ghost!’ and fell again.

The same face: the very same. Marley in his pigtail, usual waistcoat, tights and boots; the tassels on the latter bristling, like his pigtail, and his coat-skirts, and the hair upon his head. The chain he drew was clasped about his middle. It was long, and wound about him like a tail; and it was made (for Scrooge observed it closely) of cash- boxes, keys, padlocks, ledgers, deeds, and heavy purses wrought in steel. His body was transparent; so that Scrooge, observing him, and looking through his waistcoat, could see the two buttons on his coat behind.

Scrooge had often heard it said that Marley had no bowels, but he had never believed it until now.

No, nor did he believe it even now. Though he looked the phantom through and through, and saw it standing before him; though he felt the chilling influence of its death-cold eyes; and marked the very texture of the folded kerchief bound about its head and chin, which wrapper he had not observed before; he was still incredulous, and fought against his senses.

‘How now!’ said Scrooge, caustic and cold as ever. ‘What do you want with me?’

‘Much!’ — Marley’s voice, no doubt about it.

‘Who are you?’

‘Ask me who I was.’

‘Who were you then?’ said Scrooge, raising his voice. ‘You’re particular, for a shade.’ He was going to say ‘to a shade,’ but substituted this, as more appropriate.

‘In life I was your partner, Jacob Marley.’

‘Can you — can you sit down?’ asked Scrooge, looking doubtfully at him.

‘I can.’

‘Do it, then.’

Scrooge asked the question, because he didn’t know whether a ghost so transparent might find himself in a condition to take a chair; and felt that in the event of its being impossible, it might involve the necessity of an embarrassing explanation. But the ghost sat down on the opposite side of the fireplace, as if he were quite used to it.

‘You don’t believe in me,’ observed the Ghost.

‘I don’t.’ said Scrooge.

‘What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your senses?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Scrooge.

‘Why do you doubt your senses?’

‘Because,’ said Scrooge, ‘a little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheats. You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There’s more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!’

Scrooge was not much in the habit of cracking jokes, nor did he feel, in his heart, by any means waggish then. The truth is, that he tried to be smart, as a means of distracting his own attention, and keeping down his terror; for the spectre’s voice disturbed the very marrow in his bones.

To sit, staring at those fixed glazed eyes, in silence for a moment, would play, Scrooge felt, the very deuce with him. There was something very awful, too, in the spectre’s being provided with an infernal atmosphere of its own. Scrooge could not feel it himself, but this was clearly the case; for though the Ghost sat perfectly motionless, its hair, and skirts, and tassels, were still agitated as by the hot vapour from an oven.

‘You see this toothpick?’ said Scrooge, returning quickly to the charge, for the reason just assigned; and wishing, though it were only for a second, to divert the vision’s stony gaze from himself.

‘I do,’ replied the Ghost.

‘You are not looking at it,’ said Scrooge.

‘But I see it,’ said the Ghost, ‘notwithstanding.’

‘Well!’ returned Scrooge, ‘I have but to swallow this, and be for the rest of my days persecuted by a legion of goblins, all of my own creation. Humbug, I tell you! humbug!’

At this the spirit raised a frightful cry, and shook its chain with such a dismal and appalling noise, that Scrooge held on tight to his chair, to save himself from falling in a swoon. But how much greater was his horror, when the phantom taking off the bandage round its head, as if it were too warm to wear indoors, its lower jaw dropped down upon its breast!

Scrooge fell upon his knees, and clasped his hands before his face.

‘Mercy!’ he said. ‘Dreadful apparition, why do you trouble me?’

‘Man of the worldly mind!’ replied the Ghost, ‘do you believe in me or not?’

‘I do,’ said Scrooge. ‘I must. But why do spirits walk the earth, and why do they come to me?’

‘It is required of every man,’ the Ghost returned, ‘that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellowmen, and travel far and wide; and if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world — oh, woe is me! — and witness what it cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!’

Again the spectre raised a cry, and shook its chain and wrung its shadowy hands.

‘You are fettered,’ said Scrooge, trembling. ‘Tell me why?’

‘I wear the chain I forged in life,’ replied the Ghost. ‘I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?’

Scrooge trembled more and more.

‘Or would you know,’ pursued the Ghost, ‘the weight and length of the strong coil you bear yourself? It was full as heavy and as long as this, seven Christmas Eves ago. You have laboured on it, since. It is a ponderous chain!’

Scrooge glanced about him on the floor, in the expectation of finding himself surrounded by some fifty or sixty fathoms of iron cable: but he could see nothing.

‘Jacob,’ he said, imploringly. ‘Old Jacob Marley, tell me more. Speak comfort to me, Jacob!’

‘I have none to give,’ the Ghost replied. ‘It comes from other regions, Ebenezer Scrooge, and is conveyed by other ministers, to other kinds of men. Nor can I tell you what I would. A very little more, is all permitted to me. I cannot rest, I cannot stay, I cannot linger anywhere. My spirit never walked beyond our counting-house — mark me! — in life my spirit never roved beyond the narrow limits of our money-changing hole; and weary journeys lie before me!’

It was a habit with Scrooge, whenever he became thoughtful, to put his hands in his breeches pockets. Pondering on what the Ghost had said, he did so now, but without lifting up his eyes, or getting off his knees.

‘You must have been very slow about it, Jacob,’ Scrooge observed, in a business-like manner, though with humility and deference.

‘Slow!’ the Ghost repeated.

‘Seven years dead,’ mused Scrooge. ‘And travelling all the time!’

‘The whole time,’ said the Ghost. ‘No rest, no peace. Incessant torture of remorse.’

‘You travel fast?’ said Scrooge.

‘On the wings of the wind,’ replied the Ghost.

‘You might have got over a great quantity of ground in seven years,’ said Scrooge.

The Ghost, on hearing this, set up another cry, and clanked its chain so hideously in the dead silence of the night, that the Ward would have been justified in indicting it for a nuisance.

‘Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed,’ cried the phantom, ‘not to know, that ages of incessant labour, by immortal creatures, for this earth must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is all developed. Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life’s opportunity misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I!’

‘But you were always a good man of business, Jacob,’ faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself.

‘Business!’ cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. ‘Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!’

It held up its chain at arm’s length, as if that were the cause of all its unavailing grief, and flung it heavily upon the ground again.

‘At this time of the rolling year,’ the spectre said ‘I suffer most. Why did I walk through crowds of fellow- beings with my eyes turned down, and never raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise Men to a poor abode! Were there no poor homes to which its light would have conducted me!’

Scrooge was very much dismayed to hear the spectre going on at this rate, and began to quake exceedingly.

‘Hear me!’ cried the Ghost. ‘My time is nearly gone.’

‘I will,’ said Scrooge. ‘But don’t be hard upon me! Don’t be flowery, Jacob! Pray!’ ‘How it is that I appear before you in a shape that you can see, I may not tell. I have sat invisible beside you many and many a day.’

It was not an agreeable idea. Scrooge shivered, and wiped the perspiration from his brow.

‘That is no light part of my penance,’ pursued the Ghost. ‘I am here to-night to warn you, that you have yet a chance and hope of escaping my fate. A chance and hope of my procuring, Ebenezer.’

‘You were always a good friend to me,’ said Scrooge. ‘Thank ‘ee!’

‘You will be haunted,’ resumed the Ghost, ‘by Three Spirits.’

Scrooge’s countenance fell almost as low as the Ghost’s had done.

‘Is that the chance and hope you mentioned, Jacob?’ he demanded, in a faltering voice.

‘It is.’

‘I — I think I’d rather not,’ said Scrooge.

‘Without their visits,’ said the Ghost, ‘you cannot hope to shun the path I tread. Expect the first tomorrow, when the bell tolls One.’

‘Couldn’t I take ‘em all at once, and have it over, Jacob?’ hinted Scrooge.

‘Expect the second on the next night at the same hour. The third upon the next night when the last stroke of Twelve has ceased to vibrate. Look to see me no more; and look that, for your own sake, you remember what has passed between us!’

When it had said these words, the spectre took its wrapper from the table, and bound it round its head, as before. Scrooge knew this, by the smart sound its teeth made, when the jaws were brought together by the bandage. He ventured to raise his eyes again, and found his supernatural visitor confronting him in an erect attitude, with its chain wound over and about its arm.

The apparition walked backward from him; and at every step it took, the window raised itself a little, so that when the spectre reached it, it was wide open. It beckoned Scrooge to approach, which he did. When they were within two paces of each other, Marley’s Ghost held up its hand, warning him to come no nearer. Scrooge stopped.

Not so much in obedience, as in surprise and fear: for on the raising of the hand, he became sensible of confused noises in the air; incoherent sounds of lamentation and regret; wailings inexpressibly sorrowful and self-accusatory. The spectre, after listening for a moment, joined in the mournful dirge; and floated out upon the bleak, dark night.

Scrooge followed to the window: desperate in his curiosity. He looked out.

The air was filled with phantoms, wandering hither and thither in restless haste, and moaning as they went. Every one of them wore chains like Marley’s Ghost; some few (they might be guilty governments) were linked together; none were free. Many had been personally known to Scrooge in their lives. He had been quite familiar with one old ghost, in a white waistcoat, with a monstrous iron safe attached to its ankle, who cried piteously at being unable to assist a wretched woman with an infant, whom it saw below, upon a door-step. The misery with them all was, clearly, that they sought to interfere, for good, in human matters, and had lost the power for ever.

Whether these creatures faded into mist, or mist enshrouded them, he could not tell. But they and their spirit voices faded together; and the night became as it had been when he walked home.

Scrooge closed the window, and examined the door by which the Ghost had entered. It was double-locked, as he had locked it with his own hands, and the bolts were undisturbed. He tried to say ‘Humbug!’ but stopped at the first syllable. And being, from the emotion he had undergone, or the fatigues of the day, or his glimpse of the Invisible World, or the dull conversation of the Ghost, or the lateness of the hour, much in need of repose; went straight to bed, without undressing, and fell asleep upon the instant.

Stave 2: The First of the Three Spirits

When Scrooge awoke, it was so dark, that looking out of bed, he could scarcely distinguish the transparent window from the opaque walls of his chamber. He was endeavouring to pierce the darkness with his ferret eyes, when the chimes of a neighbouring church struck the four quarters. So he listened for the hour.

To his great astonishment the heavy bell went on from six to seven, and from seven to eight, and regularly up to twelve; then stopped. Twelve. It was past two when he went to bed. The clock was wrong. An icicle must have got into the works. Twelve.

He touched the spring of his repeater, to correct this most preposterous clock. Its rapid little pulse beat twelve: and stopped.

‘Why, it isn’t possible,’ said Scrooge, ‘that I can have slept through a whole day and far into another night. It isn’t possible that anything has happened to the sun, and this is twelve at noon.’

The idea being an alarming one, he scrambled out of bed, and groped his way to the window. He was obliged to rub the frost off with the sleeve of his dressing-gown before he could see anything; and could see very little then. All he could make out was, that it was still very foggy and extremely cold, and that there was no noise of people running to and fro, and making a great stir, as there unquestionably would have been if night had beaten off bright day, and taken possession of the world. This was a great relief, because ‘Three days after sight of this First of Exchange pay to Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge on his order,’ and so forth, would have become a mere United States security if there were no days to count by.

Scrooge went to bed again, and thought, and thought, and thought it over and over, and could make nothing of it. The more he thought, the more perplexed he was; and, the more he endeavoured not to think, the more he thought.

Marley’s Ghost bothered him exceedingly. Every time he resolved within himself, after mature inquiry that it was all a dream, his mind flew back again, like a strong spring released, to its first position, andpresented the same problem to be worked all through, ‘Was it a dream or not?’

Scrooge lay in this state until the chime had gone three-quarters more, when he remembered, on a sudden, that the Ghost hadwarned him of a visitation when the bell tolled one. He resolved to lie awake until the hour was passed; and, considering that he could no more go to sleep than go to heaven, this was, perhaps, the wisest resolution in his power.

The quarter was so long, that he was more than once convinced he must have sunk into a doze unconsciously, and missed the clock. At length it broke upon his listening ear.

‘Ding, dong!’

‘A quarter past,’ said Scrooge, counting.

‘Ding, dong!’

‘Half past,’ said Scrooge.

‘Ding, dong!’

‘A quarter to it,’ said Scrooge. ‘Ding, dong!’

‘The hour itself,’ said Scrooge triumphantly, ‘and nothing else!’

He spoke before the hour bell sounded, which it now did with a deep, dull, hollow, melancholy ONE. Light flashed up in the room upon the instant, and the curtains of his bed were drawn.

The curtains of his bed were drawn aside, I tell you, by a hand. Not the curtains at his feet, nor the curtains at his back, but those to which his face was addressed. The curtains of his bed were drawn aside; and Scrooge, starting up into a half-recumbent attitude, found himself face to face with the unearthly visitor who drew them: as close to it as I am now to you, and I am standing in the spirit at your elbow.

It was a strange figure — like a child: yet not so like a child as like an old man, viewed through some supernatural medium, which gave him the appearance of having receded from the view, and being diminished to a child’s proportions. Its hair, which hung about its neck and down its back, was white as if with age; and yet the face had not a wrinkle in it, and the tenderest bloom was on the skin. The arms were very long and muscular; the hands the same, as if its hold were of uncommon strength. Its legs and feet, most delicately formed, were, like those upper members, bare. It wore a tunic of the purest white, and round its waist was bound a lustrous belt, the sheen of which was beautiful. It held a branch of fresh green holly in its hand; and, in singular contradiction of that wintry emblem, had its dress trimmed with summer flowers. But the strangest thing about it was, that from the crown of its head there sprung a bright clear jet of light, by which all this was visible; and which was doubtless the occasion of its using, in its duller moments, a great extinguisher for a cap, which it now held under its arm.

Even this, though, when Scrooge looked at it with increasing steadiness, was not its strangest quality. For as its belt sparkled and glittered now in one part and now in another, and what was light one instant, at another time was dark, so the figure itself fluctuated in its distinctness: being now a thing with one arm, now with one leg, now with twenty legs, now a pair of legs without a head, now a head without a body: of which dissolving parts, no outline would be visible in the dense gloom wherein they melted away. And in the very wonder of this, it would be itself again; distinct and clear as ever.

‘Are you the Spirit, sir, whose coming was foretold to me.’ asked Scrooge.

‘I am.’

The voice was soft and gentle. Singularly low, as if instead of being so close beside him, it were at a distance.

‘Who, and what are you.’ Scrooge demanded.

‘I am the Ghost of Christmas Past.’

‘Long Past.’ inquired Scrooge: observant of its dwarfish stature.

‘No. Your past.’

Perhaps, Scrooge could not have told anybody why, if anybody could have asked him; but he had a special desire to see the Spirit in his cap; and begged him to be covered.

‘What.’ exclaimed the Ghost, ‘would you so soon put out, with worldly hands, the light I give. Is it not enough that you are one of those whose passions made this cap, and force me through whole trains of years to wear it low upon my brow.’

Scrooge reverently disclaimed all intention to offend or any knowledge of having wilfully bonneted the Spirit at any period of his life. He then made bold to inquire what business brought him there.

‘Your welfare.’ said the Ghost.

Scrooge expressed himself much obliged, but could not help thinking that a night of unbroken rest would have been more conducive to that end. The Spirit must have heard him thinking, for it said immediately:

‘Your reclamation, then. Take heed.’

It put out its strong hand as it spoke, and clasped him gently by the arm.

‘Rise. and walk with me.’

It would have been in vain for Scrooge to plead that the weather and the hour were not adapted to pedestrian purposes; that bed was warm, and the thermometer a long way below freezing; that he was clad but lightly in his slippers, dressing-gown, and nightcap; and that he had a cold upon him at that time. The grasp, though gentle as a woman’s hand, was not to be resisted. He rose: but finding that the Spirit made towards the window, clasped his robe in supplication.

‘I am mortal,’ Scrooge remonstrated, ‘and liable to fall.’

‘Bear but a touch of my hand there,’ said the Spirit, laying it upon his heart,’ and you shall be upheld in more than this.’

As the words were spoken, they passed through the wall, and stood upon an open country road, with fields on either hand. The city had entirely vanished. Not a vestige of it was to be seen. The darkness and the mist had vanished with it, for it was a clear, cold, winter day, with snow upon the ground.

‘Good Heaven!’ said Scrooge, clasping his hands together, as he looked about him. ‘I was bred in this place. I was a boy here.’

The Spirit gazed upon him mildly. Its gentle touch, though it had been light and instantaneous, appeared still present to the old man’s sense of feeling. He was conscious of a thousand odours floating in the air, each one connected with a thousand thoughts, and hopes, and joys, and cares long, long, forgotten.

‘Your lip is trembling,’ said the Ghost. ‘And what is that upon your cheek.’

Scrooge muttered, with an unusual catching in his voice, that it was a pimple; and begged the Ghost to lead him where he would.

‘You recollect the way.’ inquired the Spirit.

‘Remember it.’ cried Scrooge with fervour; ‘I could walk it blindfold.’

‘Strange to have forgotten it for so many years.’ observed the Ghost. ‘Let us go on.’

They walked along the road, Scrooge recognising every gate, and post, and tree; until a little market-town appeared in the distance, with its bridge, its church, and winding river. Some shaggy ponies now were seen trotting towards them with boys upon their backs, who called to other boys in country gigs and carts, driven by farmers. All these boys were in great spirits, and shouted to each other, until the broad fields were so full of merry music, that the crisp air laughed to hear it.

‘These are but shadows of the things that have been,’ said the Ghost. ‘They have no consciousness of us.’

The jocund travellers came on; and as they came, Scrooge knew and named them every one. Why was he rejoiced beyond all bounds to see them. Why did his cold eye glisten, and his heart leap up as they went past. Why was he filled with gladness when he heard them give each other Merry Christmas, as they parted at cross-roads and bye-ways, for their several homes. What was merry Christmas to Scrooge. Out upon merry Christmas. What good had it ever done to him.

‘The school is not quite deserted,’ said the Ghost. ‘A solitary child, neglected by his friends, is left there still.’

Scrooge said he knew it. And he sobbed.

They left the high-road, by a well-remembered lane, and soon approached a mansion of dull red brick, with a little weathercock-surmounted cupola, on the roof, and a bell hanging in it. It was a large house, but one of broken fortunes; for the spacious offices were little used, their walls were damp and mossy, their windows broken, and their gates decayed. Fowls clucked and strutted in the stables; and the coach-houses and sheds were over-run with grass. Nor was it more retentive of its ancient state, within; for entering the dreary hall, and glancing through the open doors of many rooms, they found them poorly furnished, cold, and vast. There was an earthy savour in the air, a chilly bareness in the place, which associated itself somehow with too much getting up by candle-light, and not too much to eat.

They went, the Ghost and Scrooge, across the hall, to a door at the back of the house. It opened before them, and disclosed a long, bare, melancholy room, made barer still by lines of plain deal forms and desks. At one of these a lonely boy was reading near a feeble fire; and Scrooge sat down upon a form, and wept to see his poor forgotten self as he used to be.

Not a latent echo in the house, not a squeak and scuffle from the mice behind the panelling, not a drip from the half-thawed water-spout in the dull yard behind, not a sigh among the leafless boughs of one despondent poplar, not the idle swinging of an empty store-house door, no, not a clicking in the fire, but fell upon the heart of Scrooge with a softening influence, and gave a freer passage to his tears.

The Spirit touched him on the arm, and pointed to his younger self, intent upon his reading. Suddenly a man, in foreign garments: wonderfully real and distinct to look at: stood outside the window, with an axe stuck in his belt, and leading by the bridle an ass laden with wood.

‘Why, it’s Ali Baba.’ Scrooge exclaimed in ecstasy. ‘It’s dear old honest Ali Baba. Yes, yes, I know. One Christmas time, when yonder solitary child was left here all alone, he did come, for the first time, just like that. Poor boy. And Valentine,’ said Scrooge,’ and his wild brother, Orson; there they go. And what’s his name, who was put down in his drawers, asleep, at the Gate of Damascus; don’t you see him. And the Sultan’s Groom turned upside down by the Genii; there he is upon his head. Serve him right. I’m glad of it. What business had he to be married to the Princess.’

To hear Scrooge expending all the earnestness of his nature on such subjects, in a most extraordinary voice between laughing and crying; and to see his heightened and excited face; would have been a surprise to his business friends in the city, indeed.

‘There’s the Parrot.’ cried Scrooge. ‘Green body and yellow tail, with a thing like a lettuce growing out of the top of his head; there he is. Poor Robin Crusoe, he called him, when he came home again after sailing round the island. ‘Poor Robin Crusoe, where have you been, Robin Crusoe.’ The man thought he was dreaming, but he wasn’t. It was the Parrot, you know. There goes Friday, running for his life to the little creek. Halloa. Hoop. Hallo.’

Then, with a rapidity of transition very foreign to his usual character, he said, in pity for his former self, ‘Poor boy.’ and cried again.

‘I wish,’ Scrooge muttered, putting his hand in his pocket, and looking about him, after drying his eyes with his cuff: ‘but it’s too late now.’

‘What is the matter.’ asked the Spirit.

‘Nothing,’ said Scrooge. ‘Nothing. There was a boy singing a Christmas Carol at my door last night. I should like to have given him something: that’s all.’

The Ghost smiled thoughtfully, and waved its hand: saying as it did so, ‘Let us see another Christmas.’

Scrooge’s former self grew larger at the words, and the room became a little darker and more dirty. The panels shrunk, the windows cracked; fragments of plaster fell out of the ceiling, and the naked laths were shown instead; but how all this was brought about, Scrooge knew no more than you do. He only knew that it was quite correct; that everything had happened so; that there he was, alone again, when all the other boys had gone home for the jolly holidays.

He was not reading now, but walking up and down despairingly.

Scrooge looked at the Ghost, and with a mournful shaking of his head, glanced anxiously towards the door.

It opened; and a little girl, much younger than the boy, came darting in, and putting her arms about his neck, and often kissing him, addressed him as her ‘Dear, dear brother.’

‘I have come to bring you home, dear brother.’ said the child, clapping her tiny hands, and bending down to laugh. ‘To bring you home, home, home.’

‘Home, little Fan.’ returned the boy.

‘Yes.’ said the child, brimful of glee. ‘Home, for good and all. Home, for ever and ever. Father is so much kinder than he used to be, that home’s like Heaven. He spoke so gently to me one dear night when I was going to bed, that I was not afraid to ask him once more if you might come home; and he said Yes, you should; and sent me in a coach to bring you. And you’re to be a man.’ said the child, opening her eyes,’ and are never to come back here; but first, we’re to be together all the Christmas long, and have the merriest time in all the world.’

‘You are quite a woman, little Fan.’ exclaimed the boy.

She clapped her hands and laughed, and tried to touch his head; but being too little, laughed again, and stood on tiptoe to embrace him. Then she began to drag him, in her childish eagerness, towards the door; and he, nothing loth to go, accompanied her.

A terrible voice in the hall cried. ‘Bring down Master Scrooge’s box, there.’ and in the hall appeared the

schoolmaster himself, who glared on Master Scrooge with a ferocious condescension, and threw him into a dreadful state of mind by shaking hands with him. He then conveyed him and his sister into the veriest old well of a shivering best-parlour that ever was seen, where the maps upon the wall, and the celestial and terrestrial globes in the windows, were waxy with cold. Here he produced a decanter of curiously light wine, and a block of curiously heavy cake, and administered instalments of those dainties to the young people: at the same time, sending out a meagre servant to offer a glass of something to the postboy, who answered that he thanked the gentleman, but if it was the same tap as he had tasted before, he had rather not. Master Scrooge’s trunk being by this time tied on to the top of the chaise, the children bade the schoolmaster good-bye right willingly; and getting into it, drove gaily down the garden-sweep: the quick wheels dashing the hoar-frost and snow from off the dark leaves of the evergreens like spray.

‘Always a delicate creature, whom a breath might have withered,’ said the Ghost. ‘But she had a large heart.’

‘So she had,’ cried Scrooge. ‘You’re right. I will not gainsay it, Spirit. God forbid.’

‘She died a woman,’ said the Ghost, ‘and had, as I think, children.’

‘One child,’ Scrooge returned.

‘True,’ said the Ghost. ‘Your nephew.’

Scrooge seemed uneasy in his mind; and answered briefly, ‘Yes.’

Although they had but that moment left the school behind them, they were now in the busy thoroughfares of a city, where shadowy passengers passed and repassed; where shadowy carts and coaches battle for the way, and all the strife and tumult of a real city were. It was made plain enough, by the dressing of the shops, that here too it was Christmas time again; but it was evening, and the streets were lighted up.

The Ghost stopped at a certain warehouse door, and asked Scrooge if he knew it.

‘Know it.’ said Scrooge. ‘I was apprenticed here.’

They went in. At sight of an old gentleman in a Welsh wig, sitting behind such a high desk, that if he had been two inches taller he must have knocked his head against the ceiling, Scrooge cried in great excitement:

‘Why, it’s old Fezziwig. Bless his heart; it’s Fezziwig alive again.’

Old Fezziwig laid down his pen, and looked up at the clock, which pointed to the hour of seven. He rubbed his hands; adjusted his capacious waistcoat; laughed all over himself, from his shows to his organ of benevolence; and called out in a comfortable, oily, rich, fat, jovial voice:

‘Yo ho, there. Ebenezer. Dick.’

Scrooge’s former self, now grown a young man, came briskly in, accompanied by his fellow-prentice.

‘Dick Wilkins, to be sure.’ said Scrooge to the Ghost. ‘Bless me, yes. There he is. He was very much attached to me, was Dick. Poor Dick. Dear, dear.’

‘Yo ho, my boys.’ said Fezziwig. ‘No more work to- night. Christmas Eve, Dick. Christmas, Ebenezer. Let’s have the shutters up,’ cried old Fezziwig, with a sharp clap of his hands,’ before a man can say Jack Robinson.’

You wouldn’t believe how those two fellows went at it. They charged into the street with the shutters — one, two, three — had them up in their places — four, five, six — barred them and pinned then — seven, eight, nine — and came back before you could have got to twelve, panting like race-horses.

‘Hilli-ho!’ cried old Fezziwig, skipping down from the high desk, with wonderful agility. ‘Clear away, my lads, and let’s have lots of room here. Hilli-ho, Dick. Chirrup, Ebenezer.’

Clear away. There was nothing they wouldn’t have cleared away, or couldn’t have cleared away, with old Fezziwig looking on. It was done in a minute. Every movable was packed off, as if it were dismissed from public life for evermore; the floor was swept and watered, the lamps were trimmed, fuel was heaped upon the fire; and the warehouse was as snug, and warm, and dry, and bright a ball-room, as you would desire to see upon a winter’s night.

In came a fiddler with a music-book, and went up to the lofty desk, and made an orchestra of it, and tuned like fifty stomach-aches. In came Mrs Fezziwig, one vast substantial smile. In came the three Miss Fezziwigs, beaming and lovable. In came the six young followers whose hearts they broke. In came all the young men and women employed in the business. In came the housemaid, with her cousin, the baker. In came the cook, with her brother’s particular friend, the milkman. In came the boy from over the way, who was suspected of not having board enough from his master; trying to hide himself behind the girl from next door but one, who was proved to have had her ears pulled by her mistress. In they all came, one after another; some shyly, some boldly, some gracefully, some awkwardly, some pushing, some pulling; in they all came, anyhow and everyhow. Away they all went, twenty couples at once; hands half round and back again the other way; down the middle and up again; round and round in various stages of affectionate grouping; old top couple always turning up in the wrong place; new top couple starting off again, as soon as they got there; all top couples at last, and not a bottom one to help them. When this result was brought about, old Fezziwig, clapping his hands to stop the dance, cried out,’ Well done.’ and the fiddler plunged his hot face into a pot of porter, especially provided for that purpose. But scorning rest, upon his reappearance, he instantly began again, though there were no dancers yet, as if the other fiddler had been carried home, exhausted, on a shutter, and he were a bran-new man resolved to beat him out of sight, or perish.

There were more dances, and there were forfeits, and more dances, and there was cake, and there was negus, and there was a great piece of Cold Roast, and there was a great piece of Cold Boiled, and there were mince-pies, and plenty of beer. But the great effect of the evening came after the Roast and Boiled, when the fiddler (an artful dog, mind. The sort of man who knew his business better than you or I could have told it him.) struck up Sir Roger de Coverley.’ Then old Fezziwig stood out to dance with Mrs Fezziwig. Top couple, too; with a good stiff piece of work cut out for them; three or four and twenty pair of partners; people who were not to be trifled with; people who would dance, and had no notion of walking.

But if they had been twice as many — ah, four times — old Fezziwig would have been a match for them, and so would Mrs Fezziwig. As to her, she was worthy to be his partner in every sense of the term. If that’s not high praise, tell me higher, and I’ll use it. A positive light appeared to issue from Fezziwig’s calves. They shone in every part of the dance like moons. You couldn’t have predicted, at any given time, what would have become of them next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs Fezziwig had gone all through the dance; advance and retire, both hands to your partner, bow and curtsey, corkscrew, thread-the- needle, and back again to your place; Fezziwig cut — cut so deftly, that he appeared to wink with his legs, and came upon his feet again without a stagger.

When the clock struck eleven, this domestic ball broke up. Mr and Mrs Fezziwig took their stations, one on either side of the door, and shaking hands with every person individually as he or she went out, wished him or her a Merry Christmas. When everybody had retired but the two prentices, they did the same to them; and thus the cheerful voices died away, and the lads were left to their beds; which were under a counter in the back-shop.

During the whole of this time, Scrooge had acted like a man out of his wits. His heart and soul were in the scene, and with his former self. He corroborated everything, remembered everything, enjoyed everything, and underwent the strangest agitation. It was not until now, when the bright faces of his former self and Dick were turned from them, that he remembered the Ghost, and became conscious that it was looking full upon him, while the light upon its head burnt very clear.

‘A small matter,’ said the Ghost, ‘to make these silly folks so full of gratitude.’

‘Small.’ echoed Scrooge.

The Spirit signed to him to listen to the two apprentices, who were pouring out their hearts in praise of Fezziwig: and when he had done so, said,

‘Why. Is it not. He has spent but a few pounds of your mortal money: three or four perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise.’

‘It isn’t that,’ said Scrooge, heated by the remark, and speaking unconsciously like his former, not his latter, self. ‘It isn’t that, Spirit. He has the power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our service light or burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. Say that his power lies in words and looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it is impossible to add and count them up: what then. The happiness he gives, is quite as great as if it cost a fortune.’

He felt the Spirit’s glance, and stopped.

‘What is the matter.’ asked the Ghost.

‘Nothing in particular,’ said Scrooge.

‘Something, I think.’ the Ghost insisted.

‘No,’ said Scrooge,’ No. I should like to be able to say a word or two to my clerk just now. That’s all.’

His former self turned down the lamps as he gave utterance to the wish; and Scrooge and the Ghost again stood side by side in the open air.

‘My time grows short,’ observed the Spirit. ‘Quick.’

This was not addressed to Scrooge, or to any one whom he could see, but it produced an immediate effect. For again Scrooge saw himself. He was older now; a man in the prime of life. His face had not the harsh and rigid lines of later years; but it had begun to wear the signs of care and avarice. There was an eager, greedy, restless motion in the eye, which showed the passion that had taken root, and where the shadow of the growing tree would fall.

He was not alone, but sat by the side of a fair young girl in a mourning-dress: in whose eyes there were tears, which sparkled in the light that shone out of the Ghost of Christmas Past.

‘It matters little,’ she said, softly. ‘To you, very little. Another idol has displaced me; and if it can cheer and comfort you in time to come, as I would have tried to do, I have no just cause to grieve.’

‘What Idol has displaced you.’ he rejoined.

‘A golden one.’

