He fluttered slowly to the ground and paused for a few minutes under a thicket of syringas , and while he was gazing about him , there walked slowly past a flock of the same beautiful birds he had seen so many months ago . Fascinated , he watched them one by one step into the canal , and float quietly upon the waters as if they were part of them . ' I will follow them , ' said the duckling to himself ; ` ugly though I am , I would rather be killed by them than suffer all I have suffered from cold and hunger , and from the ducks and fowls who should have treated me kindly . ' And flying quickly down to the water , he swam after them as fast as he could . It did not take him long to reach them , for they had stopped to rest in a green pool shaded by a tree whose branches swept the water . And directly they saw him coming some of the younger ones swam out to meet him with cries of welcome , which again the duckling hardly understood . He approached them glad , yet trembling , and turning to one of the older birds , who by this time had left the shade of the tree , he said : ` If I am to die , I would rather you should kill me . I do n't know why I was ever hatched , for I am too ugly to live . ' And as he spoke , he bowed his head and looked down into the water . Reflected in the still pool he saw many white shapes , with long necks and golden bills , and , without thinking , he looked for the dull grey body and the awkward skinny neck . But no such thing was there . Instead , he beheld beneath him a beautiful white swan ! ` The new one is the best of all , ' said the children when they came down to feed the swans with biscuit and cake before going to bed . ` His feathers are whiter and his beak more golden than the rest . ' And when he heard that , the duckling thought that it was worth while having undergone all the persecution and loneliness that he had passed through , as otherwise he would never have known what it was to be really happy . The Two Caskets -LSB- Hans Andersen . -RSB- Far , far away , in the midst of a pine forest , there lived a woman who had both a daughter and a stepdaughter . Ever since her own daughter was born the mother had given her all that she cried for , so she grew up to be as cross and disagreeable as she was ugly . Her stepsister , on the other hand , had spent her childhood in working hard to keep house for her father , who died soon after his second marriage ; and she was as much beloved by the neighbours for her goodness and industry as she was for her beauty . As the years went on , the difference between the two girls grew more marked , and the old woman treated her stepdaughter worse than ever , and was always on the watch for some pretext for beating her , or depriving her of her food .
Anything , however foolish , was good enough XXXXX this , and one day , when she could think of nothing better , she set both the girls to spin while sitting on the low wall of the well .
If after by for from on since so while with