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TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES


Obvious spelling, typographical and punctuation errors have been
corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within the
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  WONDERFUL STORIES
  FOR CHILDREN.

  BY HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN,
  AUTHOR OF "THE IMPROVISATORE," ETC.

  TRANSLATED FROM THE DANISH BY MARY HOWITT.

  NEW YORK.
  WILEY & PUTNAM,
  161 Broadway.

  1846.




CONTENTS.


                                                     PAGE

  OLE LUCKOIE--THE STORY-TELLER AT NIGHT                5

  THE DAISY                                            28

  THE NAUGHTY BOY                                      37

  TOMMELISE                                            42

  THE ROSE-ELF                                         64

  THE GARDEN OF PARADISE                               74

  A NIGHT IN THE KITCHEN                              102

  LITTLE IDA'S FLOWERS                                108

  THE CONSTANT TIN SOLDIER                            124

  THE STORKS                                          133




OLE LUCKOIE, (SHUT-EYE.)


There is nobody in all this world who knows so many tales as Ole
Luckoie! He can tell tales! In an evening, when a child sits so nicely
at the table, or on its little stool, Ole Luckoie comes. He comes
so quietly into the house, for he walks without shoes; he opens the
door without making any noise, and then he flirts sweet milk into the
children's eyes; but so gently, so very gently, that they cannot keep
their eyes open, and, therefore, they never see him; he steals softly
behind them and blows gently on their necks, and thus their heads
become heavy. Oh yes! But then it does them no harm; for Ole Luckoie
means nothing but kindness to the children, he only wants to amuse
them; and the best thing that can be done is for somebody to carry them
to bed, where they may lie still and listen to the tales that he will
tell them.

Now when the children are asleep, Ole Luckoie sits down on the bed;
he is very well dressed; his coat is of silk, but it is not possible
to tell what color it is, because it shines green, and red, and blue,
just as if one color ran into another. He holds an umbrella under each
arm; one of them is covered all over the inside with pictures, and
this he sets over the good child, and it dreams all night long the
most beautiful histories. The other umbrella has nothing at all within
it; this he sets over the heads of naughty children, and they sleep so
heavily, that next morning when they wake they have not dreamed the
least in the world.

Now we will hear how Ole Luckoie came every evening for a whole week to
a little boy, whose name was Yalmar, and what he told him. There are
seven stories, because there are seven days in a week.


MONDAY.

"Just listen!" said Ole Luckoie, in the evening, when they had put
Yalmar in bed; "now I shall make things fine!"--and with that all the
plants in the flower-pots grew up into great trees which stretched
out their long branches along the ceiling and the walls, till the
whole room looked like the most beautiful summer-house; and all the
branches were full of flowers, and every flower was more beautiful than
a rose, and was so sweet, that if anybody smelt at it, it was sweeter
than raspberry jam! The fruit on the trees shone like gold, and great
big bunches of raisins hung down--never had any thing been seen like
it!--but all at once there began such a dismal lamentation in the
table-drawer where Yalmar kept his school-books.

"What is that?" said Ole Luckoie, and went to the table and opened
the drawer. It was the slate that was in great trouble; for there was
an addition sum on it that was added up wrong, and the slate-pencil
was hopping and jumping about in its string, like a little dog that
wanted to help the sum, but it could not! And besides this, Yalmar's
copy-book was crying out sadly! All the way down each page stood a
row of great letters, each with a little one by its side; these were
the copy; and then there stood other letters, which fancied that they
looked like the copy; and these Yalmar had written; but they were
some one way and some another, just as if they were tumbling over the
pencil-lines on which they ought to have stood.

"Look, you should hold yourselves up--thus!" said the copy; "thus, all
in a line, with a brisk air!"

"Oh! we would so gladly, if we could," said Yalmar's writing; "but we
cannot, we are so miserable!"

"Then we will make you!" said Ole Luckoie gruffly.

"Oh, no!" cried the poor little crooked letters; but for all that they
straightened themselves, till it was quite a pleasure to see them.

"Now, then, cannot we tell a story?" said Ole Luckoie; "now I can
exercise them! One, two! One, two!" And so, like a drill-sergeant, he
put them all through their exercise, and they stood as straight and
as well-shaped as any copy. After that Ole Luckoie went his way; and
Yalmar, when he looked at the letters next morning, found them tumbling
about just as miserably as at first.


TUESDAY.

No sooner was Yalmar in bed than Ole Luckoie came with his little wand,
and touched all the furniture in the room; and, in a minute, every
thing began to chatter; and they chattered all together, and about
nothing but themselves. Every thing talked except the old door-mat,
which lay silent, and was vexed that they should be all so full of
vanity as to talk of nothing but themselves, and think only about
themselves, and never have one thought for it which lay so modestly in
a corner and let itself be trodden upon.