‘This is the even-handed dealing of the world.’ he said. ‘There is nothing on which it is so hard as poverty; and there is nothing it professes to condemn with such severity as the pursuit of wealth.’

‘You fear the world too much,’ she answered, gently. ‘All your other hopes have merged into the hope of being beyond the chance of its sordid reproach. I have seen your nobler aspirations fall off one by one, until the master- passion, Gain, engrosses you. Have I not.’

‘What then.’ he retorted. ‘Even if I have grown so much wiser, what then. I am not changed towards you.’

She shook her head.

‘Am I.’

‘Our contract is an old one. It was made when we were both poor and content to be so, until, in good season, we could improve our worldly fortune by our patient industry. You are changed. When it was made, you were another man.’

‘I was a boy,’ he said impatiently.

‘Your own feeling tells you that you were not what you are,’ she returned. ‘I am. That which promised happiness when we were one in heart, is fraught with misery now that we are two. How often and how keenly I have thought of this, I will not say. It is enough that I have thought of it, and can release you.’

‘Have I ever sought release.’

‘In words. No. Never.’

‘In what, then.’

‘In a changed nature; in an altered spirit; in another atmosphere of life; another Hope as its great end. In everything that made my love of any worth or value in your sight. If this had never been between us,’ said the girl, looking mildly, but with steadiness, upon him;’ tell me, would you seek me out and try to win me now. Ah, no.’

He seemed to yield to the justice of this supposition, in spite of himself. But he said with a struggle,’ You think not.’

‘I would gladly think otherwise if I could,’ she answered, ‘Heaven knows. When I have learned a Truth like this, I know how strong and irresistible it must be. But if you were free to-day, to-morrow, yesterday, can even I believe that you would choose a dowerless girl — you who, in your very confidence with her, weigh everything by Gain: or, choosing her, if for a moment you were false enough to your one guiding principle to do so, do I not know that your repentance and regret would surely follow. I do; and I release you. With a full heart, for the love of him you once were.’

He was about to speak; but with her head turned from him, she resumed.

‘You may — the memory of what is past half makes me hope you will — have pain in this. A very, very brief time, and you will dismiss the recollection of it, gladly, as an unprofitable dream, from which it happened well that you awoke. May you be happy in the life you have chosen.’

She left him, and they parted.

‘Spirit.’ said Scrooge,’ show me no more. Conduct me home. Why do you delight to torture me.’

‘One shadow more.’ exclaimed the Ghost.

‘No more.’ cried Scrooge. ‘No more, I don’t wish to see it. Show me no more.’

But the relentless Ghost pinioned him in both his arms, and forced him to observe what happened next.

They were in another scene and place; a room, not very large or handsome, but full of comfort. Near to the winter fire sat a beautiful young girl, so like that last that Scrooge believed it was the same, until he saw her, now a comely matron, sitting opposite her daughter. The noise in this room was perfectly tumultuous, for there were more children there, than Scrooge in his agitated state of mind could count; and, unlike the celebrated herd in the poem, they were not forty children conducting themselves like one, but every child was conducting itself like forty. The consequences were uproarious beyond belief; but no one seemed to care; on the contrary, the mother and daughter laughed heartily, and enjoyed it very much; and the latter, soon beginning to mingle in the sports, got pillaged by the young brigands most ruthlessly. What would I not have given to one of them. Though I never could have been so rude, no, no. I wouldn’t for the wealth of all the world have crushed that braided hair, and torn it down; and for the precious little shoe, I wouldn’t have plucked it off, God bless my soul. to save my life. As to measuring her waist in sport, as they did, bold young brood, I couldn’t have done it; I should have expected my arm to have grown round it for a punishment, and never come straight again. And yet I should have dearly liked, I own, to have touched her lips; to have questioned her, that she might have opened them; to have looked upon the lashes of her downcast eyes, and never raised a blush; to have let loose waves of hair, an inch of which would be a keepsake beyond price: in short, I should have liked, I do confess, to have had the lightest licence of a child, and yet to have been man enough to know its value.

But now a knocking at the door was heard, and such a rush immediately ensued that she with laughing face and plundered dress was borne towards it the centre of a flushed and boisterous group, just in time to greet the father, who came home attended by a man laden with Christmas toys and presents. Then the shouting and the struggling, and the onslaught that was made on the defenceless porter. The scaling him with chairs for ladders to dive into his pockets, despoil him of brown-paper parcels, hold on tight by his cravat, hug him round his neck, pommel his back, and kick his legs in irrepressible affection. The shouts of wonder and delight with which the development of every package was received. The terrible announcement that the baby had been taken in the act of putting a doll’s frying-pan into his mouth, and was more than suspected of having swallowed a fictitious turkey, glued on a wooden platter. The immense relief of finding this a false alarm. The joy, and gratitude, and ecstasy. They are all indescribable alike. It is enough that by degrees the children and their emotions got out of the parlour, and by one stair at a time, up to the top of the house; where they went to bed, and so subsided.

And now Scrooge looked on more attentively than ever, when the master of the house, having his daughter leaning fondly on him, sat down with her and her mother at his own fireside; and when he thought that such another creature, quite as graceful and as full of promise, might have called him father, and been a spring-time in the haggard winter of his life, his sight grew very dim indeed.

‘Belle,’ said the husband, turning to his wife with a smile,’ I saw an old friend of yours this afternoon.’

‘Who was it.’

‘Guess.’

‘How can I. Tut, don’t I know.’ she added in the same breath, laughing as he laughed. ‘Mr Scrooge.’

‘Mr Scrooge it was. I passed his office window; and as it was not shut up, and he had a candle inside, I could scarcely help seeing him. His partner lies upon the point of death, I hear; and there he sat alone. Quite alone in the world, I do believe.’

‘Spirit.’ said Scrooge in a broken voice,’ remove me from this place.’

‘I told you these were shadows of the things that have been,’ said the Ghost. ‘That they are what they are, do not blame me.’

‘Remove me.’ Scrooge exclaimed,’ I cannot bear it.’

He turned upon the Ghost, and seeing that it looked upon him with a face, in which in some strange way there were fragments of all the faces it had shown him, wrestled with it.

‘Leave me. Take me back. Haunt me no longer.’

In the struggle, if that can be called a struggle in which the Ghost with no visible resistance on its own part was undisturbed by any effort of its adversary, Scrooge observed that its light was burning high and bright; and dimly connecting that with its influence over him, he seized the extinguisher-cap, and by a sudden action pressed it down upon its head.

The Spirit dropped beneath it, so that the extinguisher covered its whole form; but though Scrooge pressed it down with all his force, he could not hide the light, which streamed from under it, in an unbroken flood upon the ground.

He was conscious of being exhausted, and overcome by an irresistible drowsiness; and, further, of being in his own bedroom. He gave the cap a parting squeeze, in which his hand relaxed; and had barely time to reel to bed, before he sank into a heavy sleep.

Stave 3: The Second of the Three Spirits

Awaking in the middle of a prodigiously tough snore, and sitting up in bed to get his thoughts together, Scrooge had no occasion to be told that the bell was again upon the stroke of One. He felt that he was restored to consciousness in the right nick of time, for the especial purpose of holding a conference with the second messenger despatched to him through Jacob Marley’s intervention. But, finding that he turned uncomfortably cold when he began to wonder which of his curtains this new spectre would draw back, he put them every one aside with his own hands, and lying down again, established a sharp look-out all round the bed. For, he wished to challenge the Spirit on the moment of its appearance, and did not wish to be taken by surprise, and made nervous.

Gentlemen of the free-and-easy sort, who plume themselves on being acquainted with a move or two, and being usually equal to the time-of-day, express the wide range of their capacity for adventure by observing that they are good for anything from pitch-and-toss to manslaughter; between which opposite extremes, no doubt, there lies a tolerably wide and comprehensive range of subjects. Without venturing for Scrooge quite as hardily as this, I don’t mind calling on you to believe that he was ready for a good broad field of strange appearances, and that nothing between a baby and rhinoceros would have astonished him very much.

Now, being prepared for almost anything, he was not by any means prepared for nothing; and, consequently, when the Bell struck One, and no shape appeared, he was taken with a violent fit of trembling. Five minutes, ten minutes, a quarter of an hour went by, yet nothing came. All this time, he lay upon his bed, the very core and centre of a blaze of ruddy light, which streamed upon it when the clock proclaimed the hour; and which, being only light, was more alarming than a dozen ghosts, as he was powerless to make out what it meant, or would be at; and was sometimes apprehensive that he might be at that very moment an interesting case of spontaneous combustion, without having the consolation of knowing it. At last, however, he began to think — as you or I would have thought at first; for it is always the person not in the predicament who knows what ought to have been done in it, and would unquestionably have done it too — at last, I say, he began to think that the source and secret of this ghostly light might be in the adjoining room, from whence, on further tracing it, it seemed to shine. This idea taking full possession of his mind, he got up softly and shuffled in his slippers to the door.

The moment Scrooge’s hand was on the lock, a strange voice called him by his name, and bade him enter. He obeyed.

It was his own room. There was no doubt about that. But it had undergone a surprising transformation. The walls and ceiling were so hung with living green, that it looked a perfect grove; from every part of which, bright gleaming berries glistened. The crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe, and ivy reflected back the light, as if so many little mirrors had been scattered there; and such a mighty blaze went roaring up the chimney, as that dull petrification of a hearth had never known in Scrooge’s time, or Marley’s, or for many and many a winter season gone. Heaped up on the floor, to form a kind of throne, were turkeys, geese, game, poultry, brawn, great joints of meat, sucking-pigs, long wreaths of sausages, mince-pies, plum-puddings, barrels of oysters, red-hot chestnuts, cherry-cheeked apples, juicy oranges, luscious pears, immense twelfth-cakes, and seething bowls of punch, that made the chamber dim with their delicious steam. In easy state upon this couch, there sat a jolly Giant, glorious to see, who bore a glowing torch, in shape not unlike Plenty’s horn, and held it up, high up, to shed its light on Scrooge, as he came peeping round the door.

‘Come in.’ exclaimed the Ghost. ‘Come in, and know me better, man.’

Scrooge entered timidly, and hung his head before this Spirit. He was not the dogged Scrooge he had been; and though the Spirit’s eyes were clear and kind, he did not like to meet them.

‘I am the Ghost of Christmas Present,’ said the Spirit. ‘Look upon me.’

Scrooge reverently did so. It was clothed in one simple green robe, or mantle, bordered with white fur. This garment hung so loosely on the figure, that its capacious breast was bare, as if disdaining to be warded or concealed by any artifice. Its feet, observable beneath the ample folds of the garment, were also bare; and on its head it wore no other covering than a holly wreath, set here and there with shining icicles. Its dark brown curls were long and free; free as its genial face, its sparkling eye, its open hand, its cheery voice, its unconstrained demeanour, and its joyful air. Girded round its middle was an antique scabbard; but no sword was in it, and the ancient sheath was eaten up with rust.

‘You have never seen the like of me before.’ exclaimed the Spirit.

‘Never,’ Scrooge made answer to it.

‘Have never walked forth with the younger members of my family; meaning (for I am very young) my elder brothers born in these later years.’ pursued the Phantom.

‘I don’t think I have,’ said Scrooge. ‘I am afraid I have not. Have you had many brothers, Spirit.’

‘More than eighteen hundred,’ said the Ghost.

‘A tremendous family to provide for.’ muttered Scrooge.

The Ghost of Christmas Present rose.

‘Spirit,’ said Scrooge submissively,’ conduct me where you will. I went forth last night on compulsion, and I learnt a lesson which is working now. To-night, if you have aught to teach me, let me profit by it.’

‘Touch my robe.’

Scrooge did as he was told, and held it fast.

Holly, mistletoe, red berries, ivy, turkeys, geese, game, poultry, brawn, meat, pigs, sausages, oysters, pies, puddings, fruit, and punch, all vanished instantly. So did the room, the fire, the ruddy glow, the hour of night, and they stood in the city streets on Christmas morning, where (for the weather was severe) the people made a rough, but brisk and not unpleasant kind of music, in scraping the snow from the pavement in front of their dwellings, and from the tops of their houses, whence it was mad delight to the boys to see it come plumping down into the road below, and splitting into artificial little snow-storms.

The house fronts looked black enough, and the windows blacker, contrasting with the smooth white sheet of snow upon the roofs, and with the dirtier snow upon the ground; which last deposit had been ploughed up in deep furrows by the heavy wheels of carts and waggons; furrows that crossed and recrossed each other hundreds of times where the great streets branched off; and made intricate channels, hard to trace in the thick yellow mud and icy water. The sky was gloomy, and the shortest streets were choked up with a dingy mist, half thawed, half frozen, whose heavier particles descended in shower of sooty atoms, as if all the chimneys in Great Britain had, by one consent, caught fire, and were blazing away to their dear hearts’ content. There was nothing very cheerful in the climate or the town, and yet was there an air of cheerfulness abroad that the clearest summer air and brightest summer sun might have endeavoured to diffuse in vain.

For, the people who were shovelling away on the housetops were jovial and full of glee; calling out to one another from the parapets, and now and then exchanging a facetious snowball — better-natured missile far than many a wordy jest — laughing heartily if it went right and not less heartily if it went wrong. The poulterers’ shops were still half open, and the fruiterers’ were radiant in their glory. There were great, round, round, pot-bellied baskets of chestnuts, shaped like the waistcoats of jolly old gentlemen, lolling at the doors, and tumbling out into the street in their apoplectic opulence. There were ruddy, brown-faced, broad-girthed Spanish onions, shining in the fatness of their growth like Spanish Friars, and winking from their shelves in wanton slyness at the girls as they went by, and glanced demurely at the hung-up mistletoe. There were pears and apples, clustered high in blooming pyramids; there were bunches of grapes, made, in the shopkeepers’ benevolence to dangle from conspicuous hooks, that people’s mouths might water gratis as they passed; there were piles of filberts, mossy and brown, recalling, in their fragrance, ancient walks among the woods, and pleasant shufflings ankle deep through withered leaves; there were Norfolk Biffins, squab and swarthy, setting off the yellow of the oranges and lemons, and, in the great compactness of their juicy persons, urgently entreating and beseeching to be carried home in paper bags and eaten after dinner. The very gold and silver fish, set forth among these choice fruits in a bowl, though members of a dull and stagnant-blooded race, appeared to know that there was something going on; and, to a fish, went gasping round and round their little world in slow and passionless excitement.

The Grocers’. oh the Grocers’. nearly closed, with perhaps two shutters down, or one; but through those gaps such glimpses. It was not alone that the scales descending on the counter made a merry sound, or that the twine and roller parted company so briskly, or that the canisters were rattled up and down like juggling tricks, or even that the blended scents of tea and coffee were so grateful to the nose, or even that the raisins were so plentiful and rare, the almonds so extremely white, the sticks of cinnamon so long and straight, the other spices so delicious, the candied fruits so caked and spotted with molten sugar as to make the coldest lookers-on feel faint and subsequently bilious. Nor was it that the figs were moist and pulpy, or that the French plums blushed in modest tartness from their highly-decorated boxes, or that everything was good to eat and in its Christmas dress; but the customers were all so hurried and so eager in the hopeful promise of the day, that they tumbled up against each other at the door, crashing their wicker baskets wildly, and left their purchases upon the counter, and came running back to fetch them, and committed hundreds of the like mistakes, in the best humour possible; while the Grocer and his people were so frank and fresh that the polished hearts with which they fastened their aprons behind might have been their own, worn outside for general inspection, and for Christmas daws to peck at if they chose.

But soon the steeples called good people all, to church and chapel, and away they came, flocking through the streets in their best clothes, and with their gayest faces. And at the same time there emerged from scores of bye- streets, lanes, and nameless turnings, innumerable people, carrying their dinners to the baker’ shops. The sight of these poor revellers appeared to interest the Spirit very much, for he stood with Scrooge beside him in a baker’s doorway, and taking off the covers as their bearers passed, sprinkled incense on their dinners from his torch. And it was a very uncommon kind of torch, for once or twice when there were angry words between some dinner- carriers who had jostled each other, he shed a few drops of water on them from it, and their good humour was restored directly. For they said, it was a shame to quarrel upon Christmas Day. And so it was. God love it, so it was.

In time the bells ceased, and the bakers were shut up; and yet there was a genial shadowing forth of all these dinners and the progress of their cooking, in the thawed blotch of wet above each baker’s oven; where the pavement smoked as if its stones were cooking too.

‘Is there a peculiar flavour in what you sprinkle from your torch.’ asked Scrooge.

‘There is. My own.’

‘Would it apply to any kind of dinner on this day.’ asked Scrooge.

‘To any kindly given. To a poor one most.’

‘Why to a poor one most.’ asked Scrooge.

‘Because it needs it most.’

‘Spirit,’ said Scrooge, after a moment’s thought,’ I wonder you, of all the beings in the many worlds about us, should desire to cramp these people’s opportunities of innocent enjoyment.’

‘I.’ cried the Spirit.

‘You would deprive them of their means of dining every seventh day, often the only day on which they can be said to dine at all,’ said Scrooge. ‘Wouldn’t you.’

‘I.’ cried the Spirit.

‘You seek to close these places on the Seventh Day.’ said Scrooge. ‘And it comes to the same thing.’

‘I seek.’ exclaimed the Spirit.

‘Forgive me if I am wrong. It has been done in your name, or at least in that of your family,’ said Scrooge.

‘There are some upon this earth of yours,’ returned the Spirit,’ who lay claim to know us, and who do their deeds of passion, pride, ill-will, hatred, envy, bigotry, and selfishness in our name, who are as strange to us and all our kith and kin, as if they had never lived. Remember that, and charge their doings on themselves, not us.’

Scrooge promised that he would; and they went on, invisible, as they had been before, into the suburbs of the town. It was a remarkable quality of the Ghost (which Scrooge had observed at the baker’s), that notwithstanding his gigantic size, he could accommodate himself to any place with ease; and that he stood beneath a low roof quite as gracefully and like a supernatural creature, as it was possible he could have done in any lofty hall.

And perhaps it was the pleasure the good Spirit had in showing off this power of his, or else it was his own kind, generous, hearty nature, and his sympathy with all poor men, that led him straight to Scrooge’s clerk’s; for there he went, and took Scrooge with him, holding to his robe; and on the threshold of the door the Spirit smiled, and stopped to bless Bob Cratchit’s dwelling with the sprinkling of his torch. Think of that. Bob had but fifteen bob a-week himself; he pocketed on Saturdays but fifteen copies of his Christian name; and yet the Ghost of Christmas Present blessed his four-roomed house.

Then up rose Mrs Cratchit, Cratchit’s wife, dressed out but poorly in a twice-turned gown, but brave in ribbons, which are cheap and make a goodly show for sixpence; and she laid the cloth, assisted by Belinda Cratchit, second of her daughters, also brave in ribbons; while Master Peter Cratchit plunged a fork into the saucepan of potatoes, and getting the corners of his monstrous shirt collar (Bob’s private property, conferred upon his son and heir in honour of the day) into his mouth, rejoiced to find himself so gallantly attired, and yearned to show his linen in the fashionable Parks. And now two smaller Cratchits, boy and girl, came tearing in, screaming that outside the baker’s they had smelt the goose, and known it for their own; and basking in luxurious thoughts of sage and onion, these young Cratchits danced about the table, and exalted Master Peter Cratchit to the skies, while he (not proud, although his collars nearly choked him) blew the fire, until the slow potatoes bubbling up, knocked loudly at the saucepan-lid to be let out and peeled.

‘What has ever got your precious father then.’ said Mrs Cratchit. ‘And your brother, Tiny Tim. And Martha warn’t as late last Christmas Day by half-an-hour.’

‘Here’s Martha, mother.’ said a girl, appearing as she spoke.

‘Here’s Martha, mother.’ cried the two young Cratchits. ‘Hurrah. There’s such a goose, Martha.’

‘Why, bless your heart alive, my dear, how late you are.’ said Mrs Cratchit, kissing her a dozen times, and taking off her shawl and bonnet for her with officious zeal.

‘We’d a deal of work to finish up last night,’ replied the girl,’ and had to clear away this morning, mother.’

‘Well. Never mind so long as you are come,’ said Mrs Cratchit. ‘Sit ye down before the fire, my dear, and have a warm, Lord bless ye.’

‘No, no. There’s father coming,’ cried the two young Cratchits, who were everywhere at once. ‘Hide, Martha, hide.’

So Martha hid herself, and in came little Bob, the father, with at least three feet of comforter exclusive of the fringe, hanging down before him; and his threadbare clothes darned up and brushed, to look seasonable; and Tiny Tim upon his shoulder. Alas for Tiny Tim, he bore a little crutch, and had his limbs supported by an iron frame.

‘Why, where’s our Martha.’ cried Bob Cratchit, looking round.

‘Not coming,’ said Mrs Cratchit.

‘Not coming.’ said Bob, with a sudden declension in his high spirits; for he had been Tim’s blood horse all the way from church, and had come home rampant. ‘Not coming upon Christmas Day.’

Martha didn’t like to see him disappointed, if it were only in joke; so she came out prematurely from behind the closet door, and ran into his arms, while the two young Cratchits hustled Tiny Tim, and bore him off into the wash-house, that he might hear the pudding singing in the copper.

‘And how did little Tim behave. asked Mrs Cratchit, when she had rallied Bob on his credulity, and Bob had hugged his daughter to his heart’s content.

‘As good as gold,’ said Bob,’ and better. Somehow he gets thoughtful, sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see.’

Bob’s voice was tremulous when he told them this, and trembled more when he said that Tiny Tim was growing strong and hearty.

His active little crutch was heard upon the floor, and back came Tiny Tim before another word was spoken, escorted by his brother and sister to his stool before the fire; and while Bob, turning up his cuffs — as if, poor fellow, they were capable of being made more shabby — compounded some hot mixture in a jug with gin and lemons, and stirred it round and round and put it on the hob to simmer; Master Peter, and the two ubiquitous young Cratchits went to fetch the goose, with which they soon returned in high procession.

Such a bustle ensued that you might have thought a goose the rarest of all birds; a feathered phenomenon, to which a black swan was a matter of course — and in truth it was something very like it in that house. Mrs Cratchit made the gravy (ready beforehand in a little saucepan) hissing hot; Master Peter mashed the potatoes with incredible vigour; Miss Belinda sweetened up the apple- sauce; Martha dusted the hot plates; Bob took Tiny Tim beside him in a tiny corner at the table; the two young Cratchits set chairs for everybody, not forgetting themselves, and mounting guard upon their posts, crammed spoons into their mouths, lest they should shriek for goose before their turn came to be helped. At last the dishes were set on, and grace was said. It was succeeded by a breathless pause, as Mrs Cratchit, looking slowly all along the carving-knife, prepared to plunge it in the breast; but when she did, and when the long expected gush of stuffing issued forth, one murmur of delight arose all round the board, and even Tiny Tim, excited by the two young Cratchits, beat on the table with the handle of his knife, and feebly cried Hurrah.

There never was such a goose. Bob said he didn’t believe there ever was such a goose cooked. Its tenderness and flavour, size and cheapness, were the themes of universal admiration. Eked out by apple-sauce and mashed potatoes, it was a sufficient dinner for the whole family; indeed, as Mrs Cratchit said with great delight (surveying one small atom of a bone upon the dish), they hadn’t ate it all at last. Yet every one had had enough, and the youngest Cratchits in particular, were steeped in sage and onion to the eyebrows. But now, the plates being changed by Miss Belinda, Mrs Cratchit left the room alone — too nervous to bear witnesses — to take the pudding up and bring it in.

Suppose it should not be done enough. Suppose it should break in turning out. Suppose somebody should have got over the wall of the back-yard, and stolen it, while they were merry with the goose — a supposition at which the two young Cratchits became livid. All sorts of horrors were supposed.

Hallo. A great deal of steam. The pudding was out of the copper. A smell like a washing-day. That was the cloth. A smell like an eating-house and a pastrycook’s next door to each other, with a laundress’s next door to that. That was the pudding. In half a minute Mrs Cratchit entered — flushed, but smiling proudly — with the pudding, like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern of ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top.

Oh, a wonderful pudding. Bob Cratchit said, and calmly too, that he regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs Cratchit since their marriage. Mrs Cratchit said that now the weight was off her mind, she would confess she had had her doubts about the quantity of flour. Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it was at all a small pudding for a large family. It would have been flat heresy to do so. Any Cratchit would have blushed to hint at such a thing.

At last the dinner was all done, the cloth was cleared, the hearth swept, and the fire made up. The compound in the jug being tasted, and considered perfect, apples and oranges were put upon the table, and a shovel-full of chestnuts on the fire. Then all the Cratchit family drew round the hearth, in what Bob Cratchit called a circle, meaning half a one; and at Bob Cratchit’s elbow stood the family display of glass. Two tumblers, and a custard-cup without a handle.

These held the hot stuff from the jug, however, as well as golden goblets would have done; and Bob served it out with beaming looks, while the chestnuts on the fire sputtered and cracked noisily. Then Bob proposed:

‘A Merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us.’

Which all the family re-echoed.

‘God bless us every one.’ said Tiny Tim, the last of all.

He sat very close to his father’s side upon his little stool. Bob held his withered little hand in his, as if he loved the child, and wished to keep him by his side, and dreaded that he might be taken from him.

‘Spirit,’ said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before, ‘tell me if Tiny Tim will live.’

‘I see a vacant seat,’ replied the Ghost, ‘in the poor chimney-corner, and a crutch without an owner, carefully preserved. If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, the child will die.’

‘No, no,’ said Scrooge. ‘Oh, no, kind Spirit. say he will be spared.’

‘If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none other of my race,’ returned the Ghost, ‘will find him here. What then. If he be like to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.’

Scrooge hung his head to hear his own words quoted by the Spirit, and was overcome with penitence and grief. ‘Man,’ said the Ghost, ‘if man you be in heart, not adamant, forbear that wicked cant until you have discovered What the surplus is, and Where it is. Will you decide what men shall live, what men shall die. It may be, that in the sight of Heaven, you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like this poor man’s child. Oh God. to hear the Insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry brothers in the dust.’

Scrooge bent before the Ghost’s rebuke, and trembling cast his eyes upon the ground. But he raised them speedily, on hearing his own name.

‘Mr Scrooge.’ said Bob; ‘I’ll give you Mr Scrooge, the Founder of the Feast.’

‘The Founder of the Feast indeed.’ cried Mrs Cratchit, reddening. ‘I wish I had him here. I’d give him a piece of my mind to feast upon, and I hope he’d have a good appetite for it.’

‘My dear,’ said Bob, ‘the children. Christmas Day.’

‘It should be Christmas Day, I am sure,’ said she, ‘on which one drinks the health of such an odious, stingy, hard, unfeeling man as Mr Scrooge. You know he is, Robert. Nobody knows it better than you do, poor fellow.’

‘My dear,’ was Bob’s mild answer, ‘Christmas Day.’

‘I’ll drink his health for your sake and the Day’s,’ said Mrs Cratchit, ‘not for his. Long life to him. A merry Christmas and a happy new year. He’ll be very merry and very happy, I have no doubt.’

The children drank the toast after her. It was the first of their proceedings which had no heartiness. Tiny Tim drank it last of all, but he didn’t care twopence for it. Scrooge was the Ogre of the family. The mention of his name cast a dark shadow on the party, which was not dispelled for full five minutes.

After it had passed away, they were ten times merrier than before, from the mere relief of Scrooge the Baleful being done with. Bob Cratchit told them how he had a situation in his eye for Master Peter, which would bring in, if obtained, full five-and-sixpence weekly. The two young Cratchits laughed tremendously at the idea of Peter’s being a man of business; and Peter himself looked thoughtfully at the fire from between his collars, as if he were deliberating what particular investments he should favour when he came into the receipt of that bewildering income. Martha, who was a poor apprentice at a milliner’s, then told them what kind of work she had to do, and how many hours she worked at a stretch, and how she meant to lie abed to-morrow morning for a good long rest; to-morrow being a holiday she passed at home. Also how she had seen a countess and a lord some days before, and how the lord was much about as tall as Peter; at which Peter pulled up his collars so high that you couldn’t have seen his head if you had been there. All this time the chestnuts and the jug went round and round; and by-and- bye they had a song, about a lost child travelling in the snow, from Tiny Tim, who had a plaintive little voice, and sang it very well indeed.

There was nothing of high mark in this. They were not a handsome family; they were not well dressed; their shoes were far from being water-proof; their clothes were scanty; and Peter might have known, and very likely did, the inside of a pawnbroker’s. But, they were happy, grateful, pleased with one another, and contented with the time; and when they faded, and looked happier yet in the bright sprinklings of the Spirit’s torch at parting, Scrooge had his eye upon them, and especially on Tiny Tim, until the last.

By this time it was getting dark, and snowing pretty heavily; and as Scrooge and the Spirit went along the streets, the brightness of the roaring fires in kitchens, parlours, and all sorts of rooms, was wonderful. Here, the flickering of the blaze showed preparations for a cosy dinner, with hot plates baking through and through before the fire, and deep red curtains, ready to be drawn to shut out cold and darkness. There all the children of the house were running out into the snow to meet their married sisters, brothers, cousins, uncles, aunts, and be the first to greet them. Here, again, were shadows on the window- blind of guests assembling; and there a group of handsome girls, all hooded and fur-booted, and all chattering at once, tripped lightly off to some near neighbour’s house; where, woe upon the single man who saw them enter — artful witches, well they knew it — in a glow.

But, if you had judged from the numbers of people on their way to friendly gatherings, you might have thought that no one was at home to give them welcome when they got there, instead of every house expecting company, and piling up its fires half-chimney high. Blessings on it, how the Ghost exulted. How it bared its breadth of breast, and opened its capacious palm, and floated on, outpouring, with a generous hand, its bright and harmless mirth on everything within its reach. The very lamplighter, who ran on before, dotting the dusky street with specks of light, and who was dressed to spend the evening somewhere, laughed out loudly as the Spirit passed, though little kenned the lamplighter that he had any company but Christmas.

And now, without a word of warning from the Ghost, they stood upon a bleak and desert moor, where monstrous masses of rude stone were cast about, as though it were the burial-place of giants; and water spread itself wheresoever it listed, or would have done so, but for the frost that held it prisoner; and nothing grew but moss and furze, and coarse rank grass. Down in the west the setting sun had left a streak of fiery red, which glared upon the desolation for an instant, like a sullen eye, and frowning lower, lower, lower yet, was lost in the thick gloom of darkest night.

‘What place is this.’ asked Scrooge.

‘A place where Miners live, who labour in the bowels of the earth,’ returned the Spirit. ‘But they know me. See.’

A light shone from the window of a hut, and swiftly they advanced towards it. Passing through the wall of mud and stone, they found a cheerful company assembled round a glowing fire. An old, old man and woman, with their children and their children’s children, and another generation beyond that, all decked out gaily in their holiday attire. The old man, in a voice that seldom rose above the howling of the wind upon the barren waste, was singing them a Christmas song — it had been a very old song when he was a boy — and from time to time they all joined in the chorus. So surely as they raised their voices, the old man got quite blithe and loud; and so surely as they stopped, his vigour sank again.

The Spirit did not tarry here, but bade Scrooge hold his robe, and passing on above the moor, sped — whither.

Not to sea. To sea. To Scrooge’s horror, looking back, he saw the last of the land, a frightful range of rocks, behind them; and his ears were deafened by the thundering of water, as it rolled and roared, and raged among the dreadful caverns it had worn, and fiercely tried to undermine the earth.

Built upon a dismal reef of sunken rocks, some league or so from shore, on which the waters chafed and dashed, the wild year through, there stood a solitary lighthouse. Great heaps of sea-weed clung to its base, and storm-birds — born of the wind one might suppose, as sea-weed of the water — rose and fell about it, like the waves they skimmed.