There hung over the chest of drawers a great picture in a gilt frame;
it was a landscape; one could see tall, old trees, flowers in the
grass, and a great river, which ran through great woods, past many
castles out into the wild sea.

Ole Luckoie touched the picture with his wand; and with that the birds
in the picture began to sing, the tree-branches began to wave, and the
clouds regularly to move,--one could see them moving along over the
landscape!

Ole Luckoie now lifted little Yalmar up into the picture; he put his
little legs right into it, just as if into tall grass, and there he
stood. The sun shone down through the tree-branches upon him. He ran
down to the river, and got into a little boat which lay there. It was
painted red and white, the sails shone like silk, and six swans, each
with a circlet of gold round its neck and a beaming blue star upon its
head, drew the little boat past the green-wood,--where he heard the
trees talking about robbers, and witches, and flowers, and the pretty
little fairies, and all that the summer birds had told them of.

The loveliest fishes, with scales like silver and gold, swam after the
boat, and leaped up in the water; and birds, some red and some blue,
small and great, flew, in two long rows, behind; gnats danced about,
and cockchafers said hum, hum! They all came following Yalmar, and you
may think what a deal they had to tell him.

It was a regular voyage! Now the woods were so thick and so dark--now
they were like the most beautiful garden, with sunshine and flowers;
and in the midst of them there stood great castles of glass and of
marble. Upon the balconies of these castles stood princesses, and every
one of them were the little girls whom Yalmar knew very well, and with
whom he had played. They all reached out their hands to him, and held
out the most delicious sticks of barley-sugar which any confectioner
could make; and Yalmar bit off a piece from every stick of barley-sugar
as he sailed past, and Yalmar's piece was always a very large piece!
Before every castle stood little princes as sentinels; they stood with
their golden swords drawn, and showered down almonds and raisins. They
were perfect princes!

Yalmar soon sailed through the wood, then through a great hall, or into
the midst of a city; and at last he came to that in which his nurse
lived, she who had nursed him when he was a very little child, and
had been so very fond of him. And there he saw her, and she nodded
and waved her hand to him, and sang the pretty little verse which she
herself had made about Yalmar--

    Full many a time I thee have missed,
      My Yalmar, my delight!
    I, who thy cherry-mouth have kissed,
      Thy rosy cheeks, thy forehead white!
    I saw thy earliest infant mirth--
      I now must say farewell!
    May our dear Lord bless thee on earth,
      Then take thee to his heaven to dwell!

And all the birds sang, too, the flowers danced upon their stems, and
the old trees nodded like as Ole Luckoie did while he told his tales.


WEDNESDAY.

How the rain did pour down! Yalmar could hear it in his sleep! and
when Ole Luckoie opened the casement, the water stood up to the very
window-sill. There was a regular sea outside; but the most splendid
ship lay close up to the house.

"If thou wilt sail with me, little Yalmar," said Ole Luckoie, "thou
canst reach foreign countries in the night, and be here again by
to-morrow morning!"

And with this Yalmar stood in his Sunday clothes in the ship, and
immediately the weather became fine, and they sailed through the
streets, tacked about round the church, and then came out into a great,
desolate lake. They sailed so far, that at last they could see no more
land, and then they saw a flock of storks, which were coming from home,
on their way to the warm countries; one stork after another flew on,
and they had already flown such a long, long way. One of the storks was
so very much tired that it seemed as if his wings could not support him
any longer; he was the very last of all the flock, and got farther and
farther behind them; and, at last, he sank lower and lower, with his
outspread wings: he still flapped his wings, now and then, but that
did not help him; now his feet touched the cordage of the ship; now he
glided down the sail, and, bounce! down he came on the deck.

A sailor-boy then took him up, and set him in the hencoop among hens,
and ducks, and turkeys. The poor stork stood quite confounded among
them all.

"Here's a thing!" said all the hens.

And the turkey-cock blew himself up as much as ever he could, and asked
the stork who he was; and the ducks they went on jostling one against
the other, saying, "Do thou ask! do thou ask!"

The stork told them all about the warm Africa, about the pyramids, and
about the simoom, which sped like a horse over the desert: but the
ducks understood not a word about what he said, and so they whispered
one to the other, "We are all agreed, he is silly!"

"Yes, to be sure, he is silly," said the turkey-cock aloud. The poor
stork stood quite still, and thought about Africa.

"What a pair of beautiful thin legs you have got!" said the
turkey-cock; "what is the price by the yard?"

"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed all the ducks; but the stork pretended that he
did not hear.

"I cannot help laughing," said the turkey-cock, "it was so very witty;
or, perhaps, it was too low for him!--ha! ha! he can't take in many
ideas! Let us only be interesting to ourselves!" And with that they
began to gobble, and the ducks chattered, "Gik, gak! gik, gak!" It was
amazing to see how entertaining they were to themselves.

Yalmar, however, went up to the hencoop, opened the door, and called
to the stork, which hopped out to him on the deck. It had now rested
itself; and it seemed as if it nodded to Yalmar to thank him. With this
it spread out its wings and flew away to its warm countries; but the
hens clucked, the ducks chattered, and the turkey-cocks grew quite red
in the head.

"To-morrow we shall have you for dinner!" said Yalmar; and so he awoke,
and was lying in his little bed.

It was, however, a wonderful voyage that Ole Luckoie had taken him that
night.


THURSDAY.

"Dost thou know what?" said Ole Luckoie. "Now do not be afraid, and
thou shalt see a little mouse!" and with that he held out his hand with
the pretty little creature in it.

"It is come to invite thee to a wedding," said he. "There are two
little mice who are going to be married to-night; they live down
under the floor of thy mother's store-closet; it will be such a nice
opportunity for thee."

"But how can I get through the little mouse-hole in the floor?" asked
Yalmar.

"Leave that to me," said Ole Luckoie; "I shall make thee little
enough!" And with that he touched Yalmar with his wand, and immediately
he grew less and less, until at last he was no bigger than my finger.

"Now thou canst borrow the tin soldier's clothes," said Ole Luckoie; "I
think they would fit thee, and it looks so proper to have uniform on
when people go into company."

"Yes, to be sure!" said Yalmar; and in a moment he was dressed up like
the most beautiful new tin soldier.

"Will you be so good as to seat yourself in your mother's thimble,"
said the little mouse; "and then I shall have the honor of driving you!"

"Goodness!" said Yalmar; "will the young lady herself take the
trouble?" and with that they drove to the mouse's wedding.

First of all, after going under the floor, they came into a long
passage, which was so low that they could hardly drive in the thimble,
and the whole passage was illuminated with touchwood.

"Does it not smell delicious?" said the mouse as they drove along; "the
whole passage has been rubbed with bacon-sward; nothing can be more
delicious!"

They now came into the wedding-hall. On the right hand stood the little
she-mice, and they all whispered and tittered as if they were making
fun of one another; on the left hand all the he-mice, and stroked their
mustachios with their paws. In the middle of the floor were to be seen
the bridal pair, who stood in a hollow cheese-paring; and they kept
kissing one another before everybody, for they were desperately in
love, and were going to be married directly.

And all this time there kept coming in more and more strangers, till
one mouse was ready to trample another to death; and the bridal pair
had placed themselves in a doorway, so that people could neither go in
nor come out. The whole room, like the passage, had been smeared with
sward of bacon; that was all the entertainment: but as a dessert a pea
was produced, on which a little mouse of family had bitten the name of
the bridal pair,--that is to say, the first letters of their name; that
was something quite out of the common way.

All the mice said that it was a charming wedding, and that the
conversation had been so good!

Yalmar drove home again; he had really been in very grand society, but
he must have been regularly squeezed together to make himself small
enough for a tin soldier's uniform.


FRIDAY.

"It is incredible how many elderly people there are who would be so
glad of me," said Ole Luckoie, "especially those who have done any
thing wrong. 'Good little Ole,' say they to me, 'we cannot close our
eyes; and so we lie all night long awake, and see all our bad deeds,
which sit, like ugly little imps, on the bed's head, and squirt hot
water on us. Wilt thou only just come and drive them away, that we may
have a good sleep!' and with that they heave such deep sighs--'we would
so gladly pay thee; good-night, Ole!' Silver pennies lie for me in the
window," said Ole Luckoie, "but I do not give sleep for money!"

"Now what shall we have to-night?" inquired Yalmar.

"I do not know whether thou hast any desire to go again to-night to a
wedding," said Ole Luckoie; "but it is of a different kind to that of
last night. Thy sister's great doll, which is dressed like a gentleman,
and is called Herman, is going to be married to the doll Bertha;
besides, it is the doll's birthday, and therefore there will be a great
many presents made."

"Yes, I know," said Yalmar; "always, whenever the dolls have new
clothes, my sister entreats that they have a birthday or a wedding;
that has happened certainly a hundred times!"

"Yes, but to-night it is the hundred and first wedding, and when
a hundred and one is done then all is over! Therefore it will be
incomparably grand. Only look!"