But even here, two men who watched the light had made a fire, that through the loophole in the thick stone wall shed out a ray of brightness on the awful sea. Joining their horny hands over the rough table at which they sat, they wished each other Merry Christmas in their can of grog; and one of them: the elder, too, with his face all damaged and scarred with hard weather, as the figure-head of an old ship might be: struck up a sturdy song that was like a Gale in itself.

Again the Ghost sped on, above the black and heaving sea — on, on — until, being far away, as he told Scrooge, from any shore, they lighted on a ship. They stood beside the helmsman at the wheel, the look-out in the bow, the officers who had the watch; dark, ghostly figures in their several stations; but every man among them hummed a Christmas tune, or had a Christmas thought, or spoke below his breath to his companion of some bygone Christmas Day, with homeward hopes belonging to it. And every man on board, waking or sleeping, good or bad, had had a kinder word for another on that day than on any day in the year; and had shared to some extent in its festivities; and had remembered those he cared for at a distance, and had known that they delighted to remember him.

It was a great surprise to Scrooge, while listening to the moaning of the wind, and thinking what a solemn thing it was to move on through the lonely darkness over an unknown abyss, whose depths were secrets as profound as Death: it was a great surprise to Scrooge, while thus engaged, to hear a hearty laugh. It was a much greater surprise to Scrooge to recognise it as his own nephew’s and to find himself in a bright, dry, gleaming room, with the Spirit standing smiling by his side, and looking at that same nephew with approving affability.

‘Ha, ha.’ laughed Scrooge’s nephew. ‘Ha, ha, ha.’

If you should happen, by any unlikely chance, to know a man more blest in a laugh than Scrooge’s nephew, all I can say is, I should like to know him too. Introduce him to me, and I’ll cultivate his acquaintance.

It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good-humour. When Scrooge’s nephew laughed in this way: holding his sides, rolling his head, and twisting his face into the most extravagant contortions: Scrooge’s niece, by marriage, laughed as heartily as he. And their assembled friends being not a bit behindhand, roared out lustily.

‘Ha, ha. Ha, ha, ha, ha.’

‘He said that Christmas was a humbug, as I live.’ cried Scrooge’s nephew. ‘He believed it too.’

‘More shame for him, Fred.’ said Scrooge’s niece, indignantly. Bless those women; they never do anything by halves. They are always in earnest.

She was very pretty: exceedingly pretty. With a dimpled, surprised-looking, capital face; a ripe little mouth, that seemed made to be kissed — as no doubt it was; all kinds of good little dots about her chin, that melted into one another when she laughed; and the sunniest pair of eyes you ever saw in any little creature’s head. Altogether she was what you would have called provoking, you know; but satisfactory.

‘He’s a comical old fellow,’ said Scrooge’s nephew,’ that’s the truth: and not so pleasant as he might be. However, his offences carry their own punishment, and I have nothing to say against him.’

‘I’m sure he is very rich, Fred,’ hinted Scrooge’s niece. ‘At least you always tell me so.’

‘What of that, my dear.’ said Scrooge’s nephew. ‘His wealth is of no use to him. He don’t do any good with it. He don’t make himself comfortable with it. He hasn’t the satisfaction of thinking — ha, ha, ha. — that he is ever going to benefit us with it.’

‘I have no patience with him,’ observed Scrooge’s niece. Scrooge’s niece’s sisters, and all the other ladies, expressed the same opinion.

‘Oh, I have.’ said Scrooge’s nephew. ‘I am sorry for him; I couldn’t be angry with him if I tried. Who suffers by his ill whims. Himself, always. Here, he takes it into his head to dislike us, and he won’t come and dine with us. What’s the consequence. He don’t lose much of a dinner.’

‘Indeed, I think he loses a very good dinner,’ interrupted Scrooge’s niece. Everybody else said the same, and they must be allowed to have been competent judges, because they had just had dinner; and, with the dessert upon the table, were clustered round the fire, by lamplight.

‘Well. I’m very glad to hear it,’ said Scrooge’s nephew, ‘because I haven’t great faith in these young housekeepers. What do you say, Topper.’

Topper had clearly got his eye upon one of Scrooge’s niece’s sisters, for he answered that a bachelor was a wretched outcast, who had no right to express an opinion on the subject. Whereat Scrooge’s niece’s sister — the plump one with the lace tucker: not the one with the roses — blushed.

‘Do go on, Fred,’ said Scrooge’s niece, clapping her hands. ‘He never finishes what he begins to say. He is such a ridiculous fellow.’

Scrooge’s nephew revelled in another laugh, and as it was impossible to keep the infection off; though the plump sister tried hard to do it with aromatic vinegar; his example was unanimously followed.

‘I was only going to say,’ said Scrooge’s nephew,’ that the consequence of his taking a dislike to us, and not making merry with us, is, as I think, that he loses some pleasant moments, which could do him no harm. I am sure he loses pleasanter companions than he can find in his own thoughts, either in his mouldy old office, or his dusty chambers. I mean to give him the same chance every year, whether he likes it or not, for I pity him. He may rail at Christmas till he dies, but he can’t help thinking better of it — I defy him — if he finds me going there, in good temper, year after year, and saying Uncle Scrooge, how are you. If it only puts him in the vein to leave his poor clerk fifty pounds, that’s something; and I think I shook him yesterday.’

It was their turn to laugh now at the notion of his shaking Scrooge. But being thoroughly good-natured, and not much caring what they laughed at, so that they laughed at any rate, he encouraged them in their merriment, and passed the bottle joyously.

After tea. they had some music. For they were a musical family, and knew what they were about, when they sung a Glee or Catch, I can assure you: especially Topper, who could growl away in the bass like a good one, and never swell the large veins in his forehead, or get red in the face over it. Scrooge’s niece played well upon the harp; and played among other tunes a simple little air (a mere nothing: you might learn to whistle it in two minutes), which had been familiar to the child who fetched Scrooge from the boarding-school, as he had been reminded by the Ghost of Christmas Past. When this strain of music sounded, all the things that Ghost had shown him, came upon his mind; he softened more and more; and thought that if he could have listened to it often, years ago, he might have cultivated the kindnesses of life for his own happiness with his own hands, without resorting to the sexton’s spade that buried Jacob Marley.

But they didn’t devote the whole evening to music. After a while they played at forfeits; for it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child himself. Stop. There was first a game at blind-man’s buff. Of course there was. And I no more believe Topper was really blind than I believe he had eyes in his boots. My opinion is, that it was a done thing between him and Scrooge’s nephew; and that the Ghost of Christmas Present knew it. The way he went after that plump sister in the lace tucker, was an outrage on the credulity of human nature. Knocking down the fire-irons, tumbling over the chairs, bumping against the piano, smothering himself among the curtains, wherever she went, there went he. He always knew where the plump sister was. He wouldn’t catch anybody else. If you had fallen up against him (as some of them did), on purpose, he would have made a feint of endeavouring to seize you, which would have been an affront to your understanding, and would instantly have sidled off in the direction of the plump sister. She often cried out that it wasn’t fair; and it really was not. But when at last, he caught her; when, in spite of all her silken rustlings, and her rapid flutterings past him, he got her into a corner whence there was no escape; then his conduct was the most execrable. For his pretending not to know her; his pretending that it was necessary to touch her head-dress, and further to assure himself of her identity by pressing a certain ring upon her finger, and a certain chain about her neck; was vile, monstrous. No doubt she told him her opinion of it, when, another blind-man being in office, they were so very confidential together, behind the curtains.

Scrooge’s niece was not one of the blind-man’s buff party, but was made comfortable with a large chair and a footstool, in a snug corner, where the Ghost and Scrooge were close behind her. But she joined in the forfeits, and loved her love to admiration with all the letters of the alphabet. Likewise at the game of How, When, and Where, she was very great, and to the secret joy of Scrooge’s nephew, beat her sisters hollow: though they were sharp girls too, as could have told you. There might have been twenty people there, young and old, but they all played, and so did Scrooge, for, wholly forgetting the interest he had in what was going on, that his voice made no sound in their ears, he sometimes came out with his guess quite loud, and very often guessed quite right, too; for the sharpest needle, best Whitechapel, warranted not to cut in the eye, was not sharper than Scrooge; blunt as he took it in his head to be.

The Ghost was greatly pleased to find him in this mood, and looked upon him with such favour, that he begged like a boy to be allowed to stay until the guests departed. But this the Spirit said could not be done.

‘Here is a new game,’ said Scrooge. ‘One half hour, Spirit, only one.’

It was a Game called Yes and No, where Scrooge’s nephew had to think of something, and the rest must find out what; he only answering to their questions yes or no, as the case was. The brisk fire of questioning to which he was exposed, elicited from him that he was thinking of an animal, a live animal, rather a disagreeable animal, a savage animal, an animal that growled and grunted sometimes, and talked sometimes, and lived in London, and walked about the streets, and wasn’t made a show of, and wasn’t led by anybody, and didn’t live in a menagerie, and was never killed in a market, and was not a horse, or an ass, or a cow, or a bull, or a tiger, or a dog, or a pig, or a cat, or a bear. At every fresh question that was put to him, this nephew burst into a fresh roar of laughter; and was so inexpressibly tickled, that he was obliged to get up off the sofa and stamp. At last the plump sister, falling into a similar state, cried out:

‘I have found it out. I know what it is, Fred. I know what it is.’

‘What is it.’ cried Fred.

‘It’s your Uncle Scrooge.’

Which it certainly was. Admiration was the universal sentiment, though some objected that the reply to ‘Is it a bear.’ ought to have been ‘Yes;’ inasmuch as an answer in the negative was sufficient to have diverted their thoughts from Mr Scrooge, supposing they had ever had any tendency that way.

‘He has given us plenty of merriment, I am sure,’ said Fred,’ and it would be ungrateful not to drink his health. Here is a glass of mulled wine ready to our hand at the moment; and I say, ‘Uncle Scrooge.‘‘

‘Well. Uncle Scrooge.’ they cried.

‘A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to the old man, whatever he is.’ said Scrooge’s nephew. ‘He wouldn’t take it from me, but may he have it, nevertheless. Uncle Scrooge.’

Uncle Scrooge had imperceptibly become so gay and light of heart, that he would have pledged the unconscious company in return, and thanked them in an inaudible speech, if the Ghost had given him time. But the whole scene passed off in the breath of the last word spoken by his nephew; and he and the Spirit were again upon their travels.

Much they saw, and far they went, and many homes they visited, but always with a happy end. The Spirit stood beside sick beds, and they were cheerful; on foreign lands, and they were close at home; by struggling men, and they were patient in their greater hope; by poverty, and it was rich. In almshouse, hospital, and jail, in misery’s every refuge, where vain man in his little brief authority had not made fast the door and barred the Spirit out, he left his blessing, and taught Scrooge his precepts.

It was a long night, if it were only a night; but Scrooge had his doubts of this, because the Christmas Holidays appeared to be condensed into the space of time they passed together. It was strange, too, that while Scrooge remained unaltered in his outward form, the Ghost grew older, clearly older. Scrooge had observed this change, but never spoke of it, until they left a children’s Twelfth Night party, when, looking at the Spirit as they stood together in an open place, he noticed that its hair was grey.

‘Are spirits’ lives so short.’ asked Scrooge.

‘My life upon this globe, is very brief,’ replied the Ghost. ‘It ends to-night.’

‘To-night.’ cried Scrooge.

‘To-night at midnight. Hark. The time is drawing near.’

The chimes were ringing the three quarters past eleven at that moment.

‘Forgive me if I am not justified in what I ask,’ said Scrooge, looking intently at the Spirit’s robe,’ but I see something strange, and not belonging to yourself, protruding from your skirts. Is it a foot or a claw.’

‘It might be a claw, for the flesh there is upon it,’ was the Spirit’s sorrowful reply. ‘Look here.’

From the foldings of its robe, it brought two children; wretched, abject, frightful, hideous, miserable. They knelt down at its feet, and clung upon the outside of its garment.

‘Oh, Man. look here. Look, look, down here.’ exclaimed the Ghost.

They were a boy and a girl. Yellow, meagre, ragged, scowling, wolfish; but prostrate, too, in their humility. Where graceful youth should have filled their features out, and touched them with its freshest tints, a stale and shrivelled hand, like that of age, had pinched, and twisted them, and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat enthroned, devils lurked, and glared out menacing. No change, no degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade, through all the mysteries of wonderful creation, has monsters half so horrible and dread.

Scrooge started back, appalled. Having them shown to him in this way, he tried to say they were fine children, but the words choked themselves, rather than be parties to a lie of such enormous magnitude.

‘Spirit. are they yours.’ Scrooge could say no more.

‘They are Man’s,’ said the Spirit, looking down upon them. ‘And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it.’ cried the Spirit,

stretching out its hand towards the city. ‘Slander those who tell it ye. Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse. And abide the end.’

‘Have they no refuge or resource.’ cried Scrooge.

‘Are there no prisons.’ said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. ‘Are there no workhouses.’ The bell struck twelve.

Scrooge looked about him for the Ghost, and saw it not. As the last stroke ceased to vibrate, he remembered the prediction of old Jacob Marley, and lifting up his eyes, beheld a solemn Phantom, draped and hooded, coming, like a mist along the ground, towards him.

Stave 4: The Last of the Spirits

The Phantom slowly, gravely, silently approached. When it came, Scrooge bent down upon his knee; for in the very air through which this Spirit moved it seemed to scatter gloom and mystery.

It was shrouded in a deep black garment, which concealed its head, its face, its form, and left nothing of it visible save one outstretched hand. But for this it would have been difficult to detach its figure from the night, and separate it from the darkness by which it was surrounded.

He felt that it was tall and stately when it came beside him, and that its mysterious presence filled him with a solemn dread. He knew no more, for the Spirit neither spoke nor moved.

‘I am in the presence of the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come.’ said Scrooge.

The Spirit answered not, but pointed onward with its hand.

‘You are about to show me shadows of the things that have not happened, but will happen in the time before us,’ Scrooge pursued. ‘Is that so, Spirit.’

The upper portion of the garment was contracted for an instant in its folds, as if the Spirit had inclined its head. That was the only answer he received.

Although well used to ghostly company by this time, Scrooge feared the silent shape so much that his legs trembled beneath him, and he found that he could hardly stand when he prepared to follow it. The Spirit pauses a moment, as observing his condition, and giving him time to recover.

But Scrooge was all the worse for this. It thrilled him with a vague uncertain horror, to know that behind the dusky shroud, there were ghostly eyes intently fixed upon him, while he, though he stretched his own to the utmost, could see nothing but a spectral hand and one great heap of black.

‘Ghost of the Future.’ he exclaimed,’ I fear you more than any spectre I have seen. But as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope to live to be another man from what I was, I am prepared to bear you company, and do it with a thankful heart. Will you not speak to me.’

It gave him no reply. The hand was pointed straight before them.

‘Lead on.’ said Scrooge. ‘Lead on. The night is waning fast, and it is precious time to me, I know. Lead on, Spirit.’

The Phantom moved away as it had come towards him. Scrooge followed in the shadow of its dress, which bore him up, he thought, and carried him along.

They scarcely seemed to enter the city; for the city rather seemed to spring up about them, and encompass them of its own act. But there they were, in the heart of it; on Change, amongst the merchants; who hurried up and down, and chinked the money in their pockets, and conversed in groups, and looked at their watches, and trifled thoughtfully with their great gold seals; and so forth, as Scrooge had seen them often.

The Spirit stopped beside one little knot of business men. Observing that the hand was pointed to them, Scrooge advanced to listen to their talk.

‘No,’ said a great fat man with a monstrous chin,’ I don’t know much about it, either way. I only know he’s dead.’

‘When did he die.’ inquired another.

‘Last night, I believe.’

‘Why, what was the matter with him.’ asked a third, taking a vast quantity of snuff out of a very large snuff- box. ‘I thought he’d never die.’

‘God knows,’ said the first, with a yawn.

‘What has he done with his money.’ asked a red-faced gentleman with a pendulous excrescence on the end of his nose, that shook like the gills of a turkey-cock.

‘I haven’t heard,’ said the man with the large chin, yawning again. ‘Left it to his company, perhaps. He hasn’t left it to me. That’s all I know.’

This pleasantry was received with a general laugh.

‘It’s likely to be a very cheap funeral,’ said the same speaker;’ for upon my life I don’t know of anybody to go to it. Suppose we make up a party and volunteer.’

‘I don’t mind going if a lunch is provided,’ observed the gentleman with the excrescence on his nose. ‘But I must be fed, if I make one.’

Another laugh.

‘Well, I am the most disinterested among you, after all,’ said the first speaker,’ for I never wear black gloves, and I never eat lunch. But I’ll offer to go, if anybody else will. When I come to think of it, I’m not at all sure that I wasn’t his most particular friend; for we used to stop and speak whenever we met. Bye, bye.’

Speakers and listeners strolled away, and mixed with other groups. Scrooge knew the men, and looked towards the Spirit for an explanation.

The Phantom glided on into a street. Its finger pointed to two persons meeting. Scrooge listened again, thinking that the explanation might lie here.

He knew these men, also, perfectly. They were men of aye business: very wealthy, and of great importance. He had made a point always of standing well in their esteem: in a business point of view, that is; strictly in a business point of view.

‘How are you.’ said one.

‘How are you.’ returned the other.

‘Well.’ said the first. ‘Old Scratch has got his own at last, hey.’

‘So I am told,’ returned the second. ‘Cold, isn’t it.’

‘Seasonable for Christmas time. You’re not a skater, I suppose.’

‘No. No. Something else to think of. Good morning.’

Not another word. That was their meeting, their conversation, and their parting.

Scrooge was at first inclined to be surprised that the Spirit should attach importance to conversations apparently so trivial; but feeling assured that they must have some hidden purpose, he set himself to consider what it was likely to be. They could scarcely be supposed to have any bearing on the death of Jacob, his old partner, for that was Past, and this Ghost’s province was the Future. Nor could he think of any one immediately connected with himself, to whom he could apply them. But nothing doubting that to whomsoever they applied they had some latent moral for his own improvement, he resolved to treasure up every word he heard, and everything he saw; and especially to observe the shadow of himself when it appeared. For he had an expectation that the conduct of his future self would give him the clue he missed, and would render the solution of these riddles easy.

He looked about in that very place for his own image; but another man stood in his accustomed corner, and though the clock pointed to his usual time of day for being there, he saw no likeness of himself among the multitudes that poured in through the Porch. It gave him little surprise, however; for he had been revolving in his mind a change of life, and thought and hoped he saw his new-born resolutions carried out in this.

Quiet and dark, beside him stood the Phantom, with its outstretched hand. When he roused himself from his thoughtful quest, he fancied from the turn of the hand, and its situation in reference to himself, that the Unseen Eyes were looking at him keenly. It made him shudder, and feel very cold.

They left the busy scene, and went into an obscure part of the town, where Scrooge had never penetrated before, although he recognised its situation, and its bad repute. The ways were foul and narrow; the shops and houses wretched; the people half-naked, drunken, slipshod, ugly. Alleys and archways, like so many cesspools, disgorged their offences of smell, and dirt, and life, upon the straggling streets; and the whole quarter reeked with crime, with filth, and misery.

Far in this den of infamous resort, there was a low- browed, beetling shop, below a pent-house roof, where iron, old rags, bottles, bones, and greasy offal, were bought. Upon the floor within, were piled up heaps of rusty keys, nails, chains, hinges, files, scales, weights, and refuse iron of all kinds. Secrets that few would like to scrutinise were bred and hidden in mountains of unseemly rags, masses of corrupted fat, and sepulchres of bones. Sitting in among the wares he dealt in, by a charcoal stove, made of old bricks, was a grey-haired rascal, nearly seventy years of age; who had screened himself from the cold air without, by a frousy curtaining of miscellaneous tatters, hung upon a line; and smoked his pipe in all the luxury of calm retirement.

Scrooge and the Phantom came into the presence of this man, just as a woman with a heavy bundle slunk into the shop. But she had scarcely entered, when another woman, similarly laden, came in too; and she was closely followed by a man in faded black, who was no less startled by the sight of them, than they had been upon the recognition of each other. After a short period of blank astonishment, in which the old man with the pipe had joined them, they all three burst into a laugh.

‘Let the charwoman alone to be the first.’ cried she who had entered first. ‘Let the laundress alone to be the second; and let the undertaker’s man alone to be the third. Look here, old Joe, here’s a chance. If we haven’t all three met here without meaning it.’

‘You couldn’t have met in a better place,’ said old Joe, removing his pipe from his mouth. ‘Come into the parlour. You were made free of it long ago, you know; and the other two an’t strangers. Stop till I shut the door of the shop. Ah. How it skreeks. There an’t such a rusty bit of metal in the place as its own hinges, I believe; and I’m sure there’s no such old bones here, as mine. Ha, ha.

We’re all suitable to our calling, we’re well matched. Come into the parlour. Come into the parlour.’

The parlour was the space behind the screen of rags. The old man raked the fire together with an old stair-rod, and having trimmed his smoky lamp (for it was night), with the stem of his pipe, put it in his mouth again.

While he did this, the woman who had already spoken threw her bundle on the floor, and sat down in a flaunting manner on a stool; crossing her elbows on her knees, and looking with a bold defiance at the other two.

‘What odds then. What odds, Mrs Dilber.’ said the woman. ‘Every person has a right to take care of themselves. He always did.’

‘That’s true, indeed.’ said the laundress. ‘No man more so.’

‘Why then, don’t stand staring as if you was afraid, woman; who’s the wiser. We’re not going to pick holes in each other’s coats, I suppose.’

‘No, indeed.’ said Mrs Dilber and the man together. ‘We should hope not.’

‘Very well, then.’ cried the woman. ‘That’s enough. Who’s the worse for the loss of a few things like these. Not a dead man, I suppose.’

‘No, indeed,’ said Mrs Dilber, laughing.

‘If he wanted to keep them after he was dead, a wicked old screw,’ pursued the woman,’ why wasn’t he natural in his lifetime. If he had been, he’d have had somebody to look after him when he was struck with Death, instead of lying gasping out his last there, alone by himself.’

‘It’s the truest word that ever was spoke,’ said Mrs Dilber. ‘It’s a judgment on him.’

‘I wish it was a little heavier judgment,’ replied the woman;’ and it should have been, you may depend upon it, if I could have laid my hands on anything else. Open that bundle, old Joe, and let me know the value of it. Speak out plain. I’m not afraid to be the first, nor afraid for them to see it. We know pretty well that we were helping ourselves, before we met here, I believe. It’s no sin. Open the bundle, Joe.’

But the gallantry of her friends would not allow of this; and the man in faded black, mounting the breach first, produced his plunder. It was not extensive. A seal or two, a pencil-case, a pair of sleeve-buttons, and a brooch of no great value, were all. They were severally examined and appraised by old Joe, who chalked the sums he was disposed to give for each, upon the wall, and added them up into a total when he found there was nothing more to come.

‘That’s your account,’ said Joe,’ and I wouldn’t give another sixpence, if I was to be boiled for not doing it. Who’s next.’

Mrs Dilber was next. Sheets and towels, a little wearing apparel, two old-fashioned silver teaspoons, a pair of sugar-tongs, and a few boots. Her account was stated on the wall in the same manner.

‘I always give too much to ladies. It’s a weakness of mine, and that’s the way I ruin myself,’ said old Joe. ‘That’s your account. If you asked me for another penny, and made it an open question, I’d repent of being so liberal and knock off half-a-crown.’

‘And now undo my bundle, Joe,’ said the first woman.

Joe went down on his knees for the greater convenience of opening it, and having unfastened a great many knots, dragged out a large and heavy roll of some dark stuff.

‘What do you call this.’ said Joe. ‘Bed-curtains.’

‘Ah.’ returned the woman, laughing and leaning forward on her crossed arms. ‘Bed-curtains.’

‘You don’t mean to say you took them down, rings and all, with him lying there.’ said Joe.

‘Yes I do,’ replied the woman. ‘Why not.’

‘You were born to make your fortune,’ said Joe,’ and you’ll certainly do it.’

‘I certainly shan’t hold my hand, when I can get anything in it by reaching it out, for the sake of such a man as he was, I promise you, Joe,’ returned the woman coolly. ‘Don’t drop that oil upon the blankets, now.’

‘His blankets.’ asked Joe.

‘Whose else’s do you think.’ replied the woman. ‘He isn’t likely to take cold without them, I dare say.’

‘I hope he didn’t die of any thing catching. Eh.’ said old Joe, stopping in his work, and looking up.

‘Don’t you be afraid of that,’ returned the woman. ‘I an’t so fond of his company that I’d loiter about him for such things, if he did. Ah. you may look through that shirt till your eyes ache; but you won’t find a hole in it, nor a threadbare place. It’s the best he had, and a fine one too. They’d have wasted it, if it hadn’t been for me.’

‘What do you call wasting of it.’ asked old Joe.

‘Putting it on him to be buried in, to be sure,’ replied the woman with a laugh. ‘Somebody was fool enough to do it, but I took it off again. If calico an’t good enough for such a purpose, it isn’t good enough for anything. It’s quite as becoming to the body. He can’t look uglier than he did in that one.’

Scrooge listened to this dialogue in horror. As they sat grouped about their spoil, in the scanty light afforded by the old man’s lamp, he viewed them with a detestation and disgust, which could hardly have been greater, though the demons, marketing the corpse itself.

‘Ha, ha.’ laughed the same woman, when old Joe, producing a flannel bag with money in it, told out their several gains upon the ground. ‘This is the end of it, you see. He frightened every one away from him when he was alive, to profit us when he was dead. Ha, ha, ha.’

‘Spirit.’ said Scrooge, shuddering from head to foot. ‘I see, I see. The case of this unhappy man might be my own. My life tends that way, now. Merciful Heaven, what is this.’

He recoiled in terror, for the scene had changed, and now he almost touched a bed: a bare, uncurtained bed: on which, beneath a ragged sheet, there lay a something covered up, which, though it was dumb, announced itself in awful language.

The room was very dark, too dark to be observed with any accuracy, though Scrooge glanced round it in obedience to a secret impulse, anxious to know what kind of room it was. A pale light, rising in the outer air, fell straight upon the bed; and on it, plundered and bereft, unwatched, unwept, uncared for, was the body of this man.

Scrooge glanced towards the Phantom. Its steady hand was pointed to the head. The cover was so carelessly adjusted that the slightest raising of it, the motion of a finger upon Scrooge’s part, would have disclosed the face. He thought of it, felt how easy it would be to do, and longed to do it; but had no more power to withdraw the veil than to dismiss the spectre at his side.

Oh cold, cold, rigid, dreadful Death, set up thine altar here, and dress it with such terrors as thou hast at thy command: for this is thy dominion. But of the loved, revered, and honoured head, thou canst not turn one hair to thy dread purposes, or make one feature odious. It is not that the hand is heavy and will fall down when released; it is not that the heart and pulse are still; but that the hand was open, generous, and true; the heart brave, warm, and tender; and the pulse a man’s. Strike, Shadow, strike. And see his good deeds springing from the wound, to sow the world with life immortal.

No voice pronounced these words in Scrooge’s ears, and yet he heard them when he looked upon the bed. He thought, if this man could be raised up now, what would be his foremost thoughts. Avarice, hard-dealing, griping cares. They have brought him to a rich end, truly.

He lay, in the dark empty house, with not a man, a woman, or a child, to say that he was kind to me in this or that, and for the memory of one kind word I will be kind to him. A cat was tearing at the door, and there was a sound of gnawing rats beneath the hearth-stone. What they wanted in the room of death, and why they were so restless and disturbed, Scrooge did not dare to think.

‘Spirit.’ he said,’ this is a fearful place. In leaving it, I shall not leave its lesson, trust me. Let us go.’

Still the Ghost pointed with an unmoved finger to the head.

‘I understand you,’ Scrooge returned,’ and I would do it, if I could. But I have not the power, Spirit. I have not the power.’

Again it seemed to look upon him.

‘If there is any person in the town, who feels emotion caused by this man’s death,’ said Scrooge quite agonised, ‘show that person to me, Spirit, I beseech you.’

The Phantom spread its dark robe before him for a moment, like a wing; and withdrawing it, revealed a room by daylight, where a mother and her children were.

She was expecting some one, and with anxious eagerness; for she walked up and down the room; started at every sound; looked out from the window; glanced at the clock; tried, but in vain, to work with her needle; and could hardly bear the voices of the children in their play.

At length the long-expected knock was heard. She hurried to the door, and met her husband; a man whose face was careworn and depressed, though he was young. There was a remarkable expression in it now; a kind of serious delight of which he felt ashamed, and which he struggled to repress.

He sat down to the dinner that had been boarding for him by the fire; and when she asked him faintly what news (which was not until after a long silence), he appeared embarrassed how to answer.

‘Is it good.’ she said, ‘or bad?’ — to help him.

‘Bad,’ he answered.

‘We are quite ruined.’

‘No. There is hope yet, Caroline.’

‘If he relents,’ she said, amazed, ‘there is. Nothing is past hope, if such a miracle has happened.’

‘He is past relenting,’ said her husband. ‘He is dead.’

She was a mild and patient creature if her face spoke truth; but she was thankful in her soul to hear it, and she said so, with clasped hands. She prayed forgiveness the next moment, and was sorry; but the first was the emotion of her heart.

‘What the half-drunken woman whom I told you of last night, said to me, when I tried to see him and obtain a week’s delay; and what I thought was a mere excuse to avoid me; turns out to have been quite true. He was not only very ill, but dying, then.’

‘To whom will our debt be transferred.’

‘I don’t know. But before that time we shall be ready with the money; and even though we were not, it would be a bad fortune indeed to find so merciless a creditor in his successor. We may sleep to-night with light hearts, Caroline.’

Yes. Soften it as they would, their hearts were lighter. The children’s faces, hushed and clustered round to hear what they so little understood, were brighter; and it was a happier house for this man’s death. The only emotion that the Ghost could show him, caused by the event, was one of pleasure.

‘Let me see some tenderness connected with a death,’ said Scrooge;’ or that dark chamber, Spirit, which we left just now, will be for ever present to me.’

The Ghost conducted him through several streets familiar to his feet; and as they went along, Scrooge looked here and there to find himself, but nowhere was he to be seen. They entered poor Bob Cratchit’s house; the dwelling he had visited before; and found the mother and the children seated round the fire.

Quiet. Very quiet. The noisy little Cratchits were as still as statues in one corner, and sat looking up at Peter, who had a book before him. The mother and her daughters were engaged in sewing. But surely they were very quiet.

‘And he took a child, and set him in the midst of them.’

Where had Scrooge heard those words. He had not dreamed them. The boy must have read them out, as he and the Spirit crossed the threshold. Why did he not go on.

The mother laid her work upon the table, and put her hand up to her face.

‘The colour hurts my eyes,’ she said.

The colour. Ah, poor Tiny Tim.

‘They’re better now again,’ said Cratchit’s wife. ‘It makes them weak by candle-light; and I wouldn’t show weak eyes to your father when he comes home, for the world. It must be near his time.’

‘Past it rather,’ Peter answered, shutting up his book. ‘But I think he has walked a little slower than he used, these few last evenings, mother.’

They were very quiet again. At last she said, and in a steady, cheerful voice, that only faltered once:

‘I have known him walk with — I have known him walk with Tiny Tim upon his shoulder, very fast indeed.’

‘And so have I,’ cried Peter. ‘Often.’

‘And so have I,’ exclaimed another. So had all.

‘But he was very light to carry,’ she resumed, intent upon her work,’ and his father loved him so, that it was no trouble: no trouble. And there is your father at the door.’

She hurried out to meet him; and little Bob in his comforter — he had need of it, poor fellow — came in. His tea was ready for him on the hob, and they all tried who should help him to it most. Then the two young Cratchits got upon his knees and laid, each child a little cheek, against his face, as if they said,’ Don’t mind it, father. Don’t be grieved.’

Bob was very cheerful with them, and spoke pleasantly to all the family. He looked at the work upon the table, and praised the industry and speed of Mrs Cratchit and the girls. They would be done long before Sunday, he said.

‘Sunday. You went to-day, then, Robert.’ said his wife.

‘Yes, my dear,’ returned Bob. ‘I wish you could have gone. It would have done you good to see how green a place it is. But you’ll see it often. I promised him that I would walk there on a Sunday. My little, little child.’ cried Bob. ‘My little child.’

He broke down all at once. He couldn’t help it. If he could have helped it, he and his child would have been farther apart perhaps than they were.

He left the room, and went up-stairs into the room above, which was lighted cheerfully, and hung with Christmas. There was a chair set close beside the child, and there were signs of some one having been there, lately. Poor Bob sat down in it, and when he had thought a little and composed himself, he kissed the little face. He was reconciled to what had happened, and went down again quite happy.

They drew about the fire, and talked; the girls and mother working still. Bob told them of the extraordinary kindness of Mr Scrooge’s nephew, whom he had scarcely seen but once, and who, meeting him in the street that day, and seeing that he looked a little -’ just a little down you know,’ said Bob, inquired what had happened to distress him. ‘On which,’ said Bob,’ for he is the pleasantest-spoken gentleman you ever heard, I told him. ‘I am heartily sorry for it, Mr Cratchit,’ he said,’ and heartily sorry for your good wife.’ By the bye, how he ever knew that, I don’t know.’

‘Knew what, my dear.’

‘Why, that you were a good wife,’ replied Bob.

‘Everybody knows that.’ said Peter.

‘Very well observed, my boy.’ cried Bob. ‘I hope they do. ‘Heartily sorry,’ he said,’ for your good wife. If I can be of service to you in any way,’ he said, giving me his card,’ that’s where I live. Pray come to me.’ Now, it wasn’t,’ cried Bob,’ for the sake of anything he might be able to do for us, so much as for his kind way, that this was quite delightful. It really seemed as if he had known our Tiny Tim, and felt with us.’

‘I’m sure he’s a good soul.’ said Mrs Cratchit.

‘You would be surer of it, my dear,’ returned Bob,’ if you saw and spoke to him. I shouldn’t be at all surprised - mark what I say. — if he got Peter a better situation.’

‘Only hear that, Peter,’ said Mrs Cratchit.

‘And then,’ cried one of the girls,’ Peter will be keeping company with some one, and setting up for himself.’

‘Get along with you.’ retorted Peter, grinning.

‘It’s just as likely as not,’ said Bob,’ one of these days; though there’s plenty of time for that, my dear. But however and when ever we part from one another, I am sure we shall none of us forget poor Tiny Tim — shall we — or this first parting that there was among us.’

‘Never, father.’ cried they all.

‘And I know,’ said Bob,’ I know, my dears, that when we recollect how patient and how mild he was; although he was a little, little child; we shall not quarrel easily among ourselves, and forget poor Tiny Tim in doing it.’

‘No, never, father.’ they all cried again.

‘I am very happy,’ said little Bob,’ I am very happy.’

Mrs Cratchit kissed him, his daughters kissed him, the two young Cratchits kissed him, and Peter and himself shook hands. Spirit of Tiny Tim, thy childish essence was from God.

‘Spectre,’ said Scrooge,’ something informs me that our parting moment is at hand. I know it, but I know not how. Tell me what man that was whom we saw lying dead.’

The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come conveyed him, as before — though at a different time, he thought: indeed, there seemed no order in these latter visions, save that they were in the Future — into the resorts of business men, but showed him not himself. Indeed, the Spirit did not stay for anything, but went straight on, as to the end just now desired, until besought by Scrooge to tarry for a moment.

‘This courts,’ said Scrooge,’ through which we hurry now, is where my place of occupation is, and has been for a length of time. I see the house. Let me behold what I shall be, in days to come.’

The Spirit stopped; the hand was pointed elsewhere.

‘The house is yonder,’ Scrooge exclaimed. ‘Why do you point away.’

The inexorable finger underwent no change.

Scrooge hastened to the window of his office, and looked in. It was an office still, but not his. The furniture was not the same, and the figure in the chair was not himself. The Phantom pointed as before.

He joined it once again, and wondering why and whither he had gone, accompanied it until they reached an iron gate. He paused to look round before entering.

A churchyard. Here, then, the wretched man whose name he had now to learn, lay underneath the ground. It was a worthy place. Walled in by houses; overrun by grass and weeds, the growth of vegetation’s death, not life; choked up with too much burying; fat with repleted appetite. A worthy place.

The Spirit stood among the graves, and pointed down to One. He advanced towards it trembling. The Phantom was exactly as it had been, but he dreaded that he saw new meaning in its solemn shape.

‘Before I draw nearer to that stone to which you point,’ said Scrooge, ‘answer me one question. Are these the shadows of the things that Will be, or are they shadows of things that May be, only.’

Still the Ghost pointed downward to the grave by which it stood.

‘Men’s courses will foreshadow certain ends, to which, if persevered in, they must lead,’ said Scrooge. ‘But if the courses be departed from, the ends will change. Say it is thus with what you show me.’

The Spirit was immovable as ever.

Scrooge crept towards it, trembling as he went; and following the finger, read upon the stone of the neglected grave his own name, Ebenezer Scrooge.

‘Am I that man who lay upon the bed.’ he cried, upon his knees.

The finger pointed from the grave to him, and back again.

‘No, Spirit. Oh no, no.’

The finger still was there.

‘Spirit.’ he cried, tight clutching at its robe,’ hear me. I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been but for this intercourse. Why show me this, if I am past all hope.’

For the first time the hand appeared to shake.

‘Good Spirit,’ he pursued, as down upon the ground he fell before it:’ Your nature intercedes for me, and pities me. Assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life.’

The kind hand trembled.

‘I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone.’

In his agony, he caught the spectral hand. It sought to free itself, but he was strong in his entreaty, and detained it. The Spirit, stronger yet, repulsed him.

Holding up his hands in a last prayer to have his fate aye reversed, he saw an alteration in the Phantom’s hood and dress. It shrunk, collapsed, and dwindled down into a bedpost.

Stave 5: The End of It

Yes! and the bedpost was his own. The bed was his own, the room was his own. Best and happiest of all, the Time before him was his own, to make amends in!

‘I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future.’ Scrooge repeated, as he scrambled out of bed. ‘The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. Oh Jacob Marley. Heaven, and the Christmas Time be praised for this. I say it on my knees, old Jacob, on my knees.’

He was so fluttered and so glowing with his good intentions, that his broken voice would scarcely answer to his call. He had been sobbing violently in his conflict with the Spirit, and his face was wet with tears.

‘They are not torn down.’ cried Scrooge, folding one of his bed-curtains in his arms,’ they are not torn down, rings and all. They are here — I am here — the shadows of the things that would have been, may be dispelled. They will be. I know they will.’

His hands were busy with his garments all this time; turning them inside out, putting them on upside down, tearing them, mislaying them, making them parties to every kind of extravagance.

‘I don’t know what to do.’ cried Scrooge, laughing and crying in the same breath; and making a perfect Laocoon of himself with his stockings. ‘I am as light as a feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as merry as a schoolboy. I am as giddy as a drunken man. A merry Christmas to everybody. A happy New Year to all the world. Hallo here. Whoop. Hallo.’

He had frisked into the sitting-room, and was now standing there: perfectly winded.

‘There’s the saucepan that the gruel was in.’ cried Scrooge, starting off again, and going round the fireplace. ‘There’s the door, by which the Ghost of Jacob Marley entered. There’s the corner where the Ghost of Christmas Present, sat. There’s the window where I saw the wandering Spirits. It’s all right, it’s all true, it all happened. Ha ha ha.’

Really, for a man who had been out of practice for so many years, it was a splendid laugh, a most illustrious laugh. The father of a long, long line of brilliant laughs.

‘I don’t know what day of the month it is.’ said Scrooge. ‘I don’t know how long I’ve been among the Spirits. I don’t know anything. I’m quite a baby. Never mind. I don’t care. I’d rather be a baby. Hallo. Whoop. Hallo here.’

He was checked in his transports by the churches ringing out the lustiest peals he had ever heard. Clash, clang, hammer; ding, dong, bell. Bell, dong, ding; hammer, clang, clash. Oh, glorious, glorious.

Running to the window, he opened it, and put out his head. No fog, no mist; clear, bright, jovial, stirring, cold; cold, piping for the blood to dance to; Golden sunlight; Heavenly sky; sweet fresh air; merry bells. Oh, glorious. Glorious.

‘What’s to-day.’ cried Scrooge, calling downward to a boy in Sunday clothes, who perhaps had loitered in to look about him.

‘Eh.’ returned the boy, with all his might of wonder.

‘What’s to-day, my fine fellow.’ said Scrooge.

‘To-day.’ replied the boy. ‘Why, Christmas Day.’

‘It’s Christmas Day.’ said Scrooge to himself. ‘I haven’t missed it. The Spirits have done it all in one night. They can do anything they like. Of course they can. Of course they can. Hallo, my fine fellow.’

‘Hallo.’ returned the boy.

‘Do you know the Poulterer’s, in the next street but one, at the corner.’ Scrooge inquired.

‘I should hope I did,’ replied the lad.

‘An intelligent boy.’ said Scrooge. ‘A remarkable boy. Do you know whether they’ve sold the prize Turkey that was hanging up there — Not the little prize Turkey: the big one.’

‘What, the one as big as me.’ returned the boy.

‘What a delightful boy.’ said Scrooge. ‘It’s a pleasure to talk to him. Yes, my buck.’

‘It’s hanging there now,’ replied the boy.

‘Is it.’ said Scrooge. ‘Go and buy it.’

‘Walk-er.’ exclaimed the boy.

‘No, no,’ said Scrooge, ‘I am in earnest. Go and buy it, and tell them to bring it here, that I may give them the direction where to take it. Come back with the man, and I’ll give you a shilling. Come back with him in less than five minutes and I’ll give you half-a-crown.’

The boy was off like a shot. He must have had a steady hand at a trigger who could have got a shot off half so fast.

‘I’ll send it to Bon Cratchit’s.’ whispered Scrooge, rubbing his hands, and splitting with a laugh. ‘He shan’t know who sends it. It’s twice the size of Tiny Tim. Joe Miller never made such a joke as sending it to Bob’s will be.’

The hand in which he wrote the address was not a steady one, but write it he did, somehow, and went down-stairs to open the street door, ready for the coming of the poulterer’s man. As he stood there, waiting his arrival, the knocker caught his eye.

‘I shall love it, as long as I live.’ cried Scrooge, patting it with his hand. ‘I scarcely ever looked at it before. What an honest expression it has in its face. It’s a wonderful knocker. — Here’s the Turkey. Hallo. Whoop. How are you. Merry Christmas.’

It was a Turkey. He never could have stood upon his legs, that bird. He would have snapped them short off in a minute, like sticks of sealing-wax.

‘Why, it’s impossible to carry that to Camden Town,’ said Scrooge. ‘You must have a cab.’

The chuckle with which he said this, and the chuckle with which he paid for the Turkey, and the chuckle with which he paid for the cab, and the chuckle with which he recompensed the boy, were only to be exceeded by the chuckle with which he sat down breathless in his chair again, and chuckled till he cried.

Shaving was not an easy task, for his hand continued to shake very much; and shaving requires attention, even when you don’t dance while you are at it. But if he had cut the end of his nose off, he would have put a piece of sticking-plaster over it, and been quite satisfied.

He dressed himself all in his best, and at last got out into the streets. The people were by this time pouring forth, as he had seen them with the Ghost of Christmas Present; and walking with his hands behind him, Scrooge regarded every one with a delighted smile. He looked so irresistibly pleasant, in a word, that three or four good- humoured fellows said,’ Good morning, sir. A merry Christmas to you.’ And Scrooge said often afterwards, that of all the blithe sounds he had ever heard, those were the blithest in his ears.

He had not gone far, when coming on towards him he beheld the portly gentleman, who had walked into his counting-house the day before, and said,’ Scrooge and Marley’s, I believe.’ It sent a pang across his heart to think how this old gentleman would look upon him when they met; but he knew what path lay straight before him, and he took it.

‘My dear sir,’ said Scrooge, quickening his pace, and taking the old gentleman by both his hands. ‘How do you do. I hope you succeeded yesterday. It was very kind of you. A merry Christmas to you, sir.’

‘Mr Scrooge.’

‘Yes,’ said Scrooge. ‘That is my name, and I fear it may not be pleasant to you. Allow me to ask your pardon. And will you have the goodness’ — here Scrooge whispered in his ear.

‘Lord bless me.’ cried the gentleman, as if his breath were taken away. ‘My dear Mr Scrooge, are you serious.’

‘If you please,’ said Scrooge. ‘Not a farthing less. A great many back-payments are included in it, I assure you. Will you do me that favour.’

‘My dear sir,’ said the other, shaking hands with him. ‘I don’t know what to say to such munificence.’

‘Don’t say anything please,’ retorted Scrooge. ‘Come and see me. Will you come and see me.’

‘I will.’ cried the old gentleman. And it was clear he meant to do it.

‘Thank you,’ said Scrooge. ‘I am much obliged to you. I thank you fifty times. Bless you.’

He went to church, and walked about the streets, and watched the people hurrying to and fro, and patted children on the head, and questioned beggars, and looked down into the kitchens of houses, and up to the windows, and found that everything could yield him pleasure. He had never dreamed that any walk — that anything — could give him so much happiness. In the afternoon he turned his steps towards his nephew’s house.

He passed the door a dozen times, before he had the courage to go up and knock. But he made a dash, and did it:

‘Is your master at home, my dear.’ said Scrooge to the girl. Nice girl. Very.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Where is he, my love.’ said Scrooge.

‘He’s in the dining-room, sir, along with mistress. I’ll show you up-stairs, if you please.’

‘Thank you. He knows me,’ said Scrooge, with his hand already on the dining-room lock. ‘I’ll go in here, my dear.’

He turned it gently, and sidled his face in, round the door. They were looking at the table (which was spread out in great array); for these young housekeepers are always nervous on such points, and like to see that everything is right.

‘Fred.’ said Scrooge.

Dear heart alive, how his niece by marriage started. Scrooge had forgotten, for the moment, about her sitting in the corner with the footstool, or he wouldn’t have done it, on any account.

‘Why bless my soul.’ cried Fred,’ who’s that.’

‘It’s I. Your uncle Scrooge. I have come to dinner. Will you let me in, Fred.’

Let him in. It is a mercy he didn’t shake his arm off. He was at home in five minutes. Nothing could be heartier. His niece looked just the same. So did Topper when he came. So did the plump sister when she came. So did every one when they came. Wonderful party, wonderful games, wonderful unanimity, wonderful happiness.

But he was early at the office next morning. Oh, he was early there. If he could only be there first, and catch Bob Cratchit coming late. That was the thing he had set his heart upon.

And he did it; yes, he did. The clock struck nine. No Bob. A quarter past. No Bob. He was full eighteen minutes and a half behind his time. Scrooge sat with his door wide open, that he might see him come into the Tank.

His hat was off, before he opened the door; his comforter too. He was on his stool in a jiffy; driving away with his pen, as if he were trying to overtake nine o’clock.

‘Hallo.’ growled Scrooge, in his accustomed voice, as near as he could feign it. ‘What do you mean by coming here at this time of day.’

‘I am very sorry, sir,’ said Bob. ‘I am behind my time.’

‘You are.’ repeated Scrooge. ‘Yes. I think you are. Step this way, sir, if you please.’

‘It’s only once a year, sir,’ pleaded Bob, appearing from the Tank. ‘It shall not be repeated. I was making rather merry yesterday, sir.’

‘Now, I’ll tell you what, my friend,’ said Scrooge,’ I am not going to stand this sort of thing any longer. And therefore,’ he continued, leaping from his stool, and giving Bob such a dig in the waistcoat that he staggered back into the Tank again;’ and therefore I am about to raise your salary.’

Bob trembled, and got a little nearer to the ruler. He had a momentary idea of knocking Scrooge down with it, holding him, and calling to the people in the court for help and a strait-waistcoat.

‘A merry Christmas, Bob,’ said Scrooge, with an earnestness that could not be mistaken, as he clapped him on the back. ‘A merrier Christmas, Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year. I’ll raise your salary, and endeavour to assist your struggling family, and we will discuss your affairs this very afternoon, over a Christmas bowl of smoking bishop, Bob. Make up the fires, and buy another coal-scuttle before you dot another i, Bob Cratchit.’

Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for him.

He had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the Total Abstinence Principle, ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!

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STORY MRS. PETER RABBIT BY: THORNTON BURGESS

2019-03-09T18:35:00.005-08:00

STORY MRS. PETER RABBIT

BY: THORNTON BURGESS

CATEGORY: CHILDREN -- STORIES

CHAPTER I

PETER RABBIT LOSES HIS APPETITE

Good appetite, you'll always find,

Depends upon your state of mind.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit had lost his appetite. Now when Peter Rabbit loses his appetite, something is very wrong indeed with him. Peter has boasted that he can eat any time and all the time. In fact, the two things that Peter thinks most about are his stomach and satisfying his curiosity, and nearly all of the scrapes that Peter has gotten into have been because of those two things. So when Peter loses his appetite or his curiosity, there is surely something the matter with him.

Ever since Old Man Coyote had come to live on the Green Meadows, Peter had been afraid to go very far from the dear Old Briar-patch where he makes his home, and where he always feels safe. Now there wasn't any reason why he should go far from the dear Old Briar-patch. There was plenty to eat in it and all around it, for sweet clover grew almost up to the very edge of it, and you know Peter is very fond of sweet clover. So there was plenty for Peter to eat without running any risk of danger.

With nothing to do but eat and sleep, Peter should have grown fat and contented. But he didn't.

Now that is just the way with a lot of people. The more they have and the less they have to worry about, the more discontented they become, and at last they are positively unhappy. There was little Danny Meadow Mouse, living out on the Green Meadows; he was happy all the livelong day, and yet he had no safe castle like the dear Old Briar-patch where he could always be safe. Every minute of every day Danny had to keep his eyes wide open and his wits working their very quickest, for any minute he was likely to be in danger. Old Man Coyote or Reddy Fox or Granny Fox or Digger the Badger or Mr. Blacksnake was likely to come creeping through the grass any time, and they are always hungry for a fat Meadow Mouse. And as if that weren't worry enough, Danny had to watch the sky, too, for Old Whitetail the Marsh Hawk, or his cousin Redtail, or Blacky the Crow, each of whom would be glad of a Meadow Mouse dinner. Yet in spite of all this, Danny was happy and never once lost his appetite.

But Peter Rabbit, with nothing to worry him so long as he stayed in the Old Briar-patch, couldn't eat and grew more and more unhappy.

"I don't know what's the matter with me. I really don't know what's the matter with me," said Peter, as he turned up his nose at a patch of sweet, tender young clover. "I think I'll go and cut some new paths through the Old Briar-patch."

Now, though he didn't know it, that was the very best thing he could do. It gave him something to think about. For two or three days he was very busy cutting new paths, and his appetite came back. But when he had made all the paths he wanted, and there was nothing else to do, he lost his appetite again. He just sat still all day long and moped and thought and thought and thought. The trouble with Peter Rabbit's thinking was that it was all about himself and how unhappy he was. Of course, the more he thought about this, the more unhappy he grew.

"If I only had some one to talk to, I'd feel better," said he to

himself. That reminded him of Johnny Chuck and what good times they used to have together when Johnny lived on the Green Meadows. Then he thought of how happy Johnny seemed with his little family in his new home in the Old Orchard, in spite of all the worries his family made him. And right then Peter found out what was the matter with him.

"I believe I'm just lonesome," said Peter. "Yes, Sir, that's what's the matter with me.

"It isn't good to be alone,

I've often heard my mother say.

It makes one selfish, grouchy, cross,

And quite unhappy all the day.

One needs to think of other folks,

And not of just one's self alone,

To find the truest happiness,

And joy and real content to own.

"Now that I've found out what is the trouble with me, the question is, what am I going to do about it?"

CHAPTER II

PETER RABBIT PLANS A JOURNEY

It's a long jump that makes no landing.

Peter Rabbit.

"The trouble with me is that I'm lonesome," repeated Peter Rabbit as he sat in the dear Old Briar-patch. "Yes, Sir, that's the only thing that's wrong with me. I'm just tired of myself, and that's why I've lost my appetite. And now I know what's the matter, what am I going to do about it? If I were sure, absolutely sure, that Old Man Coyote meant what he said about our being friends, I'd start out this very minute to call on all my old friends. My, my, my, it seems an age since I visited the Smiling Pool and saw Grandfather Frog and Jerry Muskrat and Billy Mink and Little Joe Otter! Mr. Coyote sounded as if he really meant to leave me alone, but, but--well, perhaps he did mean it when he saw me sitting here safe among the brambles, but if I should meet him out in the open, he might change his mind and--oh, dear, his teeth are terrible long and sharp!"

Peter sat a little longer, thinking and thinking. Then a bright idea popped into his head. He kicked up his heels.

"I'll do it," said he. "I'll make a journey! That's what I'll do! I'll

make a journey and see the Great World.

"By staying here and sitting still

I'm sure I'll simply grow quite ill.

A change of scene is what I need

To be from all my trouble freed."

Of course if Peter had really stopped to think the matter over

thoroughly he would have known that running away from one kind of trouble is almost sure to lead to other troubles. But Peter is one of

those who does his thinking afterward. Peter is what is called

impulsive. That is, he does things and then thinks about them later, and often wishes he hadn't done them. So now the minute the idea of making a journey popped into his head, he made up his mind that he would do it, and that was all there was to it. You see, Peter never looks ahead. If he could get rid of the trouble that bothered him now, which, you know, was nothing but lonesomeness, he wouldn't worry about the troubles he might get into later.

Now the minute Peter made up his mind to make a journey, he began to feel better. His lost appetite returned, and the first thing he did was to eat a good meal of sweet clover.

"Let me see," said he, as he filled his big stomach, "I believe I'll

visit the Old Pasture. It's a long way off and I've never been there, but I've heard Sammy Jay say that it's a very wonderful place, and I don't believe it is any more dangerous than the Green Meadows and the Green Forest, now that Old Man Coyote and Reddy and Granny Fox are all living here. I'll start tonight when I am sure that Old Man Coyote is nowhere around, and I won't tell a soul where I am going."

So Peter settled himself and tried to sleep the long day away, but his mind was so full of the long journey he was going to make that he couldn't sleep much, and when he did have a nap, he dreamed of wonderful sights and adventures out in the Great World.

At last he saw jolly, round, red Mr. Sun drop down to his bed behind the Purple Hills. Old Mother West Wind came hurrying back from her day's work and gathered her children, the Merry Little Breezes, into her big bag, and then she, too, started for her home behind the Purple Hills. A little star came out and winked at Peter, and then way over on the edge of the Green Forest he heard Old Man Coyote laugh. Peter grinned. That was what he had been waiting for, since it meant that Old Man Coyote was so far away that there was nothing to fear from him.

Peter hopped out from the dear, safe Old Briar-patch, looked this way and that way, and then, with his heart in his mouth, started towards the Old Pasture as fast as he could go, lipperty--lipperty--lip.

CHAPTER III

HOOTY THE OWL CHANGES HIS HUNTING GROUNDS

A full stomach makes a pleasant Day;

An empty stomach turns the whole world gray.

Peter Rabbit.

Hooty the owl sat on the tip-top of a tall dead tree in the Green Forest while the Black Shadows crept swiftly among the trees. He was talking to himself. It wouldn't have done for him to have spoken aloud what he was saying to himself, for then the little people in feathers and fur on

whom he likes to make his dinner would have heard him and known just where he was. So he said it to himself, and sat so still that he looked for all the world like a part of the tree on which he was sitting. What he was saying was this:

"Towhit, towhoo! Towhit, towhoo!

Will some one tell me what to do?

My children have an appetite

That keeps me hunting all the night,

And though their stomachs I may stuff

They never seem to have enough.

Towhit, towhoo! Towhit, towhoo!

Will some one tell me what to do?"

When it was dark enough he gave his fierce hunting call--"Whooo-hoo- hoo, whoo-hoo!"

Now that is a terrible sound in the dark woods, very terrible indeed to the little forest people, because it sounds so fierce and hungry. It makes them jump and shiver, and that is just what Hooty wants them to do, for in doing it one of them is likely to make just the least

scratching with his claws, or to rustle a leaf. If he does, Hooty, whose ears are very, very wonderful, is almost sure to hear, and with his great yellow eyes see him, and then--Hooty has his dinner.

The very night when Peter Rabbit started on his journey to the Old Pasture, Hooty the Owl had made up his mind that something had got to be done to get more food for those hungry babies of his up in the big hemlock-tree in the darkest corner of the Green Forest. Hunting was very poor, very poor indeed, and Hooty was at his wits' end to know what he should do. He had hooted and hooted in vain in the Green Forest, and he had sailed back and forth over the Green Meadows like a great black shadow without seeing so much as a single Mouse.

"It's all because of Old Man Coyote and Granny and Reddy Fox," said Hooty angrily. "They've spoiled the hunting. Yes, Sir, that's just what they have done! If I expect to feed those hungry babies of mine, I must find new hunting grounds. I believe I'll go up to the Old Pasture.

Perhaps I'll have better luck up there."

So Hooty the Owl spread his broad wings and started for the Old Pasture

just a little while after Peter Rabbit had started for the same place.

Of course he didn't know that Peter was on his way there, and of course Peter didn't know that Hooty even thought of the Old Pasture. If he had, perhaps he would have thought twice before starting. Anyway, he would have kept a sharper watch on the sky. But as it was his thoughts were all of Old Man Coyote and Granny Fox, and that is where Peter made a very grave mistake, a very grave mistake indeed, as he was soon to find out.

CHAPTEE IV

THE SHADOW WITH SHARP CLAWS

Now what's the use, pray tell me this,

When all is said and done;

A thousand things and one to learn

And then forget the one?

For when that one alone you need,

And nothing else will do,

What good are all the thousand then?

I do not see; do you?

Peter Rabbit.

Forgetting leads to more trouble than almost anything under the sun. Peter Rabbit knew this. Of course he knew it. Peter had had many a narrow escape just from forgetting something. He knew just as well as you know that he might just as well not learn a thing as to learn it and then forget it. But Peter is such a happy-go-lucky little fellow that he is very apt to forget, and forgetting leads him into all kinds of

difficulties, just as it does most folks.

Now Peter had learned when he was a very little fellow that when he went out at night, he must watch out quite as sharply for Hooty the Owl as for either Granny or Reddy Fox, and usually he did. But the night he started to make a journey to the Old Pasture, his mind was so full of Old Man Coyote and Granny and Reddy Fox that he wholly forgot Hooty the Owl. So, as he scampered across the Green Meadows, lipperty--lipperty-- lip, as fast as he could go, with his long ears and his big eyes and his wobbly nose all watching out for danger on the ground, not once did he think that there might be danger from the sky above him.

It was a moonlight night, and Peter was sharp enough to keep in the shadows whenever he could. He would scamper as fast as he knew how from one shadow to another and then sit down in the blackest part of each shadow to get his breath, and to look and listen and so make sure that no one was following him. The nearer he got to the Old Pasture, the

safer he felt from Old Man Coyote and Granny and Reddy Fox. When he scampered across the patches of moonshine his heart didn't come up in his mouth the way it had at first. He grew bolder and bolder. Once or twice he stopped for a mouthful of sweet clover. He was tired, for he had come a long way, but he was almost to the Old Pasture now, and it looked very dark and safe, for it was covered with bushes and brambles.

"Plenty of hiding places there," thought Peter. "It really looks as safe as the dear Old Briar-patch. No one will ever think to look for me way off here."

Just then he spied a patch of sweet clover out in the moonlight. His mouth began to water. "I'll just fill my stomach before I go into the Old Pasture, for there may not be any clover there," said Peter.

"You'd better be careful, Peter Rabbit," said a wee warning voice inside him.

"Pooh!" said Peter. "There's nothing to be afraid of way up here!"

A shadow drifted across the sweet clover patch. Peter saw it. "That must be made by a cloud crossing the moon," said Peter, and he was so sure of it that he didn't even look up to see, but boldly hopped out to fill his stomach. Just as he reached the patch of clover, the shadow drifted over it again. Then all in a flash a terrible thought entered Peter's head.

He didn't stop to look up. He suddenly sprang sideways, and even as he did so, sharp claws tore his coat and hurt him dreadfully. He twisted and dodged and jumped and turned this way and that way, and all the time the shadow followed him. Once again sharp claws tore his coat and made him squeal with pain.

[Illustration: HE DODGED AND JUMPED, AND ALL THE TIME THE SHADOW FOLLOWED HIM.]

At last, when his breath was almost gone, he reached the edge of the Old Pasture and dived under a friendly old bramble-bush.

"Oh," sobbed Peter, "I forgot all about Hooty the Owl! Besides, I didn't suppose he ever came way up here."

CHAPTER V

IN THE OLD PASTURE

Brambles never scratch those who understand and are considerate of them.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit sat under a friendly bramble-bush on the edge of the Old Pasture and panted for breath, while his heart went pit-a-pat, pit-a- pat, as if it would thump its way right through his sides. Peter had had a terrible fright. There were long tears in his coat, and he smarted and ached dreadfully where the cruel claws of Hooty the Owl had torn him. And there he was in a strange place, not knowing which way to turn, for you know he never had visited the Old Pasture before.

But Peter had had so many narrow escapes in his life that he had learned not to worry over dangers that are past. Peter is what wise men call a phi-los-o-pher. That is a big word, but its meaning is very simple. A philosopher is one who believes that it is foolish to think about things that have happened, except to learn some lesson from them, and that the best thing to do is to make the most of the present. Peter had learned his lesson. He was sure of that.

"I never, never will forget again to watch out for Hooty the Owl," said he to himself, as he nursed his wounds, "and so perhaps it is a good thing that he so nearly caught me this time. If he hadn't, I might have forgotten all about him some time when he could catch me. I certainly wouldn't have watched out for him way up here, for I didn't think he ever came up to the Old Pasture. But now I know he does, Mr. Hooty'll have to be smarter than he's ever been before to catch me napping again. My, how I do smart and ache! I know now just how Danny Meadow Mouse felt that time Hooty caught him and dropped him into the Old Briar-patch. Ouch! Well, as my mother used to say:

'Yesterday has gone away;

Make the most of just to-day.'

Here I am up in the Old Pasture, and the question is, what shall I do next?"

Peter felt a queer little thrill as he peeped out from under the

friendly bramble-bush. Very strange and wonderful it seemed. Of course he couldn't see very far, because the Old Pasture was all overgrown with bushes and briars, and they made the very blackest of black shadows in the moonlight. Peter wondered what dangers might be awaiting him there, but somehow he didn't feel much afraid. No, Sir, he didn't feel much afraid. You see those briars looked good to him, for briars are always friendly to Peter and unfriendly to those who would do harm to Peter. So when he saw them, he felt almost at home.

Peter drew a long breath. Then he cried "Ouch!" You see, he had forgotten for a minute how sore he was. He was eager to explore this new wonderland, for Sammy Jay had told him wonderful tales about it, and he knew that here old Granny Fox and Reddy Fox had found safety when Farmer Brown's boy had hunted for them so hard on the Green Meadows and in the Green Forest. He felt sure that there must be the most splendid hiding- places, and it seemed as if he certainly must start right out to see them, for you know Peter is very, very curious. But the first move he made brought another "Ouch" from him, and he made up a wry face.