Yalmar looked at the table; there stood the little doll's house
with lights in the windows, and all the tin soldiers presented arms
outside. The bridal couple sat upon the floor, and leaned against the
table-legs, and looked very pensive, and there might be reason for it.
But Ole Luckoie, dressed in the grandmother's black petticoat, married
them, and when they were married, all the furniture in the room joined
in the following song, which was written in pencil, and which was sung
to the tune of the drum:--

    Our song like a wind comes flitting
    Into the room where the bride-folks are sitting;
    They are partly of wood, as is befitting:
    Their skin is the skin of a glove well fitting!
    Hurrah, hurrah! for sitting and fitting!
    Thus sing we aloud as the wind comes flitting!

And now the presents were brought, but they had forbidden any kind of
eatables, for their love was sufficient for them.

"Shall we stay in the country, or shall we travel into foreign parts?"
asked the bridegroom; and with that they begged the advice of the
breeze, which had travelled a great deal, and of the old hen, which
had had five broods of chickens. The breeze told them about the
beautiful, warm countries where the bunches of grapes hung so large and
so heavy; where the air was so mild, and the mountains had colors of
which one could have no idea "in this country."

"But there they have not our green cabbage!" said the hen. "I lived
for one summer with all my chickens in the country; there was a dry,
dusty ditch in which we could go and scuttle, and we had admittance to
a garden where there was green cabbage! O, how green it was! I cannot
fancy any thing more beautiful!"

"But one cabbage-stalk looks just like another," said the breeze; "and
then there is such wretched weather here."

"Yes, but one gets used to it," said the hen.

"But it is cold--it freezes!"

"That is good for the cabbage!" said the hen. "Besides, we also have
it warm. Had not we four years ago a summer which lasted five weeks,
and it was so hot that people did not know how to bear it? And then we
have not all the poisonous creatures which they have there! and we are
far from robbers. He is a good-for-nothing fellow who does not think
our country the most beautiful in the world! and he does not deserve to
be here!" and with that the hen cried.--"And I also have travelled,"
continued she; "I have gone in a boat above twelve miles; there is no
pleasure in travelling."

"The hen is a sensible body!" said the doll Bertha; "I would rather not
travel to the mountains, for it is only going up to come down again.
No! we will go down into the ditch, and walk in the cabbage-garden."

And so they did.


SATURDAY.

"Shall I have any stories?" said little Yalmar, as soon as Ole Luckoie
had put him to sleep.

"In the evening we have no time for any," said Ole, and spread out
his most beautiful umbrella above his head. "Look now at this Chinese
scene!" and with that the whole inside of the umbrella looked like a
great china saucer, with blue trees and pointed bridges, on which
stood little Chinese, who stood and nodded with their heads. "We shall
have all the world dressed up beautifully this morning," said Ole, "for
it is really a holiday; it is Sunday. I shall go up into the church
towers to see whether the little church-elves polish the bells, because
they sound so sweetly. I shall go out into the market, and see whether
the wind blows the dust, and grass, and leaves, and what is the hardest
work there. I shall have all the stars down to polish them; I shall put
them into my apron, but first of all I must have them all numbered, and
the holes where they fit up there numbered also; else we shall never
put them into their proper places again, and then they will not be
firm, and we shall have so many falling stars, one dropping down after
another!"

"Hear, you Mr. Luckoie, there!" said an old portrait that hung on the
wall of the room where Yalmar slept: "I am Yalmar's grandfather. We are
obliged to you for telling the boy pretty stories, but you must not go
and confuse his ideas. The stars cannot be taken down and polished! The
stars are globes like our earth, and they want nothing doing at them!"

"Thou shalt have thanks, thou old grandfather," said Ole Luckoie;
"thanks thou shalt have! Thou art, to be sure, the head of the family;
thou art the old head of the family; but for all that, I am older than
thou! I am an old heathen; the Greeks and the Romans called me the god
of dreams. I go into great folks' houses, and I shall go there still. I
know how to manage both with young and old. But now thou mayst take thy
turn." And with this Ole Luckoie went away, and took his umbrella with
him.

"Now, one cannot tell what he means!" said the old Portrait.

And Yalmar awoke.


SUNDAY.

"Good-evening!" said Ole Luckoie, and Yalmar nodded; but he jumped up
and turned the grandfather's portrait to the wall, that it might not
chatter as it had done the night before.

"Now thou shalt tell me a story," said Yalmar, "about the five peas
that live in one pea-pod, and about Hanebeen who cured Honebeen; and
about the darning-needle, that was so fine that it fancied itself a
sewing-needle."

"One might do a deal of good by so doing," said Ole Luckoie; "but, dost
thou know, I would rather show thee