"I guess the best thing for me to do is to stay right where I am," said he, "for here I am safe under this friendly old bramble."

So with a sigh Peter settled down to make himself as comfortable as he could, and once, as far, far away on the Green Meadows he heard the voice of Old Man Coyote, Peter even smiled.

"I haven't anything to fear from him, anyway, for he'll never think of coming way up here," said he.

CHAPTER VI

PETER RABBIT IS STILL LONESOME

A sympathetic word or two

A wond'rous help is, when you're blue.

So pity him who sits alone

His aches and troubles to bemoan.

Peter Rabbit.

All the rest of that night Peter sat under a friendly old bramble-bush on the edge of the Old Pasture and nursed the sore places made by the claws of Hooty the Owl. At last jolly, round, red Mr. Sun began to climb up in the blue, blue sky, just as he does every day. Peter looked up at him, and he felt sure that Mr. Sun winked at him. Somehow it made him feel better. The fact is, Peter was beginning to feel just a wee, wee bit homesick. It is bad enough to be in a strange place alone, but to be sore and to smart and ache as Peter did makes that lonesome feeling a whole lot harder to bear. It is dreadful not to have any one to speak to, but to look around and not see a single thing you have ever seen before,--my, my, my, it certainly does give you a strange, sinking feeling way down inside!

Before that long night was over Peter felt as if his heart had gone way down to his very toes. Yes, Sir, that's the way he felt. Every time he moved at all he cried "Ouch!" He just knew that he was growing more stiff and sore every minute. Then he began to wonder what he should do for something to eat, for he was in a strange place, you remember. And that made him think of all his private little paths through the dear Old Briar-patch, the little paths he had made all himself, and which no one used but himself, excepting Danny Meadow Mouse when he came for a visit.

"Perhaps I shall never, never see them again," moaned Peter, and two big tears filled his eyes and were just ready to drop.

At that moment he looked up and saw jolly, round, red Mr. Sun wink. Peter tried to wink back, and that made the two tears fall. But there were no more tears to follow. You see that wink had made all the difference in the world, Peter's heart had jumped right back where it belonged. Mr. Sun was one of his oldest friends and you know

When trouble comes, a friendly face

Makes bright the very darkest place.

And so, just as he made bright all the Old Pasture, Mr. Sun also made bright the dark little corners in Peter's heart just because he was an old friend. To be sure Peter was still lonesome, but it was a different kind of lonesomeness. He hadn't anybody to talk to, which is always a dreadful thing to Peter, but he had only to look up to catch a friendly wink, and somehow that not only made him feel better inside but it seemed to make his aches and smarts better too.

CHAPTER VII

PETER FINDS TRACKS

Every day is different from every other day,

And always there is something new to see along the way.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit had sat still just as long as he could. He was stiff and lame and sore from the wounds made by Hooty the Owl, but his curiosity wouldn't let him sit still a minute longer. He just HAD to explore the Old Pasture. So with many a wry face and many an "Ouch" he limped out from the shelter of the friendly old bramble-bush and started out to see what the Old Pasture was like.

Now Hooty the Owl had taught Peter wisdom. With his torn clothes and his aches and smarts he couldn't very well forget to be careful. First he made sure that there was no danger near, and this time he took pains to look all around in the sky as well as on the ground. Then he limped out to the very patch of sweet clover where Hooty had so nearly caught him the night before.

"A good breakfast," said Peter, "will make a new Rabbit of me." You know Peter thinks a great deal of his stomach. So he began to eat as fast as he could, stopping every other mouthful to look and listen. "I know it's a bad habit to eat fast," said he, "but it's a whole lot worse to have an empty stomach." So he ate and ate and ate as fast as he could make his little jaws go, which is very fast indeed.

When Peter's stomach was stuffed full he gave a great sigh of relief and limped back to the friendly old bramble-bush to rest. But he couldn't sit still long, for he just had to find out all about the Old Pasture.

So pretty soon he started out to explore. Such a wonderful place as it seemed to Peter! There were clumps of bushes with little open spaces between, just the nicest kind of playgrounds. Then there were funny spreading, prickly juniper-trees, which made the very safest places to crawl out of harm's way and to hide. Everywhere were paths made by cows. Very wonderful they seemed to Peter, who had never seen any like them before. He liked to follow them because they led to all kinds of queer places.

Sometimes he would come to places where tall trees made him think of the Green Forest, only there were never more than a few trees together. Once he found an old tumble-down stone wall all covered with vines, and he shouted right out with delight.

"It's a regular castle!" cried Peter, and he knew that there he would be safe from every one but Shadow the Weasel. But he never was wholly safe from Shadow the Weasel anywhere, so he didn't let that thought worry him. By and by he came to a wet place called a swamp. The ground was soft, and there were little pools of water. Great ferns grew here just as they did along the bank of the Laughing Brook, only more of them. There were pretty birch-trees and wild cherry-trees. It was still and dark and oh, so peaceful! Peter liked that place and sat down under a big fern to rest. He didn't hear a sound excepting the beautiful silvery voice of Veery the Thrush. Listening to it, Peter fell asleep, for he was very tired.

By and by Peter awoke. For a minute he couldn't think where he was. Then he remembered. But for a long time he sat perfectly still, thinking of his adventures and wondering if he would be missed down on the Green Meadows. Then all of a sudden Peter saw something that made him sit up so suddenly that he cried "Ouch!" for he had forgotten all about how stiff and sore he was.

What do you think Peter saw? Tracks! Yes, Sir, he saw tracks, Rabbit tracks in the soft mud, and Peter knew that he hadn't made them!

CHAPTER VIII

THE STRANGE TRACKS IN THE OLD PASTURE

Who has attentive ear and eye

Will learn a lot if he but try.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit stared and stared at the tracks in the soft mud of the swamp in the Old Pasture. He would look first at the tracks, then at his own feet, and finally back at the tracks again. He scratched his long right ear with his long right hind foot. Then he scratched his long left ear with his long left hind foot, all the time staring his hardest at those strange tracks. They certainly were the tracks of a Rabbit, and it was equally certain that they were not his own.

"They are too big for mine, and they are too small for Jumper the Hare's. Besides, Jumper is in the Green Forest and not way off up here," said Peter to himself. "I wonder--well, I wonder if he will try to drive me away."

You see Peter knew that if he had found a strange Rabbit in his dear Old Briar-patch he certainly would have tried his best to drive him out, for he felt that the Old Briar-patch belonged to him. Now he wondered if the maker of these tracks would feel the same way about the Old Pasture. Peter looked troubled as he thought it over. Then his face cleared.

"Perhaps," said he hopefully, "he is a new comer here, too, and if he is, I'll have just as much right here as he has. Perhaps he simply has big feet and isn't any bigger or stronger than I am, and if that's the case I'd like to see him drive me out!"

Peter swelled himself out and tried to look as big as he could when he said this, but swelling himself out this way reminded him of how stiff and sore he was from the wounds given him by Hooty the Owl, and he made a wry face. You see he realized all of a sudden that he didn't feel much like fighting.

"My," said Peter, "I guess I'd better find out all about this other fellow before I have any trouble with him. The Old Pasture looks big enough for a lot of Rabbits, and perhaps if I don't bother him, he won't bother me. I wonder what he looks like. I believe I'll follow these tracks and see what I can find."

So Peter began to follow the tracks of the strange Rabbit, and he was so interested that he almost forgot to limp. They led him this way and they led him that way through the swamp and then out of it. At the foot of a certain birch-tree Peter stopped.

"Ha!" said he, "now I shall know just how big this fellow is."

How was he to know? Why, that tree was a kind of Rabbit measuring- stick. Yes, Sir, that is just what it was. You see, Rabbits like to keep a record of how they grow, just as some little boys and girls do, but as they have no doors or walls to stand against, they use trees. And this was the measuring-tree of the Rabbit whose tracks Peter had been following. Peter stopped at the foot of it and sat down to think it over. He knew what that tree meant perfectly well. He had one or two measuring-trees of his own on the edge of the Green Forest. He knew, too, that it was more than a mere measuring-tree. It was a kind of "no trespassing" sign. It meant that some other Rabbit had lived here for some time and felt that he owned this part of the Old Pasture. Peter's nose told him that, for the tree smelled very, very strong of Rabbit--of the Rabbit with the big feet. This was because whoever used it for a measuring-tree used to rub himself against it as far up as he could reach.

Peter hopped up close to it. Then he sat up very straight and stretched himself as tall as he could, but he wisely took care not to rub against the tree. You see, he didn't want to leave his own mark there. So he stretched and stretched, but stretch as he would, he couldn't make his wobbly little nose reach the mark made by the other Rabbit.

"My sakes, he is a big fellow!" exclaimed Peter. "I guess I don't want to meet him until I feel better and stronger than I do now."

CHAPTER IX

AN UNPLEASANT SURPRISE

Legs are very useful when you want to run away;

Long, sharp teeth are splendid if to fight you want to stay;

But a far, far greater blessing, whether one may stay or quit,

Is a clever, trusty, quick and ever ready wit.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit sat in a snug hiding-place in the Old Pasture and thought over what he had found out about the strange Rabbit whose tracks he had followed. They had led him to a rubbing or measuring-tree, where the strange Rabbit had placed his mark, and that mark was so high up on the tree that Peter knew the strange Rabbit must be a great deal bigger than himself.

"If he's bigger, of course he is stronger," thought Peter, "and if he is both bigger and stronger, of course it won't be the least bit of use for me to fight him. Then, anyway, I'm too stiff and sore to fight. And then, he has no business to think he owns the Old Pasture, because he doesn't. I have just as much right here as he has. Yes, Sir, I have just as much right in this Old Pasture as he has, and if he thinks he can drive me out he is going to find that he was never more mistaken in his life! I'll show him! Yes, Sir-e-e, I'll show him! I guess my wits are as sharp as his, and I wouldn't wonder if they are a little bit sharper."

Foolish Peter Rabbit! There he was boasting and bragging to himself of what he would do to some one whom he hadn't even seen, all because he had found a sign that told him the Old Pasture, in which he had made up his mind to make his new home, was already the home of some one else. Peter was like a lot of other people; he wasn't fair. No, Sir, he wasn't fair. He let his own desires destroy his sense of fair play. It was all right for him to put up signs in the dear Old Briar-patch and the Green Forest, warning other Rabbits that they must keep away, but it was all wrong for another Rabbit to do the same thing in the Old Pasture. Oh, my, yes! That was quite a different matter! The very thought of it made Peter very, very angry. When he thought of this other Rabbit, it was always as the stranger. That shows just how unfair Peter was, because, you see, Peter himself was really the stranger. It was his first visit to the Old Pasture, while it was very plain that the other had lived there for some time.

But Peter couldn't or wouldn't see that. He had counted so much on having the Old Pasture to himself and doing as he pleased, that he was too upset and disappointed to be fair. If the other Rabbit had been smaller than he--well, that might have made a difference. The truth is, Peter was just a wee bit afraid. And perhaps it was that wee bit of fear that made him unfair and unjust. Anyway, the longer he sat and thought about it, the angrier he grew, and the more he bragged and boasted to himself about what he would do.

"I'll just keep out of sight until my wounds are healed, and then we'll see who owns the Old Pasture!" thought Peter.

No sooner had this thought popped into his head than he received a surprise, such an unpleasant surprise! It was three heavy thumps right behind him. Peter knew what that meant. Of course he knew. It meant that he must run or fight. It meant that he had been so busy thinking about how smart he was going to be that he had forgotten to cover his own tracks, and so the maker of the big tracks he had followed had found him out.

Thump! Thump! Thump! There it was again. Peter knew by the sound that it was of no use to stay and fight, especially when he was so sore and stiff. There was nothing to do but run away. He simply had to. And that is just what he did do, while his eyes were filled with tears of rage and bitterness.

CHAPTER X

PETER RABBIT ALMOST DECIDES TO RETURN HOME

I have no doubt that you've been told

How timid folks are sometimes bold.

Peter Rabbit.

In all his life Peter Rabbit had never been so disappointed. Here he was in the Old Pasture, about which he had dreamed and thought so long, and in reaching which he had had such a narrow escape from Hooty the Owl, and yet he was unhappy. The fact is, Peter was more unhappy than he could remember ever to have been before. Not only was he unhappy, but he was in great fear, and the worst of it was he was in fear of an enemy who could go wherever he could go himself.

You see, it was this way: Peter had expected to find some enemies in the Old Pasture. He had felt quite sure that fierce old Mr. Goshawk was to be watched for, and perhaps Mr. Redtail and one or two others of the Hawk family. He knew that Granny and Reddy Fox had lived there once upon a time and might come back if things got too unpleasant for them on the Green Meadows, now that Old Man Coyote had made his home there. But Peter didn't worry about any of these dangers. He was used to them, was Peter. He had been dodging them ever since he could remember, A friendly bramble-bush, a little patch of briars, or an old stone wall near was all that Peter needed to feel perfectly safe from these enemies, But now he was in danger wherever he went, for he had an enemy who could go everywhere he could, and it seemed to Peter that this enemy was following him all the time. Who was it? Why, it was a great big old Rabbit with a very short temper, who, because he had lived there for a long time, felt that he owned the Old Pasture and that Peter had no right there.

Now, In spite of all his trouble, Peter had seen enough of the Old Pasture to think it a very wonderful place, a very wonderful place indeed. He had seen just enough to want to see more. You know how very curious Peter is. It seemed to him that he just couldn't go back to the dear Old Briar-patch on the Green Meadows until he had seen everything to be seen in the Old Pasture. So he couldn't make up his mind to go back home, but stayed and stayed, hoping each day that the old gray Rabbit would get tired of hunting for him, and would let him alone.

But the old gray Rabbit didn't do anything of the kind. He seemed to take the greatest delight in waiting until Peter thought that he had found a corner of the Old Pasture where he would be safe, and then in stealing there when Peter was trying to take a nap, and driving him out. Twice Peter had tried to fight, but the old gray Rabbit was too big for him. He knocked all the wind out of poor Peter with a kick from his big hind legs, and then with his sharp teeth he tore Peter's coat.

Poor Peter! His coat had already been badly torn by the cruel claws of Hooty the Owl, and Old Mother Nature hadn't had time to mend it when he fought with the old gray Rabbit. After the second time Peter didn't try to fight again. He just tried to keep out of the way. And he did, too. But in doing it he lost so much sleep and he had so little to eat that he grew thin and thin and thinner, until, with his torn clothes, he looked like a scarecrow.

And still he hated to give in

When there was still so much to see.

"Persistence, I was taught, will win,

And so I will persist," said he.

And he did persist day after day, until at last he felt that he really must give it up. He had stretched out wearily on a tiny sunning-bank in the farthest corner of the Old Pasture, and had just about made up his mind that he would go back that very night to the dear Old Briar-patch on the Green Meadows, when a tiny rustle behind him made him jump to his feet with his heart in his mouth. But instead of the angry face of the old gray Rabbit he saw--what do you think? Why, two of the softest, gentlest eyes peeping at him from behind a big fern.

CHAPTER XI

PETER RABBIT HAS A SUDDEN CHANGE OF MIND

Whatever you decide to do

Make up your mind to see it through.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit stared at the two soft, gentle eyes peeping at him from behind the big fern just back of the sunning-bank in the far corner of the Old Pasture. He had so fully expected to see the angry face of the big, gray, old Rabbit who had made life so miserable for him that for a minute he couldn't believe that he really saw what he did see. And so he just stared and stared. It was very rude. Of course it was. It was very rude indeed. It is always rude to stare at any one. So it was no wonder that after a minute the two soft, gentle eyes disappeared behind one of the great green leaves of the fern. Peter gave a great sigh. Then he remembered how rude he had been to stare so.

"I--I beg your pardon," said Peter in his politest manner, which is very polite indeed, for Peter can be very polite when he wants to be. "I beg your pardon. I didn't mean to frighten you. Please forgive me."

With the greatest eagerness Peter waited for a reply. You know it was because he had been so lonesome that he had left his home in the dear Old Briar-patch on the Green Meadows. And since he had been in the Old Pasture he had been almost as lonesome, for he had had no one to talk to. So now he waited eagerly for a reply. You see, he felt sure that the owner of such soft, gentle eyes must have a soft, gentle voice and a soft, gentle heart, and there was nothing in the world that Peter needed just then so much as sympathy. But though he waited and waited, there wasn't a sound from the big fern.

"Perhaps you don't know who I am. I'm Peter Rabbit, and I've come up here from the Green Meadows, and I'd like very much to be your friend," continued Peter after a while. Still there was no sound. Peter peeped from the corner of one eye at the place where he had seen the two soft, gentle eyes, but there was nothing to be seen but the gently waving leaf of the big fern. Peter didn't know just what to do. He wanted to hop over to the big fern and peep behind it, but he didn't dare to. He was afraid that whoever was hiding there would run away.

"I'm very lonesome; won't you speak to me?" said Peter, in his gentlest voice, and he sighed a deep, doleful sort of sigh. Still there was no reply. Peter had just about made up his mind that he would go over to the big fern when he saw those two soft, gentle eyes peeping from under a different leaf. It seemed to Peter that never in all his life had he seen such beautiful eyes. They looked so shy and bashful that Peter held his breath for fear that he would frighten them away.

After a time the eyes disappeared. Then Peter saw a little movement among the ferns, and he knew that whoever was there was stealing away.

He wanted to follow, but something down inside him warned him that It was best to sit still. So Peter sat just where he was and kept perfectly still for the longest time.

But the eyes didn't appear again, and at last he felt sure that whoever they belonged to had really gone away. Then he sighed another great sigh, for suddenly he felt more lonesome than ever. He hopped over to the big fern and looked behind it. There in the soft earth was a footprint, the footprint of a Rabbit, and it was SMALLER than his own. It seemed to Peter that it was the most wonderful little footprint he ever had seen.

"I believe," said Peter right out loud, "that I'll change my mind. I won't go back to the dear Old Briar-patch just yet, after all."

CHAPTER XII

PETER LEARNS SOMETHING FEOM TOMMY TIT

When you find a friend in trouble

Pass along a word of cheer.

Often it is very helpful

Just to feel a friend is near.

Peter Rabbit.

"Hello, Peter Rabbit! What are you doing way up here, and what are you looking so mournful about?"

Peter gave a great start of pleased surprise. That was the first

friendly voice he had heard for days and days.

"Hello yourself, Tommy Tit!" shouted Peter joyously. "My, my, my, but I am glad to see you! But what are you doing up here in the Old Pasture yourself?"

Tommy Tit the Chickadee hung head down from the tip of a slender branch of a maple-tree and winked a saucy bright eye at Peter. "I've got a secret up here," he said.

Now there is nothing in the world Peter Rabbit loves more than a secret. But he cannot keep one to save him. No, Sir, Peter Rabbit can no more keep a secret than he can fly. He means to. His intentions are the very best in the world, but-- Alas! alack! poor Peter's tongue Is very, very loosely hung. And so, because he MUST talk and WILL talk every chance he gets, he cannot keep a secret. People who talk too much never can.

"What is your secret?" asked Peter eagerly.

Tommy Tit looked down at Peter, and his sharp little eyes twinkled. "It's a nest with six of the dearest little babies in the world in it,"

he replied.

"Oh, how lovely!" cried Peter. "Where is it, Tommy Tit?"

"In a hollow birch-stub," replied Tommy, his eyes twinkling more than ever.

"But where is the hollow birch-stub?" persisted Peter.

Tommy laughed. "That's my real secret," said he, "and if I should tell you it wouldn't be a secret at all. Now tell me what you are doing up here in the Old Pasture, Peter Rabbit."

Peter saw that it was of no use to tease Tommy Tit for his secret, so instead he poured out all his own troubles. He told how lonesome he had been in the dear Old Briar-patch on the Green Meadows because he didn't dare to go about for fear of Old Man Coyote, and how at last he had decided to visit the Old Pasture. He told how Hooty the Owl had nearly caught him on his way, and then how, ever since his arrival, he had been hunted by the big, gray, old Rabbit so that he could neither eat nor sleep and had become so miserable that at last he had made up his mind to go back to the dear Old Briar-patch.

"Ho!" interrupted Tommy Tit, "I know him. He's Old Jed Thumper, the oldest, biggest, crossest Rabbit anywhere around. He's lived in the Old Pasture so long that he thinks he owns it. It's a wonder that he hasn't killed you."

"I guess perhaps he would have only I can run faster than he can," replied Peter, looking a little shamefaced because he had to own up that he ran away instead of fighting.

Tommy Tit laughed. "That's the very wisest thing you could have done," said he. "But why don't you go back to the dear Old Briar-patch in the Green Meadows?"

Peter hesitated and looked a wee bit foolish. Finally he told Tommy Tit all about the two soft, gentle eyes he had seen peeping at him from behind a big fern, and how he wanted to know who the eyes belonged to.

"If that's all you want to know, I can tell you," said Tommy Tit, jumping out into the air to catch a foolish little bug who tried to fly past. "Those eyes belong to little Miss Fuzzy-tail, and she's the favorite daughter of Old Jed Thumper. You take my advice, Peter Rabbit, and trot along home to the Old Briar-patch before you get into any more trouble. There's my wife calling. Yes, my dear, I'm coming! Chickadee- dee-dee!"

And with a wink and a nod to Peter Rabbit, off flew Tommy Tit.

CHAPTER XIII

LITTLE MISS FUZZYTAIL

Foolish questions waste time, but wise questions lead to knowledge.

Peter Rabbit.

"Little Miss Fuzzytail!" Peter said it over and over again, as he sat on the sunning-bank in the far corner of the Old Pasture, where Tommy Tit the Chickadee had left him.

"It's a pretty name," said Peter. "Yes, Sir, it's a pretty name. It's the prettiest name I've ever heard. I wonder if she is just as pretty. I--I--think she must be. Yes, I am quite sure she must be." Peter was thinking of the soft, gentle eyes he had seen peeping at him from behind the big fern, and of the dainty little footprint he had found there afterward. So he sat on the sunning-bank, dreaming pleasant dreams and wondering if he could find little Miss Fuzzytail if he should go look for her.

Now all the time, although Peter didn't know it, little Miss Fuzzytail was very close by. She was right back in her old hiding-place behind the big fern, shyly peeping out at him from under a great leaf, where she was sure he wouldn't see her. She saw the long tears in Peter's coat, made by the cruel claws of Hooty the Owl, and she saw the places where her father, Old Jed Thumper, had pulled the hair out with his teeth. She saw how thin and miserable Peter looked, and tears of pity filled the soft, gentle eyes of little Miss Fuzzytail, for, you see, she had a very tender heart.

"He's got a very nice face," thought Miss Fuzzytail, "and he certainly was very polite, and I do love good manners. And Peter is such a nice sounding name! It sounds so honest and good and true. Poor fellow! Poor Peter Rabbit!" Here little Miss Fuzzytail wiped her eyes. "He looks so miserable I do wish I could do something for him. I--I--oh, dear, I do believe he is coming right over here! I guess I better be going. How he limps!"

Once more the tears filled her soft, gentle eyes as she stole away, making not the least little sound. When she was sure she was far enough away to hurry without attracting Peter's attention, she began to run.

"I saw him talking to my old friend Tommy Tit the Chickadee, and I just know that Tommy will tell me all about him," she thought, as she scampered along certain private little paths of her own.

Just as she expected, she found Tommy Tit and his anxious little wife, Phoebe, very busy hunting for food for six hungry little babies snugly hidden in a hollow near the top of the old birch-stub. Tommy was too busy to talk then, so little Miss Fuzzytail sat down under a friendly bramble-bush to rest and wait, and while she waited, she carefully washed her face and brushed her coat until it fairly shone. You see, not in all the Old Pasture, or the Green Forest, was there so slim and trim and neat and dainty a Rabbit as little Miss Fuzzytail, and she was very, very particular about her appearance.

By and by, Tommy Tit stopped to rest. He looked down at Miss Fuzzytail and winked a saucy black eye. Miss Fuzzytail winked back. Then both laughed, for they were very good friends, indeed.

"Tell me, Tommy Tit, all about Peter Rabbit," commanded little Miss Fuzzytail. And Tommy did.

CHAPTER XIV

SOME ONE FOOLS OLD JED THUMPER

You cannot judge a person's temper by his size. There is more meanness in the head of a Weasel than in the whole of a Bear.

Peter Rabbit.

Old Jed Thumper sat in his bull-briar castle in the middle of the Old Pasture, scowling fiercely and muttering to himself. He was very angry, was Old Jed Thumper. He was so angry that presently he stopped muttering and began to chew rapidly on nothing at all but his temper, which is a way angry Rabbits have.

The more he chewed his temper, the angrier he grew. He was big and stout and strong and gray. He had lived so long in the Old Pasture that he felt that it belonged to him and that no other Rabbit had any right there unless he said so. Yet here was a strange Rabbit who had had the impudence to come up from the Green Meadows and refused to be driven away. Such impudence!

Of course it was Peter Rabbit of whom Old Jed Thumper was thinking. It was two days since he had caught a glimpse of Peter, but he knew that Peter was still in the Old Pasture, for he had found fresh tracks each day. That very morning he had visited his favorite feeding ground, only to find Peter's tracks there. It had made him so angry that he had lost his appetite, and he had gone straight back to his bull-briar castle to think it over. At last Old Jed Thumper stopped chewing on his temper. He scowled more fiercely than ever and stamped the ground impatiently.

"I'll hunt that fellow till I kill him, or drive him so far from the Old Pasture that he'll never think of coming back. I certainly will!" he said aloud, and started forth to hunt.

Now it would have been better for the plans of Old Jed Thumper if he had kept them to himself instead of speaking aloud. Two dainty little ears heard what he said, and two soft, gentle eyes watched him leave the bull-briar castle. He started straight for the far corner of the Old Pasture where, although he didn't know it, Peter Rabbit had found a warm little sunning-bank. But he hadn't gone far when, from way off in the opposite direction, he heard a sound that made him stop short and prick up his long ears to listen. There it was again--thump, thump! He was just going to thump back an angry reply, when he thought better of it.

"If do that," thought he, "I'll only warn him, and he'll run away, just as he has before."

So instead, he turned and hurried in the direction from which the thumps had come, taking the greatest care to make no noise. Every few jumps he would stop to listen. Twice more he heard those thumps, and each time new rage filled his heart, and for a minute or two he chewed his temper.

"He's down at my blueberry-patch," he muttered.

At last he reached the blueberry-patch. Very softly he crept to a place where he could see and not be seen. No one was there. No, Sir, no one was there! He waited and watched, and there wasn't a hair of Peter Rabbit to be seen. He was just getting ready to go look for Peter's tracks when he heard that thump, thump again. This time it came from his favorite clover-patch where he never allowed even his favorite daughter, little Miss Fuzzytail, to go. Anger nearly choked him as he hurried in that direction. But when he got there, just as before no one was to be seen.

So, all the morning long, Old Jed Thumper hurried from one place to another and never once caught sight of Peter Rabbit. Can you guess why? Well, the reason was that all the time Peter was stretched out on his warm sunning-bank getting the rest he so much needed. It was some one else who was fooling Old Jed Thumper.

CHAPTER XV

A PLEASANT SURPRISE FOR PETER

Sticks will break and sticks will bend,

And all things bad will have an end.

Peter Rabbit.

All morning, while someone was fooling Old Jed Thumper, the cross old Rabbit who thought he owned the Old Pasture, Peter Rabbit lay stretched out on the warm little sunning-bank, dreaming of soft, gentle eyes and beautiful little footprints. It was a dangerous place to go to sleep, because at any time fierce Mr. Goshawk might have come that way, and if he had, and had found Peter Rabbit asleep, why, that would have been the end of Peter and all the stories about him.

Peter did go to sleep. You see, the sunning-bank was so warm and comfortable, and he was so tired and had had so little sleep for such a long time that, in spite of all he could do, he nodded and nodded and finally slipped off into dreamland.

Peter slept a long time, for no one came to disturb him. It was past noon when he opened his eyes and blinked up at jolly, round, red Mr. Sun. For a minute he couldn't remember where he was. When he did, he sprang to his feet and hastily looked this way and that way.

"My gracious!" exclaimed Peter. "My gracious, what a careless fellow I am! It's a wonder that Old Jed Thumper didn't find me asleep. My, but I'm hungry! Seems as if I hadn't had a good square meal for a year."

Peter stopped suddenly and began to wrinkle his nose. "Um-m!" said he, "if I didn't know better, I should say that there is a patch of sweet clover close by. Um-m, my, my! Am I really awake, or am I still

dreaming? I certainly do smell sweet clover!"

Slowly Peter turned his head In the direction from which the delicious smell seemed to come. Then he whirled around and stared as hard as ever he could, his mouth gaping wide open in surprise. He blinked, rubbed his eyes, then blinked again. There could be no doubt of it; there on the edge of the sunning-bank was a neat little pile of tender, sweet clover. Yes, Sir, there it was!

Peter walked all around it, looking for all the world as if he couldn't believe that it was real. Finally he reached out and nibbled a leaf of it. It WAS real!

There was no doubt in Peter's mind then. Some one had put it there while Peter was asleep, and Peter knew that it was meant for him. Who could it have been?

Suddenly a thought popped into Peter's head. He stopped eating and hopped over to the big fern from behind which he had first seen the two soft, gentle eyes peeping at him the day before. There in the soft earth was a fresh footprint, and it looked very, very much like the footprint of dainty little Miss Fuzzytail!

Peter's heart gave a happy little jump. He felt sure now who had put the clover there. He looked wistfully about among the ferns, but she was nowhere to be seen. Finally he hopped back to the pile of clover and ate it, every bit, and it seemed to him that it was the sweetest, tenderest clover he had ever tasted in all his life.

CHAPTER XVI

PETER RABBIT'S LOOKING-GLASS

If people by their looks are judged,

As judged they're sure to be,

Why each should always look his best,

I'm sure you will agree.

Peter Rabbit.

For the first time in his life Peter Rabbit had begun to think about his clothes. Always he had been such a happy-go-lucky fellow that it never had entered his head to care how he looked. He laughed at Sammy Jay for thinking so much of that beautiful blue-and-white coat he wears, and he poked fun at Reddy Fox for bragging so much about his handsome suit. As for himself, Peter didn't care how he looked. If his coat was whole, or in rags and tags, it was all the same to Peter. But now Peter, sitting on the edge of his sunning-bank in the far corner of the Old Pasture, suddenly realized that he wanted to be good-looking. Yes, Sir, he wanted to be good-looking. He wished that he were bigger. He wished that he were the biggest and strongest Rabbit in the world. He wished that he had a handsome coat. And it was all because of the soft, gentle eyes of little Miss Fuzzytail that he had seen peeping out at him so often. He felt sure that it was little Miss Fuzzytail herself who had left the pile of sweet clover close by his sunning-bank the other day while he was asleep.

The fact is, Peter Rabbit was falling in love. Yes, Sir, Peter Rabbit was falling in love. All he had seen of little Miss Fuzzytail were her soft, gentle eyes, for she was very shy and had kept out of sight. But ever since he had first seen them, he had thought and dreamed of nothing else, until it seemed as if there were nothing in the world he wanted so much as to meet her. Perhaps he would have wanted this still more if he had known that it was she who had fooled her father, Old Jed Thumper, the big, gray, old Rabbit, so that Peter might have the long nap on the sunning-bank he so needed.

"I've just got to meet her. I've just got to!" said Peter to himself, and right then he began to wish that he were big and fine-looking.

"My, I must be a sight!" he thought, "I wonder how I do look, anyway. I must hunt up a looking-glass and find out."

Now when Peter Rabbit thinks of doing a thing, he wastes very little time. It was that way now. He started at once for the bit of swamp where he had first seen the tracks of Old Jed Thumper. He still limped from the wounds made by Hooty the Owl. But in spite of this he could travel pretty fast, and it didn't take him long to reach the swamp.

There, just as he expected, he found a looking-glass. What was it like? Why, it was just a tiny pool of water. Yes, Sir, it was a quiet pool of water that reflected the ferns growing around it and the branches of the trees hanging over it, and Peter Rabbit himself sitting on the edge of it. That was Peter's looking-glass.

For a long time he stared into it. At last he gave a great sigh. "My, but I am a sight!" he exclaimed.

He was. His coat was ragged and torn from the claws of Hooty the Owl and the teeth of Old Jed Thumper. The white patch on the seat of his trousers was stained and dirty from sitting down in the mud. There were burrs tangled in his waistcoat. He was thin and altogether a miserable looking Rabbit.

"It must be that Miss Fuzzytail just pities me. She certainly can't

admire me," muttered Peter, as he pulled out the burrs.

For the next hour Peter was very busy. He washed and he brushed and he combed. When, at last, he had done all that he could, he took another look in his looking-glass, and what he saw was a very different looking Rabbit.

"Though I am homely, lank and lean,

I can at least be neat and clean,"

said he, as he started back for the sunning-bank.

CHAPTER XVII

PETER MEETS MISS FUZZYTAIL

That this is true there's no denying--

There's nothing in the world like trying.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit was feeling better. Certainly he was looking better. You see, just as soon as Old Mother Nature saw that Peter was trying to look as well as he could, and was keeping himself as neat and tidy as he knew how, she was ready to help, as she always is. She did her best with the rents in his coat, made by the claws of Hooty the Owl and the teeth of Old Jed Thumper, and so it wasn't long before Peter's coat looked nearly as good as new. Then, too, Peter was getting enough to eat these days. Days and days had passed since he had seen Old Jed Thumper, and this had given him time to eat and sleep.

Peter wondered what had become of Old Jed Thumper. "Perhaps something has happened to him," thought Peter. "I--I almost hope something has." Then, being ashamed of such a wish, he added, "Something not very dreadful, but which will keep him from hunting me for a while and trying to drive me out of the Old Pasture."

Now all this time Peter had been trying to find little Miss Fuzzytail.

He was already in love with her, although all he had seen of her were her two soft, gentle eyes, shyly peeping at him from behind a big fern. He had wandered here and sauntered there, looking for her, but although he found her footprints very often, she always managed to keep out of his sight, You see, she knew the Old Pasture so much better than he did, and all the little paths in it, that she had very little trouble in

keeping out of his way. Then, too, she was very busy, for it was she who was keeping her cross father, Old Jed Thumper, away from Peter, because she was so sorry for Peter. But Peter didn't know this. If he had, I am afraid that he would have been more in love than ever.

The harder she was to find, the more Peter wanted to find her. He spent a great deal of time each day brushing his coat and making himself look as fine as he could, and while he was doing it, he kept wishing over and over again that something would happen so that he could show little Miss Fuzzytail what a smart, brave fellow he really was.

But one day followed another, and Peter seemed no nearer than ever to meeting little Miss Fuzzytail. He was thinking of this one morning and was really growing very down-hearted, as he sat under a friendly

bramble-bush, when suddenly there was a sharp little scream of fright from behind a little juniper-tree.

Somehow Peter knew whose voice that was, although he never had heard it before. He sprang around the little juniper-tree, and what he saw filled him with such rage that he didn't once stop to think of himself. There was little Miss Fuzzytail in the clutches of Black Pussy, Farmer Brown's cat, who often stole away from home to hunt in the Old Pasture. Like a flash Peter sprang over Black Pussy, and as he did so he kicked with all his might. The cat hadn't seen him coming, and the kick knocked her right into the prickly juniper-tree. Of course she lost her grip on little Miss Fuzzytail, who hadn't been hurt so much as frightened.

By the time the cat got out of the juniper-tree, Peter and Miss

Fuzzytail were sitting side by side safe in the middle of a bull-briar patch.

"Oh? how brave you are!" sobbed little Miss Fuzzytail.

And this is the way that Peter Rabbit at last got his heart's desire.

CHAPTER XVIII

TOMMY TIT PROVES A FRIEND INDEED

Nothing in all the world is so precious as a true friend.

Peter Rabbit.

After Peter Rabbit had saved little Miss Fuzzytail from Black Pussy, the cat who belonged way down at Farmer Brown's house and had no business hunting in the Old Pasture, he went with her as near to her home as she would let him. She said that it wasn't necessary that he should go a single step, but Peter insisted that she needed him to see that no more harm came to her. Miss Fuzzytail laughed at that, for she felt quite able to take care of herself. It had been just stupid carelessness on her part that had given Black Pussy the chance to catch her, she said, and she was very sure that she never would be so careless again. What she didn't tell Peter was that she had been so busy peeping at him and admiring him that she had quite forgotten to watch out for danger for herself.

Finally she said that he could go part way with her. But when they were almost within sight of the bull-briar castle of her father, Old Jed Thumper, the big, gray Rabbit who thought he owned the Old Pasture, she made Peter turn back. You see, she was afraid of what Old Jed Thumper might do to Peter, and--well, the truth is she was afraid of what he might do to her if he should find out that she had made friends with Peter.

So Peter was forced to go back, but he took with him a half promise that she would meet him the next night up near his sunning-bank in the far corner of the Old Pasture.

After that there were many pleasant days for Peter Rabbit. Sometimes little Miss Fuzzytail would meet him, and sometimes she would shyly hide from, him, but somehow, somewhere, he managed to see her every day, and so all the time in Peter's heart was a little song:

"The sky is blue; the leaves are green;

The golden sunbeams peep between;

My heart is joyful as can be,

And all the world looks bright to me."

And then one day Old Jed Thumper found out all about how his daughter, little Miss Fuzzytail, and Peter Rabbit had become such good friends. Old Jed Thumper went into a terrible rage. He chewed and chewed with nothing in his mouth, that is, nothing but his temper, the way an angry Rabbit will. He vowed and declared that if he never ate another mouthful he would drive Peter Rabbit from the Old Pasture.

My, my, my, those were bad days for Peter Rabbit! Yes, Sir, those certainly were bad days! Old Jed Thumper had found out how little Miss Fuzzytail had been fooling him by making him think Peter was in parts of the Old Pasture in quite the opposite direction from where he really was. Worse still, he found Peter's favorite sunning-bank in the far

corner of the Old Pasture and would hide near it and try to catch Peter every time Peter tried to get a few minutes' rest there. He did something worse than that.

One day he saw fierce Mr. Goshawk hunting. He let Mr. Goshawk almost catch him. and then ducked under a bramble-bush. Then he showed himself again and once more escaped in the same way. So he led fierce Mr. Goshawk to a point where Mr. Goshawk could look down and see Peter Rabbit stretched out on his sunning-bank, trying to get a little rest.

Right; away Mr. Goshawk forgot all about Old Jed Thumper and sailed up in the sky from where he could swoop down on Peter, while Old Jed Thumper, chuckling to himself wickedly, hid where he could watch what would happen.

That certainly would have been the last of Peter Rabbit if it hadn't been for Tommy Tit the Chickadee. Tommy saw Mr. Goshawk and just in time warned Peter, and so Mr. Goshawk got only his claws full of soft earth for his pains, while Old Jed Thumper once more chewed on nothing in rage and disappointment. Dear me, dear me, those certainly were dreadful days for Peter Rabbit and little Miss Fuzzytail. You see, all the time little Miss Fuzzytail was terribly worried for fear Peter would be caught.

[Illustration with caption: THAT NIGHT OLD MAN COYOTE STARTED FOR THE OLD PASTURE.]

CHAPTER XIX

OLD MAN COYOTE PAYS A DEBT

Some little seeds of goodness

You'll find in every heart,

To sprout and keep on growing

When once they get a start.

Peter Rabbit.

Matters went from bad to worse with Peter Rabbit and little Miss Fuzzytail. Peter would have made up his mind to go back to his old home in the dear Old Briar-patch on the Green Meadows, but he felt that he just couldn't leave little Miss Fuzzytail, and little Miss Fuzzytail couldn't make up her mind to go with Peter, because she felt that she just couldn't leave the Old Pasture, which always had been her home. So Peter spent his days and nights ready to jump and run from Jed Thumper, the gray old Rabbit who thought he owned the Old Pasture, and who had declared that he would drive Peter out.

Now Peter, as you know, had an old friend in the Old Pasture, Tommy Tit the Chickadee. One day Tommy took it into his head to fly down to the Green Meadows. There he found everybody wondering what had become of Peter Rabbit, for you remember Peter had stolen away from the dear Old Briar-patch in the night and had told no one where he was going.

Now one of the first to ask Tommy Tit if he had seen Peter Rabbit was Old Man Coyote. Tommy told him where Peter was and of the dreadful time Peter was having, Old Man Coyote asked a lot of questions about the Old Pasture and thanked Tommy very politely as Tommy flew over to the

Smiling Pool to call on Grandfather Frog and Jerry Muskrat.

That night, after jolly, round, red Mr. Sun had gone to bed behind the Purple Hills, and the Black Shadows had crept over the Green Meadows, Old Man Coyote started for the Old Pasture, Now, he had never been there before, but he had asked so many questions of Tommy Tit, and he is so smart anyway, that it didn't take him long to go all through the Old

Pasture and to find the bull-briar castle of Old Jed Thumper, who was making life so miserable for Peter Rabbit, He wasn't at home, but Old Man Coyote's wonderful nose soon found his tracks, and he followed them swiftly, without making a sound. Pretty soon he came to a bramble-bush, and under it he could see Old Jed Thumper. For just a minute he chuckled, a noiseless chuckle, to himself. Then he opened his mouth and out came that terrible sound which had so frightened all the little people on the Green Meadows when Old Man Coyote had first come there to live.

"Ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho!

Hee, hee, hee! Ha, ho, hee, ho!"

Old Jed Thumper never had heard anything like that before. It frightened him so that before he thought what he was doing he had jumped out from under the bramble-bush. Of course this was just what Old Man Coyote wanted. In a flash he was after him, and then began such a race as the Old Pasture never had seen before. Round and round, this way and that way, along the cow paths raced Old Jed Thumper with Old Man Coyote at his heels, until at last, out of breath, so tired that it seemed to him

he couldn't run another step, frightened almost out of his senses, Old Jed Thumper reached his bull-briar castle and was safe.

Then Old Man Coyote laughed his terrible laugh once more and trotted over to the tumble-down stone-wall in which his keen nose told him Peter Rabbit was hiding.

"One good turn deserves another, and I always pay my debts, Peter Rabbit" said he. "You did me a good turn some time ago down on the Green Meadows, when you told me how Granny and Reddy Fox were planning to make trouble for me by leading Bowser the Hound to the place where I took my daily nap, and now we are even. I don't think that old gray Rabbit will dare to poke so much as his nose out of his bull-briar castle for a week. Now I am going back to the Green Meadows, Good night, Peter Rabbit, and don't forget that I always pay my debts."

"Good night, and thank you, Mr. Coyote," said Peter, and then, when Old Man Coyote had gone, he added to himself in a shame-faced way: "I didn't believe him when he said that he guessed we would be friends."

CHAPTER XX

LITTLE MISS FUZZYTAIL WHISPERS "YES"

Love is a beautiful, wonderful thing.

There's nothing quite like it on all the

green earth.

'Tis love in the heart teaches birdies to sing,

And gives the wide world all its joy and

its mirth.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit was finding this out. Always he had been happy, for happiness had been born in him. But the happiness he had known before was nothing to the happiness that was his when he found that he loved little Miss Fuzzytail and that little Miss Fuzzytail loved him, Peter was sure that she did love him, although she wouldn't say so. But love doesn't need words, and Peter had seen it shining in the two soft, gentle eyes of little Miss Fuzzytail. So Peter was happy in spite of the trouble that Old led Thumper, the big, gray Rabbit who was the father of little Miss Fuzzytail, had made for him in the Old Pasture,

He had tried very hard, very hard indeed, to get little Miss Fuzzytail to go back with him to the dear Old Briar-patch on the Green Meadows, but in spite of all he could say she couldn't make up her mind to leave the Old Pasture, which, you know, had been her home ever since she was born. And Peter couldn't make up his mind to go back there and leave her, because--why, because he loved her so much that he felt that he could never, never be happy without her. Then, when Old Jed Thumper was hunting Peter so hard that he hardly had a chance to eat or sleep, had come Old Man Coyote the Wolf and given Old Jed Thumper such a fright that for a week he didn't dare poke so much as his nose out of his bull- briar castle.

Now, although Old Man Coyote didn't know it, his terrible voice had frightened little Miss Fuzzytail almost as much as it had Old Jed Thumper. You see, she never had heard it before, She didn't even know what it was, and all that night she had crouched in her most secret hiding-place, shivering and shaking with fright. The next morning Peter had found her there. She hadn't slept a wink, and she was still too frightened to even go look for her breakfast.

"Oh, Peter Rabbit, did you hear that terrible noise last night?" she cried.

"What noise?" asked Peter, just as if he didn't know anything about it.

"Why, that terrible voice!" cried little Miss Fuzzytail, and shivered at the thought of it.

"What was it like?" asked Peter.

"Oh, I can't tell you," said little Miss Fuzzy tall, "It wasn't like

anything I ever had heard before. It was something like the voice of Hooty the Owl and the voice of Dippy the Loon and the voice of a little yelping dog all in one, and it was just terrible!"

"Oh?" replied Peter, "you must mean the voice of my friend. Old Man Coyote. He came up here last night just to do me a good turn because I once did him a good turn."

Then he told all about how Old Man Coyote had come to the Green Meadows to live, and how he was smarter than even old Granny Fox, but he didn't tell her how he himself had once been frightened almost out of a year's growth by that terrible voice, or that it was because he hadn't really believed that Old Man Coyote was his friend that had led him to leave the Old Briar-patch and come up to the Old Pasture.

"Is--is he fond of Rabbits?" asked little Miss Fuzzytail.

Peter was quite sure that he was.

"And do you think he'll come up here hunting again?" she asked.

Peter didn't know, but he suspected that he would.

"Oh, dear," wailed little Miss Fuzzytail. "Now, I never, never will feel safe again!"

Then Peter had a happy thought. "I tell you what," said he, "the safest place in the world for you and me is my dear Old Briar-patch, Won't you go there now?"

Little Miss Fuzzytail sighed and dropped a tear or two. Then she nestled up close to Peter. "Yes," she whispered.

CHAPTER XXI

PETER AND LITTLE MISS FUZZYTAIL LEAVE THE OLD PASTURE

A danger past is a danger past,

So why not just forget it?

Watch out instead for the one ahead

Until you've safely met it,

Peter Rabbit.

As soon as little Miss Fuzzytail had agreed to go with him to make her home in the dear Old Briar-patch down on the Green Meadows, Peter Rabbit fairly boiled over with impatience to start, He had had so much trouble in the Old Pasture that he was afraid if they waited too long little

Miss Fuzzytail might change her mind, and if she should do that--well, Peter didn't know what he would do.

But Peter, who always had been so happy-go-lucky, with no one to think about but himself, now felt for the first time re-sponsi-bil-ity. That's a big word, but it is a word that everybody has to learn the meaning of sometime. Johnny Chuck learned it when he made a home for Polly Chuck in Farmer Brown's orchard, and tried to keep it a secret, so that no harm would come to Polly. It means taking care of other people or other people's things, and feeling that you must take even greater care than you would of yourself or your own things, So, while Peter himself would have been willing to take chances, and might even have made the journey down to the dear Old Briar-patch in broad daylight, he felt that that wouldn't do at all for little Miss Fuzzytail; that he must avoid every

possible chance of danger for her.

So Peter waited for a dark night, not too dark, you know, but a night when there was no moon to make great patches of light, but only the kindly little Stars looking down and twinkling in the friendly way they have. At last there was just such a night. All the afternoon little Miss Fuzzytail went about in the Old Pasture saying good-by to her friends and visiting each one of her favorite little paths and hiding-places,

and I suspect that in each one she dropped a tear or two, for you see she felt sure that she never would see them again, although Peter had promised that he would bring her back to the Old Pasture for a visit whenever she wanted to come.

At last it was time to start. Peter led the way. Very big and brave and strong and important he felt, and very timid and frightened felt little Miss Fuzzytail, hopping after him close at his heels. You see, she felt that she was going out into the Great World, of which she knew nothing at all.

"Oh, Peter," she whispered, "supposing we should meet Reddy Fox! I wouldn't know where to run or hide."

"We are not going to meet Reddy Fox," replied Peter, "but if we should, all you have to do is to just keep your eyes on the white patch on the seat of my trousers and follow me. I have fooled Reddy so many times that I'm not afraid of him."

Never in all his life had Peter been so watchful and careful. That was because he felt his re-sponsi-bil-ity. Every few jumps he would stop to sit up and look and listen. Then little Miss Fuzzytail would nestle up close to him, and Peter's heart would swell with happiness, and he would feel, oh, so proud and important. Once they heard the sharp bark of Reddy Fox, but it was a long way off, and Peter smiled, for he knew that Reddy was hunting on the edge of the Green Forest.

Once a dim shadow swept across the meadow grass ahead of them. Peter dropped flat in the grass and kept perfectly still, and little Miss Fuzzytail did just as he did, as she had promised she would.

"Wha--what was it?" she whispered.

"I think it was Hooty the Owl," Peter whispered back, "but he didn't see us." After what seemed like a long, long time they heard Hooty's fierce hunting call, but it came from way back of them on the edge of the Old Pasture. Peter hopped to his feet.

"Come on," said he. "There's nothing to fear from him now."

So slowly and watchfully Peter led the way down across the Green Meadows while the little Stars looked down and twinkled in the most friendly way, and just as jolly, round, red Mr. Sun started to kick off his

bedclothes behind the Purple Hills they reached the dear Old Briar- patch.

"Here we are!" cried Peter.

"Oh, I'm so glad!" cried little Miss Fuzzytail, hopping along one of Peter's private little paths.

CHAPTER XXII

SAMMY JAY BECOMES CURIOUS

Learn all you can about others, but keep your own affairs to yourself.

Peter Rabbit.

Of course it was Sammy Jay who first found out that Peter Rabbit was back in the dear Old Briar-patch. Sammy took it into his head to fly over there the very morning of Peter's home-coming. Indeed, little Miss Fuzzytail hadn't had time to half see the clear Old Briar-patch which, you know, was to be her new home, when Peter saw Sammy Jay coming. Now Peter was not quite ready to have all the world know that there was a Mrs. Peter, for of course that was what little Miss Fuzzytail was now that she had come to make her home with Peter. They wanted to keep by themselves for a little while and just be happy with each other. So as soon as Peter saw Sammy Jay headed towards the Old Briar-patch, he hid little Miss Fuzzytail under the thickest sweet-briar bush, and then

hurried out to the nearest sweet-clover patch.

Of course Sammy Jay saw him right away, and of course Sammy was very much surprised.

"Hello, Peter Rabbit! Where'd you come from?" he shouted, as he settled himself comfortably in a little poplar-tree growing on the edge of the Old Briar-patch.

"Oh," said Peter with a very grand air, "I've been on a long journey to see the Great World."

"Which means," said Sammy Jay with a chuckle, "that you've been in the Old Pasture all this time, and let me tell you, Peter Rabbit, the Old Pasture is a very small part of the Great World. By the way, Tommy Tit the Chickadee was down here the other day and told us all about you. He said that you had fallen in love with little Miss Fuzzytail, and he guessed that you were going to make your home up there. What's the matter? Did her father, Old Jed Thumper, drive you out?"

"No, he didn't!" snapped Peter angrily, "It's none of your business what I came home for, Sammy Jay, but I'll tell you just the same. I came home because I wanted to."

Sammy chuckled, for he dearly loves to tease Peter and make him angry. Then the imp of mischief, who seems always to live just under that smart cap of Sammy's, prompted him to ask: "Did you come home alone?"

Now Peter couldn't say "yes" for that would be an untruth, and whatever faults Peter may have, he is at least truthful. So he just pretended not to have heard Sammy's question.

Now when Sammy had asked the question he had thought nothing about it. It had just popped into his head by way of something to say. But Sammy Jay is sharp, and he noticed right away that Peter didn't answer but began to talk about other things,

"Ha, ha!" thought Sammy to himself, "I believe he didn't come alone, I wonder now if he brought Miss Fuzzytail with him."

Right away Sammy began to peer down into the Old Briar-patch, twisting and turning so that he could see in every direction, and all the time talking as fast as his tongue could go. Two or three times he flew out over the Old Briar-patch, pretending to try to catch moths, but really so that he could look down into certain hiding-places. The last time that he did this he spied little Mrs. Peter, who was, you know, Miss Fuzzytail. At once Sammy Jay started for the Green Forest, screaming at the top of his voice:

"Peter Rabbit's married! Peter Rabbit's married!"

CHAPTER XXIII

PETER INTRODUCES MRS. PETER

It's what you do for others,

Not what they do for you,

That makes you feel so happy

All through and through and through.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit made a wry face as he listened to Sammy Jay shrieking at the top of his voice as he flew through the Green Forest and over the Green Meadows," Peter Rabbit's married!" "Peter Rabbit's married!" He saw the Merry Little Breezes who, you know, are the children of Old Mother West Wind, start for the dear Old Briar-patch as soon as they heard Sammy Jay, and he knew that they would be only the first of a lot of visitors. He hurried to where Mrs. Peter was hiding under a sweet- briar bush.

"Do you hear what that mischief-maker, Sammy Jay, is screaming?" asked Peter.

Mrs. Peter nodded. "Don't--don't you think it sounds kind of--well, kind of NICE, Peter?" she asked in a bashful sort of way.

Peter chuckled. "It sounds more than KIND of nice to me," said he. "Do you know, I used to think that Sammy Jay never did and never could say anything nice, but I've just changed my mind. Though he isn't saying it to be nice, it really is the nicest thing I've ever heard him say. We

haven't been able to keep our secret, so I think the very best thing we can do is to invite everybody to call. Then we can get it over with and have a little time to ourselves. Here come the Merry Little Breezes, and I know that they will be glad to take the invitations for us."

Mrs. Peter agreed, for she thought that anything Peter did or suggested was just about right. So the Merry Little Breezes were soon skipping and dancing over the Green Meadows and through the Green Forest with this message:

"Mr. and Mrs. Peter Rabbit will be at home in the Old Briar-patch to their friends to-morrow after-noon at shadow-time."

"Why did you make it at shadow-time?" asked Mrs. Peter.

"Because that will give all our friends a chance to come," replied

Peter. "Those who sleep through the day will have waked up, and those who sleep through the night will not have gone to bed. Besides, it will be safer for some of the smallest of them if the Black Shadows are about for them to hide in on their way here."

"How thoughtful you are," said little Mrs. Peter with a little sigh of

happiness.

Of course, every one who could walk, creep, or fly headed for the Old Briar-patch the next day at shadow-time, for almost every one knows and loves Peter Rabbit, and of course every one was very anxious to meet Mrs. Peter. From the Smiling Pool came Billy Mink, Little Joe Otter, Jerry Muskrat, Spotty the Turtle, and old Grandfather Frog. From the Green Forest came Bobby Coon, Unc' Billy Possum and Mrs. Possum, Prickly Porky the Porcupine, Whitefoot the Woodmouse, Happy Jack the Gray Squirrel, Chatterer the Red Squirrel, Blacky the Crow, Sammy Jay, Ol' Mistah Buzzard, Mistah Mockingbird, and Sticky-toes the Treetoad. From the Green Meadows came Danny Meadow Mouse, Old Mr. Toad, Digger the Badger, Jimmy Skunk, and Striped Chipmunk, who lives near the old stone- wall between the edge of the Green Meadows and the Green Forest. Johnny and Polly Chuck came down from the Old Orchard and Drummer the Woodpecker came from the same place.

Of course Old Man Coyote paid his respects, and when he came everybody but Prickly Porky and Digger the Badger and Jimmy Skunk made way for him with great respect. Granny and Reddy Fox and Hooty the Owl didn't call, but they sat where they could look on and make fun. You see, Peter had fooled all three so many times that they felt none too friendly.

Very proud looked Peter as he stood under a bramble-bush with Mrs. Peter by his side and introduced her to his many friends, and very sweet and modest and retiring looked little Mrs. Peter as she sat beside him. Everybody said that she was "too sweet for anything", and when Reddy Fox overheard that remark he grinned and said:

"Not for me! She can't be too sweet for me, and I hope I'll have a

chance to find out just how sweet she is."

What do you suppose he meant?

CHAPTER XXIV

DANNY MEADOW MOUSE WARNS PETER RABBIT

Good advice Is always needed

But, alas! is seldom heeded,

Peter Rabbit.

Danny Meadow Mouse waited until all the rest of Peter Rabbit's friends had left the Old Briar-patch after paying their respects to Peter and Mrs. Peter, He waited for two reasons, did Danny Meadow Mouse. In the first place, he had seen old Granny Fox and Reddy Fox hanging about a little way off, and though they had disappeared after a while, Danny had an idea that they were not far away, but were hiding so that they might catch him on his way home. Of course, he hadn't the slightest intention of giving them the chance. He had made up his mind to ask Peter if he might spend the night in a corner of the Old Briar-patch, and he was very sure that Peter would say he might, for he and Peter are very good friends, very good friends indeed.

The second good reason Danny had for waiting was this very friendship. You see, Peter had been away from the Green Meadows so long that Danny felt sure he couldn't know all about how things were there now, and so he wanted to warn Peter that the Green Meadows were not nearly as safe as before Old Man Coyote had come there to live. So Danny waited, and when all the rest of the callers had left he called Peter to one side where little Mrs. Peter couldn't hear. Danny stood up on his hind legs so as to whisper in one of Peter's ears.

"Do you know that Old Man Coyote is the most dangerous enemy we have, Peter Rabbit? Do you know that?" he asked.

Peter Rabbit shook his head. "I don't believe that, Danny," said he.

"His terrible voice has frightened you so that you just think him as bad as he sounds. Why, Old Man Coyote is a friend of mine."

Then he told Danny how Old Man Coyote had done him a good turn In the Old Pasture in return for a good turn Peter had once done him, and how he said that he always paid his debts.

Danny Meadow Mouse looked doubtful. "What else did he say?" he demanded. "Nothing, excepting that we were even now," replied Peter.

"Ha!" said Danny Meadow Mouse.

The way he said it made Peter turn to look at him sharply.

"Ha!" said Danny again. "If you are even, why you don't owe him

anything, and he doesn't owe you anything. Watch out, Peter Rabbit! Watch out! I would stick pretty close to the Old Briar-patch with Mrs.

Peter if I were you. I would indeed. You used to think old Granny Fox pretty smart, but Old Man Coyote is smarter. Yes, Sir, he is smarter! And every one of the rest of us has got to be smarter than ever before to keep out of his clutches. Watch out, Peter Rabbit, if you and Old Man Coyote are even. Now, if you don't mind, I'll curl up in my old hiding- place for the night. I really don't dare go back home to-night."

Of course Peter told Danny Meadow Mouse that he was welcome to spend the night in the Old Briar-patch, and thanked Danny for his warning as he bade him good-night. But Peter never carries his troubles with him for long, and by the time he had rejoined little Mrs. Peter he was very much inclined to laugh at Danny's fear.

"What did that funny little Meadow Mouse have to say?" asked Mrs. Peter.

Peter told her and then added, "But I don't believe we have anything to fear from Old Man Coyote. You know he is my friend."

"But I don't know that he is mine!" replied little Mrs. Peter, and the

way she said it made Peter look at her anxiously. "I believe Danny

Meadow Mouse is right," she continued, "Oh, Peter, you will watch out, won't you?"

And Peter promised her that he would.

CHAPTER XXV

PETER RABBIT'S HEEDLESSNESS

Heedlessness is just the twin

of thoughtlessness, you know,

And where you find them both at once,

there trouble's sure to grow.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit didn't mean to be heedless. No, indeed! Oh, my, no! Peter thought so much of Mrs. Peter, he meant to be so thoughtful that she never would have a thing to worry about. But Peter was heedless. He always was heedless. This is the worst of a bad habit--you can try to let go of it, but it won't let go of you.

So it was with Peter. He had been heedless so long that now he actually didn't know when he was heedless.

When there was nobody but himself to think about, and no one to worry about him, his heedlessness didn't so much matter. If anything had happened to him then, there would have been no one to suffer. But now all this was changed. You see, there was little Mrs. Peter. At first Peter had been perfectly content to stay with her in the dear Old Briar- patch. He had led her through all his private little paths, and they had planned where they would make two or three more. He had showed her all his secret hiding-places and the shortest way to the sweet-clover patch. He had pointed out where the Lone Little Path came down to the edge of the Green Forest and so out on to the Green Meadows. He had shown her where the Crooked Little Path came down the hill. Little Mrs. Peter had been delighted with everything, and not once had she complained of being homesick for the Old Pasture.

But after a little while Peter began to get uneasy. You see in the days before Old Man Coyote had come to live on the Green Meadows, Peter had come and gone about as he pleased. Of course he had had to watch out for Granny and Reddy Fox, but he had had to watch out for them ever since he was a baby, so he didn't fear them very much in spite of their smartness. He felt quite as smart as they and perhaps a little bit smarter. Anyway, they never had caught him, and he didn't believe they ever would. So he had come and gone as he pleased, and poked his nose into everybody's business, and gossiped with everybody.

Of course it was quite natural that Peter should want to call on all his old friends and visit the Green Forest, the Old Orchard, the Laughing Brook, and the Smiling Pool. Probably Mrs. Peter wouldn't have worried very much if it hadn't been for the warning left by Danny Meadow Mouse.

Danny had said that Old Man Coyote was more to be feared than all the Hawk family and all the Fox family together, because he was smarter and slyer than any of them. At first Peter had looked very serious, but after Danny had gone back to his own home Peter had laughed at Danny for being so afraid, and he began to go farther and farther away from the safe Old Briar-patch.

One day he had ventured as far as halfway up the Crooked Little Path. He was thinking so hard of a surprise he was planning for little Mrs. Peter that he forgot to watch out and almost ran into Old Man Coyote before he saw him. There was a hungry look, such a hungry look in Old Man Coyote's eyes as he grinned and said "Good morning" that Peter didn't even stop to be polite. He remembered that Jimmy Skunk's old house was near, and he reached it just one jump ahead of Old Man Coyote.

"I thought you said that we were friends," panted Peter, as he heard Mr. Coyote sniffing at the doorway.

"So we were until I had paid my debt to you. Now that I've paid that, we are even, and it is everybody watch out for himself," replied Old Man Coyote. "But don't forget that I always pay my debts, Peter Rabbit."

CHAPTER XXVI

PETER RABBIT LISTENS TO MRS. PETER

Safety first is a wise rule for those who would live long.

Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit was glad enough to get back to the dear Old Briar-patch after his narrow escape from Old Man Coyote by dodging into Jimmy Skunk's old house halfway up the hill. And little Mrs. Peter was glad enough to have him, you may be sure. She had been watching Peter when he so heedlessly almost ran into Old Man Coyote, and it had seemed to her as if her heart stopped beating until Peter reached the safety of that old house of Jimmy Skunk just one jump ahead. Then she saw Old Man Coyote hide in the grass near by and she was terribly, terribly afraid that Peter would be heedless again and come out, thinking that Mr. Coyote had gone.

Poor little Mrs. Peter! She was so anxious that she couldn't sit still.

She felt that she just had to do something to warn Peter. She stole out from the dear Old Briar-patch and halfway to where Old Man Coyote was hiding. He was so busy watching the doorway of the old house where Peter was hiding that he didn't notice her at all. Little Mrs. Peter found a bunch of tall grass behind which she could sit up and still not be seen. So there she sat without moving for a long, long time, never once taking her eyes from Old Man Coyote and the doorway of the old house. By and by she saw Peter poke his nose out to see if the way was clear. Old Man Coyote saw him too, and began to grin. It was a hungry, wicked-looking grin, and it made little Mrs. Peter very, very angry indeed.

She waited just a minute longer to make sure that Peter was where he could see her, and then she thumped the ground very hard, which, you know, is the way Rabbits signal to each other. Peter heard it right away and thumped back that he would stay right where he was, though right down in his heart Peter thought that little Mrs. Peter was just nervous and foolish, for he was sure that Old Man Coyote had given up and gone away long ago.

Now of course Old Man Coyote heard those thumps, and he knew just what they meant. He knew that he never, never could catch Peter so long as Mrs. Peter was watching him and ready to warn Peter, So he came out of his hiding-place with an ugly snarl and sprang toward little Mrs. Peter just to frighten her. He laughed as he watched her run and, all

breathless, dive into the dear, Old Briar-patch, and then he trotted away to his favorite napping-place.

As soon as Peter was sure that he was safe he started for home, and there little Mrs. Peter scolded him soundly for being so heedless and thoughtless.

Peter didn't have a word to say. For a long time he sat thinking and thinking, every once in a while scratching his head as if puzzled.

Little Mrs. Peter noticed it.

"What's the matter with you, Peter?" she asked finally.

"I'm just studying what Old Man Coyote means by telling me one day that he is my friend, and proving it by doing me a good turn, and then trying to catch me the very next time he sees me. I don't understand it," said Peter, shaking his head,

"Oh, you dear old stupid!" replied little Mrs. Peter. "Now, you listen to me. You did Old Man Coyote a good turn and he paid you back by doing you a good turn. That made you even, didn't it?"

Peter nodded.

"Well, then you are right back where you started from, and Old Man Coyote doesn't see any reason why he should treat you any differently than at first, and I don't see why he should either, when I come to think it over. I tell you what, Peter, the thing for you to do is to keep doing good turns to Old Man Coyote so that he will always be in debt to you. Then he will always be your friend,"

As little Mrs. Peter stopped speaking, Peter sprang to his feet. "The very thing!" he cried. "It's sort of a Golden Rule, and I do believe it will work."

"Of course it will," replied little Mrs. Peter.

CHAPTER XXVII

MISTAH MOCKER PLAYS A JOKE ON MRS. PETER

This little point remember, please--

There's little gained by those who tease.

Peter Rabbit.

Mistah Mocker the Mockingbird had been very late in coming up to the Green Meadows from way down South. The truth is, he had almost decided not to come. You see, he loves the sunny south-land so much, and all who live there love him so much, that if it hadn't been for Unc' Billy Possum and Ol' Mistah Buzzard he never, never would have thought of leaving, even for a little while. Unc' Billy and Ol' Mistah Buzzard are particular friends of his, very particular friends, and he felt that he just had to come up for a little visit.

Now Mistah Mocker reached the Green Meadows just after Peter Rabbit had brought little Mrs. Peter down from the Old Pasture to live with him in the dear Old Briar-patch. He knew that little Mrs. Peter didn't know anything about him, for he never had visited the Old Pasture where she had spent her life. But he knew all the bird people who do live there, for he had met them in the sunny southland, where they spent the winter,

"I believe I'll go pay my respects to Mrs. Peter," said Mistah Mocker one day, winking at Ol' Mistah Buzzard. Ol' Mistah Buzzard chuckled and winked back.

"Ah cert'nly hopes yo'all will behave yo'self right proper and not forget that yo' is a member of one of the oldest families in the Souf," said he.

Mistah Mocker looked quite solemn as he promised to behave himself, but there was a twinkle in his eyes as he flew toward the Old Briar-patch. There he hid in a thick tangle of vines. Now it happened that Peter Rabbit had gone over to the sweet-clover patch, and little Mrs. Peter was quite alone. Somehow she got to thinking of her old home, and for the first time she began to feel just a wee, wee bit homesick. It was just then that she heard a familiar voice. Little Mrs. Peter pricked up her ears and smiled happily.

"That's the voice of Tommy Tit the Chickadee, and it must be that his wife is with him, for I hear him calling 'Phoebe! Phoebe!' How lovely of them to come down to see me so soon."

Just then she heard another voice, a deep, beautiful, ringing voice, a voice that she loved. It was the voice of Veery the Thrush. "Oh!" cried little Mrs. Peter, and then held her breath so as not to miss one note of the beautiful song. Hardly had the song ended when she heard the familiar voice of Redeye the Vireo. Little Mrs. Peter clapped her hands happily. "It must be a surprise party by my old friends and neighbors of the Old Pasture!" she cried. "How good of them to come way down here, and how glad I shall be to see them!"

With that little Mrs. Peter hurried over to the tangle of vines from which all the voices seemed to come and eagerly peered this way and that way for a sight of her friends. But all she saw was a stranger wearing a very sober-colored suit. He was very polite and told her that he was an old friend of Peter Rabbit.

"If you are a friend of Peter, then you are a friend of mine." said little Mrs. Peter very prettily. "Have you seen anybody in this tangle of vines since you arrived? I am sure some friends of mine are here, but I haven't been able to find them."

"No," said the stranger, who was, of course, Mistah Mocker the Mockingbird. "I haven't seen any one here, and I don't think there has been any one here but myself."

"Oh, yes, indeed there has!" cried little Mrs. Peter. "I heard their voices, and I couldn't possibly be mistaken in those, especially the beautiful voice of Veery the Thrush, I--I would like very much to find them."

Mistah Mocker had the grace to look ashamed of himself when saw how disappointed little Mrs. Peter was. Very softly he began to sing the song of Veery the Thrush.

Little Mrs. Peter looked up quickly. "There it is!" she cried. "There"-- she stopped with her mouth gaping wide open. She suddenly realized that it was Mistah Mocker who was singing.

"I--I'm very sorry," he stammered. "I did it just for a joke and not to make you feel bad. Will you forgive me?"

"Yes," replied little Mrs. Peter, "if you will come here often at

shadow-time and sing to me." And Mistah Mocker promised that he would.

CHAPTER XXVIII

NEWS FROM THE OLD BRIAR-PATCH

To use your eyes is very wise

And much to be commended;

But never see what cannot be

For such as you intended.

Peter Rabbit.

Jenny Wren is a busybody. Yes, Sir, she certainly is a busybody. If there is anything going on in her neighborhood that she doesn't know about, it isn't because she doesn't try to find out. She is so small and spry that it is hard work to keep track of her, and she pops out at the most unexpected times and places. Then, before you can say a word, she is gone.

And in all the Old Orchard or on the Green Meadows there is not to be found another tongue so busy as that of Jenny Wren. It is sharp

sometimes, but when she wants it to be so there is none smoother. You see she is a great gossip, is Jenny Wren, a great gossip. But if you get on the right side of Jenny Wren and ask her to keep a secret, she'll do it. No one knows how to keep a secret better than she does.

How it happened nobody knows, but it did happen that when Peter Rabbit came home to the clear Old Briar-patch, bringing Mrs. Peter with him, Jenny Wren didn't hear about it. Probably it was because the new home which she had just completed was so carefully hidden that the messengers sent by Peter to invite all his friends to call didn't find it, and

afterward she was so busy with household affairs that she didn't have time to gossip. Anyway, Peter had been back some time before Jenny Wren knew it. She was quite upset to think that she was the last to hear the news, but she consoled herself with the thought that she had been attending strictly to her duties, and now that her children were able to look out for themselves she could make up for lost time.

Just as soon as she could get away, she started for the Old Briar-patch. She wanted to hear all about Peter's adventures in the Old Pasture and to meet Mrs. Peter. But like a great many other busybodies, she wanted to find out all she could about Peter's affairs, and she thought that the surest way to do it was not to let Peter know that she was about until she had had a chance to use her sharp little eyes all she wanted to. So when she reached the Old Briar-patch, she didn't make a sound. It didn't take her long to find Peter. He was sitting under one of his favorite bramble-bushes smiling to himself. He smiled and smiled until Jenny Wren had to bite her tongue to keep from asking what was pleasing him so.

[Illustration with caption: "THE QUICKEST WAY FOR ME TO KNOW IS FOR YOU TO TELL ME," REPLIED JIMMY.]

"He looks tickled almost to death over something, but very likely if I should ask him what it is he wouldn't tell me," thought Jenny Wren. "I guess I'll look around a bit first. I wonder where Mrs. Peter is."

So leaving Peter to smile to his heart's content, she went peeking and peering through the Old Briar-patch. Of course it wasn't a nice thing to do, not a bit nice. But Jenny Wren didn't stop to think of that. By and by she saw something that made her flutter all over with excitement. She looked and looked until she could sit still no longer. Then she hurried back to where Peter was sitting. He was still smiling.

"Oh, Peter Rabbit, it's perfectly lovely!" she cried.

Peter looked up quickly, and a worried look chased the smile away.

"Hello, Jenny Wren! Where did you come from? I haven't seen you since I got back," said he.

"I've been so busy that I haven't had time to call before," replied Jenny. "I know what you've been smiling about, Peter, and it's perfectly splendid. Has everybody heard the news?"

"No," said Peter, "nobody knows it but you, and I don't want anybody else to know it just yet. Will you keep it a secret, Jenny Wren?"

Now Jenny was just bursting with desire to spread the news, but Peter looked so anxious that finally she promised that she would keep it to herself, and she really meant to. But though Peter looked greatly relieved as he watched her start for home, he didn't smile as he had before. "I wish her tongue didn't wag so much," said he.

CHAPTER XXIX

JIMMY SKUNK VISITS PETER RABBIT

It's hard to keep a secret which you fairly ache to tell;

So not to know such secrets is often quite as well.

Peter Rabbit.

On her way home from the Old Briar-patch, Jenny Wren stopped to rest in a bush beside the Crooked Little Path that comes down the hill, when who should come along but Jimmy Skunk. Now just as usual Jenny Wren was fidgeting and fussing about, and Jimmy Skunk grinned as he watched her.

"Hello, Jenny Wren!" said he. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm resting on my way home from the Old Briar-patch, if you must know, Jimmy Skunk!" replied Jenny Wren, changing her position half a dozen times while she was speaking.

"Ho, ho, ho!" laughed Jimmy Skunk. "Do you call that resting! That's a joke, Jenny Wren. Resting! Why, you couldn't sit still and rest if you tried!"

"I could so! I'm resting right now, so there, Jimmy Skunk!" protested Jenny Wren in a very indignant tone of voice, and hopped all over the little bush while she was speaking. "I guess if you knew what I know, you'd be excited too."

"Well, I guess the quickest way for me to know is for you to tell me," replied Jimmy. "I'm just aching to be excited."

Jimmy grinned, for you know Jimmy Skunk never does get excited and never hurries, no matter what happens.

"You'll have to keep right on aching then," replied Jenny Wren, with a saucy flirt of her funny little tail. "There's great news in the Old

Briar-patch, and I'm the only one that knows it, but I've promised not to tell."

Jimmy pricked up his ears. "News in the Old Briar-patch must have something to do with Peter Rabbit," said he. "What has Peter done now?"

"I'll never tell! I'll never tell!" cried Jenny Wren, growing so excited

that it seemed to Jimmy as if there was danger that she would turn herself inside out. "I promised not to and I never will!" Then, for fear that she would in spite of herself, she flew on her way home.

Jimmy watched her out of sight with a puzzled frown. "If I didn't know that she gets so terribly excited over nothing, I'd think that there

really is some news in the Old Briar-patch," he muttered to himself.

"Anyway, I haven't anything better to do, so I believe I'll drop around that way and make Peter Rabbit a call."

He found Peter in some sweet clover just outside the Old Briar-patch, and it struck Jimmy that Peter looked uncommonly happy. He said as much.

"I am," replied Peter, before he thought. Then he added hastily, "You see, I've been uncommonly happy ever since I returned with Mrs. Peter from the Old Pasture."

"But I hear there's great news over here in the Old Briar-patch,"

persisted Jimmy Skunk. "What is it, Peter?"

Peter pretended to be very much surprised. "Great news!" he repeated. "Great news! Why, what news can there be over here? Who told you that?"

"A little bird told me," replied Jimmy slyly.

"It must have been Jenny Wren!" said Peter, once more speaking before he thought.

"Then there IS news over here!" cried Jimmy triumphantly. "What is it, Peter?"

But Peter shook his head as if he hadn't the slightest idea and couldn't imagine. Jimmy coaxed and teased, but all in vain. Finally he started for home no wiser than before.

"Just the same, I believe that Jenny Wren told the truth and that there is news over in the Old Briar-patch," he muttered to himself. "Something has happened over there, and Peter won't tell. I wonder what it can be."

CHAPTER XXX

REDDY FOX LEARNS THE SECRET

Nothing that you ever do,

Nothing good or nothing bad,

But has effect on other folks--

Gives them pain or makes them glad.

Peter Rabbit.

Of course Jenny Wren didn't mean to tell the secret of the Old Briar- patch, because she had promised Peter Rabbit that she wouldn't. But she didn't see any harm in telling every one she met that there was a secret there, at least that there was great news there, and so, because Jenny Wren is a great gossip, it wasn't long before all the little people on the Green Meadows and in the Green Forest and around the Smiling Pool had heard it and were wondering what the news could be.

After Jimmy Skunk's visit came a whole string of visitors to the Old Briar-patch. One would hardly have left before another would appear. Each one tried to act as if he had just happened around that way and didn't want to pass Peter's home without making a call, but each one asked so many questions that Peter knew what had really brought him there was the desire to find out what the news in the Old Briar-patch could be. But Peter was too smart for them, and they all went away no wiser than they came, that is, all but one, and that one was Reddy Fox.

There isn't much going on in the Green Forest or on the Green Meadows that Reddy doesn't know about. He is sly, is Reddy Fox, and his eyes are sharp and his ears are keen, so little happens that he doesn't see or hear about. Of course he heard the foolish gossip of Jenny Wren and he pricked up his ears.

"So there's news down in the Old Briar-patch, is there? A secret that Jenny Wren won't tell? I think I'll trot down there and make Peter a call. Of course he'll be glad to see me."

Reddy grinned wickedly as he said this to himself, for he knew that there was no one for whom Peter Rabbit had less love, unless it was old Granny Fox.

So Reddy trotted down to the Old Briar-patch. Peter saw him coming and scowled, for he guessed right away what Reddy was coming for, and he made ready to answer all Reddy's questions and still tell him nothing, as he had with all the others who had called.

But Reddy asked no questions. He didn't once mention the fact that he had heard there was news in the Old Briar-patch. He didn't once speak of Jenny Wren. He just talked about the weather and the Old Pasture, where Peter had made such a long visit, and all the time was as pleasant and polite as if he and Peter were the dearest of friends.

But while he was talking, Reddy was using those sharp eyes and those keen ears of his the best he knew how. But the Old Briar-patch was very thick, and he could see only a little way into it, and out of it came no sound to hint of a secret there. Then Reddy began to walk around the Old Briar-patch in quite the most matter-of-fact way, but as he walked that wonderful nose of his was testing every little breath of air that came out of the Old Briar-patch. At last he reached a certain place where a little stronger breath of air tickled his nose. He stopped for a few minutes, and slowly a smile grew and grew. Then, without saying a word, he turned and trotted back towards the Green Forest.

Peter Rabbit watched him go. Then he joined Mrs. Peter in the heart of the Old Briar-patch. "My dear," he said, with a sigh that was almost a sob, "Reddy Fox has found out our secret."

"Never mind," said little Mrs. Peter brightly. "It would have to be

found out soon, anyway."

Trotting back up the Lone Little Path, Reddy Fox was grinning broadly. "It IS news!" said he. "Jenny Wren was right, it IS news! But I don't believe anybody else knows it yet, and I hope they won't find it out right away, least of all Old Man Coyote. What a wonderful thing a good nose is! It tells me what my eyes cannot see nor my ears hear."

CHAPTER XXXI

BLACKY THE CROW HAS SHARP EYES

Mischief always waits to greet

Idle hands and idle feet.

Peter Rabbit.

That is what a lot of people say about Blacky the Crow. Of course it is true that Blacky does get into a lot of mischief, but if people really knew him they would find that he isn't as black as he looks. In fact, Blacky the Crow does a whole lot of good in his own peculiar way, but people are always looking for him to do bad things, and you know you most always see what you expect to see. Thus the good Blacky does isn't seen, while the bad is, and so he has grown to have a reputation blacker than the coat he wears.

But this doesn't worry Blacky the Crow. No, Sir, it doesn't worry him a bit. You see he has grown used to it. And then he is so smart that he is never afraid of being caught when he does do wrong things. No one has sharper eyes than Blacky, and no one knows better how to use them. There is very little going on in the Green Forest or on the Green Meadows that he misses when he is about.

The day after Reddy Fox visited the Old Briar-patch and with his

wonderful nose found out Peter Rabbit's secret, Blacky just happened to fly over the Old Briar-patch on his way to Farmer Brown's cornfield. Now, being over the Old Briar-patch, he could look right down into it and see all through it. Just as he reached it, he remembered having heard Sammy Jay say something about gossipy little Jenny Wren's having said that there was great news there. He hadn't thought much about it at the time, but now that he was right there, he might as well have a look for himself and see if there was any truth in it.

So Blacky the Crow flew a little lower, and his sharp eyes looked this way and that way through all the bramble-bushes of the Old Briar-patch. He saw Peter Rabbit right away and winked at him. He thought Peter looked worried and anxious.

"Peter must have something on his mind," thought Blacky. "I wonder where Mrs. Peter is."

Just then he caught sight of her under the thickest growing sweet-briar bush. He had opened his mouth to shout, "Hello, Mrs. Peter," when he saw something that surprised him so that he didn't speak at all. He almost forgot to flap his wings to keep himself in the air. He hovered right where he was for a few minutes, looking down through the brambles. Then with a hoarse chuckle, he started for the Smiling Pool, forgetting all about Farmer Brown's cornfield. "Caw, caw, caw!" he shrieked, "Peter Rabbit's got a family! Peter Rabbit's got a family!"

Reddy Fox heard him and ground his teeth. "Now Old Man Coyote will know and will try to catch those young Rabbits, when they ought to be mine because I found out about them first," he grumbled.

Jimmy Skunk heard Blacky and grinned broadly. "So that's the great news Jenny Wren found out!" said he. "I hope Peter will take better care of his babies than he ever has of himself. I must call at once."

Redtail the Hawk heard, and he smiled too, but it wasn't a kindly smile like Jimmy Skunk's. "I think young Rabbit will taste very good for a change," said he.

CHAPTER XXXII

PETER RABBIT'S NURSERY

With home, the home you call your own,

It really doesn't matter where,

There is no place, in all the world,

That ever will or can compare.

Peter Rabbit.

The news was out at last, thanks to Blacky the Crow. Peter Rabbit had a family! Yes, Sir, Peter Rabbit had a family! Right away the Old Briar- patch became the most interesting place on the Green Meadows to all the little people who live there and in the near-by Green Forest. Of course all of Peter's friends called as soon as ever they could. They found Peter looking very proud, and very important, and very happy. Mrs. Peter looked just as proud, and just as happy, but she also looked very

anxious. You see, while she was very glad to have so many friends call, there were also other visitors. That is, they were not exactly callers, but they hung around the outside of the Old Briar-patch, and they seemed quite as much interested as the friends who really called. Indeed, they seemed more interested.

Who were they? Why, Reddy Fox was one. Then there was Old Man Coyote, also Redtail the Hawk and Digger the Badger, and just at dusk Hooty the Owl. They all seemed very much interested indeed, but every time little Mrs. Peter saw them, she shivered. You see, she couldn't help thinking that there was a dreadful, hungry look in their eyes, and if the truth is to be told, there probably was.

But happy-go-lucky Peter Rabbit didn't let this worry him. Hadn't he grown up from a teeny-weeny baby and been smart enough to escape all these dangers which worried Mrs. Peter so? And if he could do it, of course his own babies could do it, with him to teach them and show them how. Besides, they were too little to go outside of the Old Briar-patch now. Indeed, they were too little to go outside their nursery, which was in a clump of sweet-briar bushes in the very middle of the Old Briar- patch, and Peter felt that there they were perfectly safe.

"It isn't time to worry yet," said Peter to little Mrs. Peter, as he saw the fright in her eyes as the shadow of Redtail passed over them. "I don't believe in borrowing trouble. Time enough to worry when there is something to worry about, and that won't be until these little

scallawags of ours are big enough to run around and get into mischief. Did you ever see such beautiful babies in all your life?"

For a minute the worried look left little Mrs. Peter, and she gazed at the four little helpless babies fondly. "No," she replied softly, "I

never did. Oh, Peter, they are perfectly lovely! This one is the perfect image of you, and I'm going to call him Little Pete. And don't you think his brother looks like his grandfather? I think we'll call him Little

Jed."

Peter coughed behind his hand as if something had stuck in his throat. He had no love for Little Jed's grandfather, Old Jed Thumper, the big, gray, old Rabbit who had tried so hard to drive him from the Old Pasture, but he didn't say anything. If Mrs. Peter wanted to name this one Little Jed, he wouldn't say a word. Aloud he said:

"I think, my dear, that this one looks just as you must have looked when you were little, and so we'll call her Fuzzy. And her sister we'll call Wuzzy," continued Peter. "Was ever there such a splendid nursery for baby Rabbits?"

"I don't believe there ever was, Peter. It's better than my old nursery in the Old Pasture," replied little Mrs. Peter, as with a sigh of perfect happiness she stretched out beside their four babies.

And Peter softly tiptoed away to the nearest sweet-clover patch with his heart almost bursting with pride.

Of the doings of Peter and Mrs. Peter Rabbit and their four children there are many more stories, so many that one book will not hold all of them. Besides, Bowser the Hound insists that I must write a book about him, and I have promised to do it right away. So the next book will be Bowser the Hound.

STORY THE LITTLE TIN SOLDIER by : Hans Christian Andersen

2019-03-08T18:55:00.000-08:00

STORY THE LITTLE TIN SOLDIER

(THE STEADFAST TOY SOLDIER)

by : Hans Christian Andersen

Once upon a time, a toymaker fashioned twenty five Brothers, all soldiers, from the same piece of tin.

They all shouldered muskets, They all looked straight ahead and they all wore splendid uniforms of red and blue.

Alas, When it came to the last soldier there wasn’t quite enough tin left.

The toymaker only had enough to give the last soldier one leg.

But that soldier didn’t mind, he was very proud to be different, he was very proud of his one leg.

He too stood erect, shouldering his musket, looking straight ahead, in his bright red and blue uniform.

The toymaker packed all 25 soldiers tightly, into a box.

It was very dark in there.

Then he carefully gift wrapped the box.

They were a birthday present for a small boy.

When the little boy saw the box, he let out an exciting yell, “Tin Soldiers! Thanks, Mum!”

The little boy emptied the soldiers out on the floor and selected the last tin soldier (because he was different) for sentry duty. He placed him on a tower of blocks where the soldier could see:

a brown Teddy Bear; a box labelled ‘Jack’; a magnificent castle with swans floating on a lake; and … Standing at the castle door was the most beautiful girl the soldier had ever seen.

In fact, she was the only girl the soldier had ever seen, but he loved her because, like him,

she only had one leg.

Well, he thought she did.

“She is perfect,” the Little Tin Soldier said to himself, “I shall make her my wife.”

But what the soldier didn’t realise, The beautiful lady was a Dancer, She held her other leg high in the air behind her.

At midnight, when the clock struck twelve, all the toys would came alive.

The Little Tin Soldier was determined that then, he would visit the castle and ask for the beautiful lady’s hand in marriage.

At the stroke of midnight, the little tin soldier pushed open the lid of his box and climbed out.

He breathed deeply, because he was very nervous, then he began to hop in the direction of the castle.

Suddenly the lid of the jack-in-the-box popped open and an ugly grinning face jumped out and stared down at the Little Tin Soldier.

The face had sharp beady eyes that shone and flashed, “I’m Jack!”

Jack stared at the Little Tin Soldier, “She’s out of your league, soldier boy. and anyway, ya only got one leg.”

There was a moment silence between them.

“You live in a box! She lives in a castle.

Give up!” The Little Tin Soldier looked up at the castle.

The beautiful dancer had been watching him.

She smiled.

The soldier’s tin heart melted.

He jumped down onto the floor and started bouncing towards the castle.

“Tin soldier,” Jack practically spat the words out, “Don’t wish for what does not belong to you.”

The Tin Soldier pretended not to hear.

Jack’s voice became ominous, “Very well! wait until tomorrow.

Bad things will happen.

An ill wind will carry you away,” and with a fiendish laugh he disappeared back, inside his box.

“I wouldn’t take any notice of Jack.”

Standing beside the soldier’s elbow was a Teddy Bear.

In spite of his growly voice, he sounded very friendly to the Little Tin Soldier.

“He’s bitter. He’s got no legs.

He can’t join in our games.”

The Teddy Bear sighed, “Sad thing is, no-one would play with him even if he could move.”

The Little Tin Soldier glanced towards the castle and the stunningly beautiful lady.

“Go,” growled the friendly Teddy Bear, “Most important! Don’t let Jack’s words get into your heart.”

But the friendly Teddy Bear was too late.

The Little Tin Soldier had taken Jack’s words deep into his heart.

Jack had frightened him.

He lay down beside the lake, watching the Dancer;

He never took his eyes off her.

Finally he drifted off to sleep.

The next morning, when the little boy came in, he saw the tin soldier lying on the floor, he picked him up, placed him on a shelf, near an open window.

From there the soldier could see the whole room:

Jack’s box; the Teddy Bear; the castle and … the beautiful lady was smiling at him.

He smiled back.

Suddenly, a gust of wind caught the curtain.

It flipped the Little Tin Soldier backwards, out of the open window.

As he fell down towards the ground, Jack’s words tumbled through his mind,

‘Tomorrow, an ill wind will carry you away,’ And he was sure he heard Jack’s fiendish laugh in the wind.

The Little Tin Soldier landed upside down with his bayonet wedged between the cracks in the pavement.

The little boy and his mother rushed down to rescue him.

But they couldn’t find him, although at one time, they almost stood on him.

Now the soldier felt really miserable.

To make him feel even worse, large, heavy drops of rain started to fall.

It wasn’t long before water was pouring down the gutter beside him.

‘What bad thing is going to happen next,’ he said to himself.

As if in answer, two boys came running down the street.

They thought it would be fun to send him out to sea.

They quickly made a small sail boat out of an old newspaper and placed him inside.

They sent the newspaper boat sailing down the gutter, then raced alongside laughing and splashing in the puddles.

The Little Tin Soldier, shouldered his musket, looked straight ahead, and he wondered, ‘Will I ever see my beautiful Dancer again?’

Large waves rocked the boat up and down.

It became soggy.

At times it swirled a full circle, quickly, in the water.

The Little Tin Soldier trembled.

He held on to his musket tightly.

Suddenly the boat dipped down and rushed into a drain.

‘What on earth is happening?’ thought the Soldier, ‘I bet Jack is behind this, his evil words put a magic spell on me!’

Inside the drain it was very dark.

As dark as the box the soldier lived in.

In the distance he saw what looked like, the headlights of a car.

But that was silly, for cars hadn’t been invented.

As the newspaper boat floated closer, the soldier realised that

the two lamps, were in fact, eyes.

The eyes of a huge, ugly, fat, water-rat with a chewed off ear, “Passport!” it cried.

It was the border patrol!

The Rat’s eyes reminded him of Jack’s sharp, beady eyes, that shone and flashed.

Unlike Jack’s the rat’s eyes didn’t flash, but they just were as mean and unfriendly.

The Tin Soldier remained silent and held tightly to his musket.

The Water Rat’s hand reached out to make a grab for his passport.

But the Little Tin Soldier was too quick.

He crashed his boat through the straw barrier, and sped away.

Hollering and gnashing his teeth the Rat gave chase.

He screamed to the wood and the straw,“Stop ‘im, stop ‘im.

‘E asn’t paid me his toll.

‘E ‘ain’t got no pass.

But the roaring water surged on.

The Little Tin Soldier could already see daylight ahead.

‘Freedom, freedom,’ he thought,‘I might still get home to see her smile once more.

As the little boat rushed towards the daylight, the Soldier heard a noise.

It was a waterfall.

The little boat shot out into the air.

Way, way, way below was a canal.

‘Not again,’ thought the soldier. Although he was frightened, he refused to close his eyes.

The boat spun and swirled and crashed onto the surface of the water and shattered into a thousand pieces.

(Do you think the soldier actually counted the pieces?)

The soldier was thrown into the thunderous water, with millions of bubbles rising up all around him.

(He definitely didn’t count the bubbles!)

There was a sudden silver flash, everything went dark.

He thought of the beautiful Dancer’s smile. He sighed,‘will Jack’s curse never end!’ An old tune popped into his head,‘Farewell, warrior! Ever brave, drifting onward to thy grave .’

It was then the soldier understood, he had been swallowed by a fish.

He lay full length, shouldering his musket.

The fish began to thrash about; the soldier held on for dear life. Then suddenly it lay still.

As the soldier lay there, a flash of lightning struck the fish’; daylight flooded in.

Then, he heard a voice he recognised.

“Why, it’s the little one legged Soldier that fell out the window.

Goodness gracious!” The voice belonged to the little boy’s mother.

The fish that had swallowed him, had been hooked from the canal, taken to the market

and sold to the mother.

When the mother sliced it open, she found the Little Tin Soldier.

She carefully dried and showered the Soldier, then put him in the castle, next to the beautiful Dancer.

“Don’t they make a lovely couple, both standing there on one leg?”

The soldier felt the presence of the Dancer.

Her smile melted his heart.

When the clock chimed midnight, he would boldly take her hand, ask her to marry him and … perhaps, even kiss her.

But Jack’s words still shadowed his heart.

Suddenly the little boy’s sister came into the room,“That soldier is ugly, he’s deformed.”

She grabbed the Little Tin Soldier, and threw him into the fire.

The fire burned, smoke poured from his uniform.

He was suffocating, because of the flames, maybe because of the fire of his love, he was totally unsure.

All he knew was, he was melting away.

He stared up at the beautiful Dancer.

She smiled back at him.

But there was a tear that fell from her eye.

The tear finally washed Jack’s words from the soldier’s heart.

As he was watching the curtain moved.

A breeze swooped in, caught the paper dancer in its arms, and rushed her into the flames beside her love.

Happy at last,wrapped in each others arms, the paper Doll and the Little Tin Soldier, danced close in the flames.

The next morning, when the mother came in to clean up the ashes.

She discovered, lying in the fireplace, snuggled together, the soldier’s heart; and beside it, the paper Dancer’s little red tinsel rose.

… together forever.

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THE END

Story Explorer Ella’s Magic Forest Author: Bel Richardson

2019-03-06T18:13:00.002-08:00

Story Explorer Ella’s Magic Forest

Author: Bel Richardson

Ella likes exploring. She really likes reading maps and ﬁnding new places.

Ella looked at a map. The map showed no forest. But there was a huge forest next to Ella.

No explorers had found this huge forest before. Ella decided that it grew by magic.

She walked into the magic forest.

At ﬁrst, Ella saw no animals in the magic forest.

She saw trees with leaves and bark that had sparkles.

Ella saw ﬂowers that ﬂoated.

Then, Ella saw magic bugs. The bugs had wings with lights.

The magic bugs could spell with words of light. Ella could read the words in the magic bug lights.

The bugs told Ella to walk deeper into the magic forest.

Ella saw magic birds. The magic birds sang magic songs that had no notes.

The songs were made with art - the magic birds painted in the air.

Ella could see long arrows so she followed the arrows.

Ella saw magic deer and magic rabbits playing in the ﬂowers that ﬂoat.

Then Ella saw tracks.They were hoof tracks. She looked at the deer hoofs but they were not the same. These were not deer tracks.

Ella went deeper and deeper in the magic forest. She followed the hoof tracks and walked with care.

Ella saw an end to the hoof tracks and found herself next to a sleeping horse.

This horse had a long horn and rainbow hair. Hang on! It was not a horse. It was a unicorn!

The unicorn got up and let Ella get on its back.

Ella and the unicorn walked around the magic forest with the animals.

Ella and the unicorn are pals.

Ella and her unicorn had found a magic land.

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Book 4:50 from Paddington A Miss Marple Mystery by: Agatha Christie

2019-03-05T15:02:00.001-08:00

Novel 4:50 from Paddington
A Miss Marple Mystery

by : Agatha Christie

Book Name: 4:50 from Paddington

Series: Miss Marple

Author: Agatha Christie

Characters: Miss Jane Marple, Lucy Eyelesbarrow, Mrs Elspeth McGillicuddy, Luther Crackenthorpe, Emma, Alfred, Cedric and Harold Crackenthorpe

Overview

(If you don’t know the book version or are in need of a refresher, here’s what happens.)

On her way to visit her friend Miss Marple, Elspeth McGillicuddy sees a murder through the window of the train running parallel to her own. A woman is being brutally strangled by a man. When the police are unable to find any evidence of the missing woman, Miss Marple decides to investigate on her own. She deduces that, in order to have evaded discovery for so long, the body must have been thrown from the train on a particular curve of track behind a large, run-down estate called Rutherford Hall.

Rutherford Hall is owned by Luther Crackenthorpe, the curmudgeonly and miserly heir to the Crackenthorpe biscuit, confectionery and canapés fortune, who lives with his daughter Emma. His sons – Harold the banker, Cedric the artist and Alfred the spiv – visit every Christmas. Two other children – Edmund and Edith – have died, but Edith was survived by her husband Bryan and son Alexander. Luther is also regularly attended by Dr Quimper, who is rather fond of Emma.

Too frail to snoop about on her own, Miss Marple hires freelance domestic goddess Lucy Eyelesbarrow, who installs herself at the hall and quickly finds the body concealed in a sarcophagus in a dilapidated barn. Judging from her underwear, the police decide the dead woman was a foreigner, and Emma quickly makes the connection with a letter she received, purportedly from her dead brother Edmund’s French wife, Martine.

Lucy, along with Bryan’s son Alexander and Alexander’s visiting friend James Stoddart-West, continues to search for clues while the police, led by Inspector Craddock, try to find out more about the missing woman. Craddock eventually learns of a missing dancer called Anna Stravinska, who left her troupe at about the time of the murder. But he’s unable to find any definite information, and the investigation stalls.

Then one evening the whole Crackenthorpe family is taken ill. Doctor Quimper attends and the symptoms only seem to be mild, but Alfred dies in the night. A few days later, a package of pills arrives for Harold in London, allegedly from Dr Quimper. But these are poisoned and Harold also dies.

On the missing woman front, the police track down a postcard sent from Jamaica and signed ‘Anna Stravinska’, and James Stoddart-West’s mother reveals that she is Martine, although the letter Emma received was a fake. The investigation stalls again.

But Miss Marple has figured everything out. She calls on her friend Mrs McGillicuddy to return from Ceylon and stages an elaborate ploy. While having tea at the hall she pretends to choke on a fish-bone. When Dr Quimper comes to help her, Mrs McGillicuddy recognises him as the woman from the train. It turns out that the woman was Anna Stravinska. She was also Quimper’s wife. He murdered her so that he could marry Emma and inherit the Crackenthorpe fortune. Later, he got greedy, and murdered Alfred and Harold in order to increase his potential share.

So that’s it. There’s also a few romantic subplots involving Lucy Eyelesbarrow: almost everyone, including creepy Luther Crackenthorpe, seems to want to marry her. At the end she seems to have made up her mind between Bryan and Cedric, but the reader isn’t told which she’s chosen. Miss Marple claims to know, however…

------------

One of my favourite things about Agatha Christie mysteries, other than the actual mystery, of course, is the characterization. So many Christie mysteries are also comedies of manner, and the Crackenthorpe drama in 4:50 from Paddington totally drew me in. I love seeing Miss Marple play matchmaker — despite never having married, she is clearly a romantic at heart, and her knowing little smiles give her prediction the weight of years of observation. As Lucy exclaims after Miss Marple guesses some men in love with her, at a different time, Miss Marple would have been considered a witch for all the things she knew.

Long-time Christie fans, definitely pick up 4:50 from Paddington, and Christie newbies, this is a great novel to get you into the Marple series. You can check out the beginning of the story here — I hope it hooks you like it did me! Finally, I’d like to end with this fun little passage that, to me, reveals so much about Miss Marple:

Summary book 4:50 from Paddington A Miss Marple Mystery

Part 1: Chapters 1–7

When Mrs McGillicuddy takes the 4.50 train from Paddington

to visit her friend Miss Marple, she sees a man strangling a

woman on another train running parallel to hers. She doesn’t

see the man’s face, but he is dark-haired and wearing a heavy

coat.

The strangled woman is wearing a fur coat. The police don’t

find any trace of a murdered woman thrown out of a train.

The following day, after tea in London, Miss Marple and

Mrs McGillicuddy travel back on the same 4.50 train from

Paddington. Miss Marple notices a long curve by a large

country house on the track just before Brackhampton.

Mean, old Luther Crackenthorpe and his daughter, Emma,

live in this house, Rutherford Hall. Miss Marple suspects that

the body is hidden there. She asks Lucy Eyelesbarrow, a

‘professional at housework,’ to work there undercover and

investigate.

Alexander Eastley, Crackenthorpe’s only grandson, and his

friend James Stoddart-West come to stay, and with Lucy they

find a woman’s body hidden in a sarcophagus.

Nobody, including the family’s doctor Dr Quimper, recognizes

the woman. Inspector Bacon thinks the dead woman may be

foreign. Cedric, Harold, Albert – Crackenthorpe’s sons – and

his son-in-law, Bryan Eastley, all attend the woman’s inquest.

Part 2: Chapters 8–14

Detective Inspector Craddock learns from Wimbourne, the

family lawyer, that Luther Crackenthorpe’s father made his

fortune producing biscuits. A will states that Crackenthorpe

mustn’t sell the house; it will be given to his eldest son

(Cedric). The capital from the fortune will be divided equally

between his four children and grandson.

Craddock talks to the family. He thinks the woman may

have been French and a dancer in Paris.

Emma confides to Cedric that the murdered woman might

be Martine, their dead brother’s widow. Martine had sent

them a letter before Christmas saying she was in England and

wanted to meet the family. Emma invited her but then she

received a message from Martine saying she had to return to

France. Dr Quimper advises Emma to tell this to the police.

Mr Crackenthorpe shows Lucy his hidden money and suggests

she should marry him as he’ll live longer than his children.

Emma explains to Craddock about Martine. Not all the

family thinks the letter is genuine. Martine’s son would be an

heir to the fortune. Miss Marple has tea at the hall and notices

Emma and Quimper seem attracted to each other. Alfred

offers Lucy a job, and marriage. Harold also offers Lucy a job

in London.

Craddock continues his investigations in Paris. The missing

dancer, Anna, isn’t the murdered woman, but he believes she

could have known Martine and written the letter.

Wimbourne explains that Martine and Edmund’s son, and not

Cedric, would inherit Rutherford Hall.

Part 3: Chapters 15–20

Alfred and Harold have money problems. Craddock interviews

them both and they explain what they were doing on Friday

20th December. On Christmas Day Mr Crackenthorpe had

been ill and Dr Quimper looked after him. Sergeant Wetherall

recognizes Alfred as being a member of a criminal gang.

Miss Marple speaks about the strong possibility of Dr Quimper

and Emma marrying. Craddock speaks to Quimper about Mr

Crackenthorpe being poisoned at Christmas, which explains

why he was ill. Quimper thinks it was arsenic.

Alexander finds the envelope addressed to Martine that

Emma had sent. Craddock continues his investigations

and Cedric admits he’d been drinking on 20th December.

Alfred came to Rutherford Hall that day and Harold was

in London. The police think Harold might have taken the

train to Brackhampton during the afternoon and

then returned to London.

Mr Crackenthorpe demands curry for dinner, then at

3 am Quimper is called as the family all have food poisoning.

Police find arsenic in the left-over curry. Alfred dies.

Part 4: Chapters 21–27

James’s mother, Lady Stoddart-West, visits Emma; she is

surprised about Martine’s letter. She confirms that she is in

fact Martine. She had married Edmund and after his death

came to England with her present husband. She did not

send the letter.

Quimper sends Harold some pills to take, presumably for

the food poisoning. Craddock tells Miss Marple Harold has

died, Quimper apparently knew nothing about the pills. The

pills were in Emma’s pill box which has her fingerprints on

it. Miss Marple reminds Craddock that Alexander found

the envelope after the police search, perhaps intentionally

dropped by the murderer. Lucy thinks Bryan could be the

murderer; he knew Martine during the war.

Miss Marple asks Mrs McGillicuddy to come and they go

for tea at Rutherford Hall. Miss Marple starts choking on a

fish bone; Quimper puts his hands on her neck and looks down

her throat. Coming into the room Mrs McGillicuddy sees this

and instantly recognizes Quimper as the man on the train.

The murdered woman was Quimper’s wife; they were

separated, but she wouldn’t divorce. He wanted to marry

Emma and get the money. He wrote the letter to try and

implicate the family and then he started poisoning the

brothers.

I Read: book 4:50 from Paddington A Miss Marple Mystery

Download link of the book Below :

book 4:50 from Paddington Agatha Christie

DOWNLOAD book 4:50 _From_Paddington

Story What's the best costume? By Yan Li

2019-03-02T19:07:00.001-08:00

Story What's the best costume?

By Yan Li

to:

Aillie is a little kitty cat

Who cooks and wears a chef’s hat.

What she loves most is baking.

Can you guess what she’s making?

She shapes dough into balls, stars, or squares.

She decorates her cookies with faces or bears.

Allie’s smiley face cookies are the best.

They taste better than all the rest!

All Allie’s neighbors love her cookie’s sweet crunch.

They eat them with breakfast or dinner or lunch.

Each cookie is baked with love and a smile,

which makes their hearts happy for a really long while.

to:

One day, Allie got a letter she couldn’t believe.

The letter read: Come to my house New Year’s Eve.

Wear a costume - your favorite animal disguise.

The best costume of all will win the grand prize.

Sincerely, Mayor Hourse

All the animals were feeling festive through and through,

except Allie who was feeling blue.

She thought, “The monkey swings through trees.

The giraffe is so slim, and she has such pretty knees.

The sheep looks so nice with her curly white hair.

But what costume will I wear?”

to:

On the night of the New Year’s Eve party,

there was a huge crowd.

The animals were happy and the music was loud.

Allie looked in the mirror and she let out a sigh.

She knew what she should wear and wanted to give it a try.

Allie looked for a seat in the very back row

Next to with Mr. Elephant, Ms. Deer, and Ms.Hippo.

Allie saw her beautiful friends, and turned to Ms. Deer.

“Ms. Deer, why on earth are you hiding back here?”

to:

“I have these ugly horns, so I can’t wear a hat,”

Ms. Deer said.

“And my trunk’s too long, ” cried a sad Mr. Elephant, shaking his head.

“I have a big mouth, which I can’t cover up,” said Miss Hippo, in tears.

Allie said, “I used to feel that way too, but look here. Be yourselves. You have nothing to fear.”

Then everyone cheered when Mayor Horse took to the stage.

“Guess the frst costume!”

he said, as he read from a page.

to:

The poster showed you the frst costume of the night.

The crowd thought hard, and then shouted, “Stripes! Black and white!’

Zebras! But which animals dressed up as zebras? The crowd was in shock.

The spotlight flickered on...

to:

“A fuzzy sheep zebra flock!”

Everyone asked, “Do the sheep look like zebras?”

“No way!” the real zebras said very fast.

“Our stripes help us blend into tall wavy grass,

So our coats keep us safe and protect us from harm.”

“So do ours!” said the sheep. “Our curls keep us warm.”

to:

“Who will be next?” asked Mayor Horse with a smile.

The crowd saw the poster and cried, “The action star, Mr.Crocodile!”

Someone walked on stage in a crocodile costume pretending to have his fame.

The spotlight flickered on...

to:

And everyone shouted,

“Are he and Mr. Crocodile the same?”

Mr. Crocodile scoffed, “A rhinoceros?

No, we are not like each other!”

“Are you sure?”asked the rhino, “We both have thick armor!”

“Real crocodile have far tougher armor, “said the croc with a groan, “It’s not only sensitive to cold and heat, but some parts are hard as bone!”

to:

Then Mayor Horse interrupted, “Who is next up to dance?”

All the animals shouted, “The model, Miss Giraffe!”

The crowd tried to see through the darkness.

“Who is it?” they asked.

“Whose humps are those?”

The spotlight flickered on...

to:

“The dizzy camel!” they laughed.

The camel, wearing fancy brown patches, got back up on her feet.

She said, “The giraffe’s body is special and stays cool in the heat. Just like me, she does not have to sweat to stay cool.”

“But I don’t have two humps!” the real giraffe ruled.

to:

“Who is that making faces?” the Mayor then said.

“It looks like the comedian, Mr. Hedgehog is curled up for bed.”

“Silly Mr. Hedgehog rolls into a ball when he sleeps.”

The crowd shouted, “He is much funnier than the giraffe, rhino or sheep!”

But who dressed up as the Hedgehog, no one could see.

Then the spotlight flickered on...

to:

Spines, spines, spines...

And a teeny-tiny voice squeaked, “It is me!”

“I s that mouse on a bicycle?” all the animals cried.

“That costume makes no sense!” The mouse wanted to hide and said “Our stiff hairs are similar to the spines of yours.”

The real Hedgehog spoke, “I don’t think he should win. See, I’ve the prickliest coat, but the mouse has thin skin.”

to:

“Mayor Horse came back up. “What’s that chatter?”he asked.

“It must be Mr. Parrot!” the crowd guessed. “He’s talking so fast!”

But who could be wearing Mr. Parrot’s disguise?

The spotlight flickered on...

to:

It was Mrs . Parrot, to everyone’s surprise.

“She’s a Parrot for sure, but does she look like a male?”

Mr. Parrot said, “No, we’re unique from our beak to our tail. My feathers are rich green and red----not the same.

As Mrs. Parrot’s red and purple. We share only our name.”

to:

Mayor Horse asked, “Who’s singing onstage? What a lovely sound.”

The crowd shouted, “Miss Frog loves to sing!” They all turned around.

“Guess who dressed up as Miss Frog?” Mayor Horse asked.

The spotlight flickered on...

to:

“M r. Frog, who was all green, but wore a red vest. ”

The green frog crooned, “My green color help me to hide under the leaves and I think my red vest looks stunning!”

“But my dress is not cute, it’s actually cunning. The red is a warning cause we are poisonous, too.”

Miss Frog chimed in with, “This green frog’s got no clue.”

to:

Who is next up onstage?” Mayor Horse fnally asked.

The crowd answered, “It’s Allie! She must be the last.”

Who was dressed up as the chef kitty?

The spotlight flickered on...

to:

Allie walked nimbly along Elephant’s trunk.

Then, she jumped on the stage with a plonk and a plunk.

The kitty chef stood onstage dressed as herself, looking proud!

And threw smiley face cookies out into the crowd.

to:

“Why do we want to copy each other to win?

Our most perfect costume is our very own skin.

Each animal has their own color and look.

Not to mention our hobbies; I love to cook!

Each cat’s coat is different to match where we live, so before you try changing, see what you’ve got to give.”

The smiley-face cookies few over the crowd.

The animals caught them and started cheering out loud.

They agreed with what Allie said, and they added with a smile,

“We all win the contest because we all have our own unique style!”

to:

“No one can copy my trunk.” The elephant smiled and lifted Allie onto his back with his trunk.

“And these are my antlers,” the deer said with some spunk.

The hippo roared, “No one can have a huge mouth like I do.”

As everyone cheered along, too.

So, what’s your best costume, girls and boys?

Come on! Stand up proud! And make a big noise!

Put on your big smile and wear your best you.

You are your best costume: You, just you!

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SEE YOU THEN !

Story A Whistling Good Idea Author: Rahul Raghavan

2019-02-28T17:06:00.000-08:00

Story A Whistling Good Idea

Author: Rahul Raghavan

“Nivi! Turn the cooker off after three whistles,

okay?” Ma says.

Ma is going to the market to buy vegetables for dinner.

Nivi makes a face.

THUMP! She puts her book down.

PWFFT! She sticks her tongue out at the cooker.

Nivi taps her foot on the floor.

She waits and waits for the whistle to blow.

All of a sudden, she has an idea!

Nivi picks up the rolling pin and places it close to the gas knob.

She arranges a row of tomatoes and potatoes behind it.

The rasam-and-dal ladle is next.

Nivi keeps it carefully at the edge of the shelf above the cooker.

She then makes five of Nani’s spoons stand up. These are the ones Nani uses to sip her watery khichdi.

Finally, Nivi places her favourite plastic ball right above the spout of the pressure cooker.

WHOOSH! The ball moves a little.

WHOOSH! A little more.

WHOOSH! The ball rolls down the third time.

Nivi jumps, claps, and whistles herself!

The ball hits the spoons.

The spoons fall on the ladle.

The ladle swings off the shelf. BLOOONG!

The ladle hits the potatoes.

The potatoes roll into the tomatoes.

The tomatoes crash into the rolling pin.

The rolling pin hits the knob of the stove. THAAD!

The knob turns. The stove switches off. Nivi opens the pressure cooker carefully. Inside it is yummy, perfectly cooked rice.

Nivi goes back to reading her book happily.

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Story The Tale of Samuel Whiskers Author: Frederic Warne

2019-02-27T17:45:00.002-08:00

Story The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Author: Frederic Warne

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Once upon a time

there was an old cat,

called Mrs.

Tabitha Twitchit,

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit, was an anxious parent.

She used to lose her kittens continually,

and whenever they were lost, they always got into mischief!

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

On baking day she determined

to shut them up in a cupboard.

She caught Moppet and Mittens,

but she could not find Tom anywhere.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Mrs. Tabitha went up and down all over the house, mewing for Tom Kitten.

She looked in the pantry under the staircase,

and she searched the best spare bedroom that was all covered up with dust sheets.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

She went right upstairs and looked into the attics, but she could not find him anywhere.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The old house was full of cupboards and passages.

The walls were thick,

and there used to be queer noises inside them,

as if there might be a little secret staircase.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Certainly there were odd little jagged doorways in the wainscot,

and things disappeared at night,

especially

cheese and bacon.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Mrs. Tabitha

became more and more distracted,

and mewed dreadfully.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

While their mother

was searching the house,

Moppet and Mittens had got into mischief.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The cupboard door was not locked,

so they pushed it open and came out.

They went straight to the dough

which was set to rise in a pan

before the fire.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

They patted it with their little soft paws,

"Shall we make dear little muffins?"

said Mittens to Moppet.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

But just at that moment

somebody knocked

at the front door,

Frightened, Moppet jumped

into the flour barrel.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Mittens ran away to the dairy and hid in an empty jar on the stone shelf

where the milk pans stand.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The visitor was a neighbour,

Mrs. Ribby.

She had called to borrow some yeast.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Mrs. Tabitha came downstairs mewing dreadfully,

"Come in, Cousin Ribby, come in, and sit ye down!

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

I'm in sad trouble, Cousin Ribby,"

Said Tabitha, shedding tears.

"I've lost my dear son Thomas;

I'm afraid the rats have got him."

She wiped her eyes with her apron.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"He's a bad kitten,

Cousin Tabitha;

He made a cat's cradle of my best bonnet last time

I came to tea.

Where have you looked for him?"

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"All over the house!

There are too many rats for me.”

said Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit.

“What a thing it is to have an unruly family!“

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"I'm not afraid of rats;

I will help you to find him;

and whip him too!

What is all that soot in the fender?“

“ The chimney wants sweeping.”

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

“Oh, dear me, Cousin Ribby, now Moppet and Mittens are gone!“

"They both got out of the cupboard in the wainscot!“

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Ribby and Tabitha set to work to search the house thoroughly again.

They poked under the beds with Ribby's umbrella,

and they rummaged in cupboards.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Yes, it is infested with rats,“

said Tabitha tearfully.

"I caught seven young ones in the back kitchen,

and we had them

for dinner last Saturday.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

And once I saw the old father rat,

an enormous old rat.

I was just going to jump upon him,

when he showed his yellow teeth at me and whisked down the hole."

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Ribby and Tabitha

searched and searched.

They both heard a curious roly-poly noise under the attic floor. But there was nothing to be seen.

The Tale of Samuel WhiskersThey returned to the kitchen.

"Here's one of your kittens at least,“ said Ribby,

dragging Moppet out of the flour barrel.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

They shook the flour off her and set her down on the kitchen floor.

She seemed to be in a terrible fright.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Oh! Mother, Mother,” said Moppet,

"there's been an old woman rat in the kitchen, and she's stolen some of the dough!"

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The two cats ran to look at the dough pan.

Sure enough there were marks of little scratching fingers, and a lump of dough was gone!

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Which way did she go, Moppet?"

But Moppet had been too frightened to peep out of the barrel again.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Ribby and Tabitha took her with them to keep her safely in sight,

while they went on with their search. They went into the dairy.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The first thing they found was Mittens,

hiding in an empty jar.They tipped up the jar, and she scrambled out.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Oh! Mother, Mother,” said Mittens,

"there's been an old man rat in the dairy, and he's stolen a pat of butter and the rolling pin!"

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Ribby and Tabitha looked at one another.

“ A rolling-pin and butter!

Oh, my poor son Thomas!" exclaimed Tabitha, wringing her paws.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"A rolling-pin?" said Ribby.

"Did we not hear a roly-poly noise in the attic when we were looking into that chest?“

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Ribby and Tabitha rushed upstairs again.

Sure enough the roly-poly noise was still going on quite distinctly under the attic floor.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"This is serious, Cousin Tabitha," said Ribby.

"We must send for John Joiner at once, with a saw."

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Now this is what has been happening to Tom Kitten, and it shows how very unwise it is to go up a chimney in a very old house,

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Where a person does not know his way, and where there are enormous rats.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Tom Kitten did not want to be shut up in a cupboard.

When he saw that his mother was going to bake,

he determined to hide.

He looked about for a nice convenient place, and he fixed upon the chimney.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The fire had only just been lighted, and it was not hot;

but there was a white choky smoke from the green sticks.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Tom Kitten got upon the fender and looked up. It was a big, old-fashioned fire-place. The chimney itself was wide enough inside for a man to stand up and walk about.

So there was plenty of room for a little Tom Cat.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

He jumped right up into the fire-place,

balancing himself upon the iron bar where the kettle hangs.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Tom Kitten took another big jump off the bar,

and landed on a ledge high up inside the chimney,

knocking down some soot into the fender.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Tom Kitten coughed and choked with the smoke; and he could hear the sticks beginning to crackle and burn in the fire-place down below.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"I cannot go back. If I slipped I might fall in the fire and singe my beautiful tail and my little blue jacket."

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

So he made up his mind to climb right to the top,

and get out on the slates, and try to catch sparrows.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The chimney was a very big old-fashioned one.

It was built in the days when people burnt logs of wood upon the hearth.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The chimney stack stood up above the roof like a little stone tower, and the daylight shone down from the top, under the slanting slates that kept out the rain.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Tom Kitten was getting very frightened!

He climbed up, and up, and up.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Then he waded sideways through inches of soot.

He was like a little chimney sweep.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

It was most confusing in the dark. One flue seemed to lead into another.There was less smoke, but Tom Kitten felt quite lost.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

He scrambled up and up; but before he reached the chimney top he came to a place where somebody had loosened a stone in the wall.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

There were some mutton bones lying about.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"This seems funny," said Tom Kitten.

"Who has been gnawing bones up here in the chimney?

I wish I had never come!

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

And what a funny smell?

It is something like mouse; only dreadfully strong.

It makes me sneeze," said Tom Kitten.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

He squeezed through the hole in the wall, and dragged himself along a most uncomfortably tight passage,

where there was scarcely any light.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

He groped his way carefully for several yards;

He was at the back of the skirting-board in the attic, where there is a little mark * in the picture.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

All at once he fell head over heels in the dark, down a hole, and landed on a heap of very dirty rags.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

When Tom Kitten picked himself up and looked about him.

He found himself in a place that he had never seen before, although he had lived in the house all his life.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

It was a very small stuffy fusty room,

with boards, and rafters, and cobwebs,

and lath and plaster. Opposite to him, as far away as he could sit, was an enormous rat.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"What do you mean by tumbling into my bed all covered with smuts?" said the rat, chattering his teeth.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Please sir, the chimney wants sweeping,"said poor Tom Kitten.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Anna Maria! Anna Maria!" squeaked the rat.

There was a pattering noise and an old woman rat poked her head round a rafter.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

All in a minute she rushed upon Tom Kitten.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Before Tom knew what was happening,

his coat was pulled off, and he was rolled up in a bundle,

and tied with string in very hard knots.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Anna Maria did the tying.

The old rat watched her and took snuff.

When she had finished,

they both sat staring at him with their mouths open.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Anna Maria," said the old man rat

(whose name was Samuel Whiskers),

"make me a kitten dumpling roly-poly pudding for my dinner."

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"It requires dough and a pat of butter,

and a rolling-pin," said Anna Maria,

considering Tom Kitten with her head on one side.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The two rats consulted together for a few minutes.

"Make it properly with breadcrumbs," said Samuel Whiskers.“

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Nonsense! Butter and dough,"

replied Anna Maria.Then they went away.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Samuel Whiskers got through a hole in the wainscot,

and went boldly down the front staircase to the dairy to get the butter. He did not meet anybody.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

He made a second journey for the rolling-pin.

He pushed it in front of him with his paws,

like a brewer's man trundling a barrel.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

He could hear Ribby and Tabitha talking,

but they were busy lighting the candle to look into the clothes chest.

They did not see him.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Anna Maria went down by way of the skirting-board and a window shutter to the kitchen to steal the dough.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

She borrowed a small saucer,

and scooped up the dough with her paws.

She did not observe Moppet.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

While Tom Kitten was left alone under the floor of the attic,

he wriggled about and tried to mew for help.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

But his mouth was full of soot and cobwebs, and he was tied up in such very tight knots,

he could not make anybody hear him.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Except a spider, who came out of a crack in the ceiling and examined the knots critically, from a safe distance.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

It was a judge of knots because it had a habit of tying up unfortunate blue-bottles.

It did not offer to assist him.

Tom Kitten wriggled and squirmed until he was quite exhausted.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Presently the rats came back and set to work to make him into a dumpling.

First they smeared him with butter,

and then they rolled him in the dough.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Will not the string be very indigestible,

Anna Maria?" inquired Samuel Whiskers.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Anna Maria said that it was of no consequence.”

But she wished that Tom Kitten would hold his head still, as it disarranged the pastry. She laid hold of his ears.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Tom Kitten bit and spat, and mewed and wriggled.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The rats each held an end and the rolling-pin went roly-poly-roly, roly-poly-roly.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"His tail is sticking out! You did not fetch enough dough, Anna Maria.“

"I fetched as much as I could carry," replied Anna Maria.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"I do not think,“ said Samuel Whiskers,

pausing to take a look at Tom Kitten,

"I do not think it will be a good pudding.

It smells sooty."

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Anna Maria was about to argue the point,

when all at once there began to be other sounds up above.

The rasping noise of a saw; and the noise of a little dog,

scratching and yelping!

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The rats dropped the rolling-pin,

and listened attentively.

"We are discovered and interrupted, Anna Maria;

let us collect our property and other people's,

and depart at once."

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"I fear that we shall be obliged to leave this pudding.“

"But I am persuaded that the knots would have proved indigestible, whatever you may urge to the contrary."

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

"Come away at once and help me to tie up some mutton bones in a counterpane," said Anna Maria.

"I have got half a smoked ham hidden in the chimney."

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

So it happened that by the time John Joiner had got the plank up, there was nobody under the floor except the rolling-pin and Tom Kitten in a very dirty dumpling!

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

But there was a strong smell of rats;

and John Joiner spent the rest of the morning sniffing and whining, and wagging his tail, and going round and round with his head in the hole like a gimlet.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Then he nailed the plank down again

and put his tools in his bag,

and came downstairs.

The cat family had quite recovered.

They invited him to stay to dinner.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

They had been obliged to put Tom Kitten into a hot bath to get the butter off.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

The dumpling had been peeled off Tom Kitten,

and made separately into a bag pudding,

with currants in it to hide the smuts.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

John Joiner smelt the pudding;

but regretted he couldn’t stay to dinner,

he had just finished making a wheel-barrow for Miss Potter,

and she had ordered two hen-coops.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

“And I saw Mr. Samuel Whiskers and his wife on the run,

with big bundles on a little wheel-barrow, which looked,

very like mine.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

They were just turning in at the gate to the barn of Farmer Potatoes.

Samuel Whiskers was puffing and out of breath.

Anna Maria was still arguing in shrill tones.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

She seemed to have a quantity of luggage.

I am sure I never gave her leave to borrow my wheel-barrow!

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

They went into the barn,

and hauled their parcels with a bit of string to the top of the hay mow.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

After that, there were no more rats for a long time at Tabitha Twitchit's.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

As for Farmer Potatoes,

he has been driven nearly distracted.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

There are rats, and rats, and rats in his barn!

They eat up the chicken food,

and steal the oats and bran,

and make holes in the meal bags.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

And they are all descended from Mr. and Mrs.

Samuel Whiskers,

children,

grand-children,

great, great,

grand-children.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

There is no end to them!

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

Moppet and Mittens have grown up into very good rat-catchers.

They go out rat-catching in the village,

and they find plenty of employment.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers They charge so much a dozen,

and earn their living very comfortably.

They hang up the rats' tails in a row on the barn door,

to show how many they have caught

- dozens and dozens of them.

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers But Tom Kitten

has always been afraid of rats;

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

He never dares face anything that is bigger than… a mouse

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers

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1. The Worst Birthday

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6. Gilderoy Lockhart

7. Mudbloods and Murmurs

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9. The Writing on the Wall

10. The Rogue Bludger

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13. The Very Secret Diary

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15. Aragog

16. The Chamber of Secrets

17. The Heir of Slytherin

18. Dobby's reward

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Download Fairy Tale Old Sultan PDF

A Fairy tale The Tinder Box - By Hans Christian Andersen

A Fairy Tale The Tinder Box

A Fairy Tale The Twelve Huntsmen By The Brothers Grimm

A Fairy Tale

The Twelve Huntsmen

" The Twelve Brothers "

Summary and Download Story Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

The Story Of Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone

(Harry Potter and The Wizard's Stone)

Dursley family

The Boy Who Lived

Strange things happen

The Vanishing Glass

The letters from nowhere

The keeper of the keys

Daejeon Alley

The Way of Traverse

The Magic Choice

The Midnight Duel

Quidditch game

The Mirror of Erised

Norbert the Dragon

The Forbidden Forest

decided steal the Wizard's Stone

In the last room

Harry wakes up

At the end of the year

Download Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone .PDF

A Fairy Tale The Frog King Or Iron Henry - By The Brothers Grimm

The Frog King Or Iron Henry

The Last Dream of Old Oak by Hans Christian Andersen

Story While the Light Lasts - Author : Agatha Christie

WHILE THE LIGHT LASTS

Story Marching to Freedom Author: Subhadra Sen Gupta

Story Off to See Spiders! Author: Vena Kapoor

Book A Passion in the Desert By Honoré de Balzac

A farmer once had a faithful dog called Sultan,

who had grown old, and lost all his teeth, so that he could no longer hold anything fast.