How astonishingly cold it is! My body is cracking all over!' said the
Snow-man. 'The wind is really cutting one's very life out! And how that
fiery thing up there glares!' He meant the sun, which was just setting.
'It sha'n't make me blink, though, and I shall keep quite cool and
collected.'

Instead of eyes he had two large three-cornered pieces of slate in his
head; his mouth consisted of an old rake, so that he had teeth as well.

He was born amidst the shouts and laughter of the boys, and greeted by
the jingling bells and cracking whips of the sledges.

The sun went down, the full moon rose, large, round, clear and
beautiful, in the dark blue sky.

'There it is again on the other side!' said the Snow-man, by which he
meant the sun was appearing again. 'I have become quite accustomed to
its glaring. I hope it will hang there and shine, so that I may be
able to see myself. I wish I knew, though, how one ought to see about
changing one's position. I should very much like to move about. If I
only could, I would glide up and down the ice there, as I saw the boys
doing; but somehow or other, I don't know how to run.'

'Bow-wow!' barked the old yard-dog; he was rather hoarse and couldn't
bark very well. His hoarseness came on when he was a house-dog and used
to lie in front of the stove. 'The sun will soon teach you to run! I saw
that last winter with your predecessor, and farther back still with his
predecessors! They have all run away!'

'I don't understand you, my friend,' said the Snow-man. 'That thing up
there is to teach me to run?' He meant the moon. 'Well, it certainly did
run just now, for I saw it quite plainly over there, and now here it is
on this side.'

'You know nothing at all about it,' said the yard-dog. 'Why, you have
only just been made. The thing you see there is the moon; the other
thing you saw going down the other side was the sun. He will come up
again tomorrow morning, and will soon teach you how to run away down the
gutter. The weather is going to change; I feel it already by the pain in
my left hind-leg; the weather is certainly going to change.'

'I can't understand him,' said the Snow-man; 'but I have an idea that he
is speaking of something unpleasant. That thing that glares so, and then
disappears, the sun, as he calls it, is not my friend. I know that by
instinct.'

'Bow-wow!' barked the yard-dog, and walked three times round himself,
and then crept into his kennel to sleep. The weather really did change.
Towards morning a dense damp fog lay over the whole neighbourhood; later
on came an icy wind, which sent the frost packing. But when the sun
rose, it was a glorious sight. The trees and shrubs were covered with
rime, and looked like a wood of coral, and every branch was thick with
long white blossoms. The most delicate twigs, which are lost among the
foliage in summer-time, came now into prominence, and it was like a
spider's web of glistening white. The lady-birches waved in the wind;
and when the sun shone, everything glittered and sparkled as if it were
sprinkled with diamond dust, and great diamonds were lying on the snowy
carpet.

'Isn't it wonderful?' exclaimed a girl who was walking with a young
man in the garden. They stopped near the Snow-man, and looked at the
glistening trees. 'Summer cannot show a more beautiful sight,' she said,
with her eyes shining.

'And one can't get a fellow like this in summer either,' said the young
man, pointing to the Snow-man. 'He's a beauty!'

The girl laughed, and nodded to the Snow-man, and then they both danced
away over the snow.

'Who were those two?' asked the Snow-man of the yard-dog. 'You have been
in this yard longer than I have. Do you know who they are?'

'Do I know them indeed?' answered the yard-dog. 'She has often stroked
me, and he has given me bones. I don't bite either of them!'

'But what are they?' asked the Snow-man.

'Lovers!' replied the yard-dog. 'They will go into one kennel and gnaw
the same bone!'

'Are they the same kind of beings that we are?' asked the Snow-man.

'They are our masters,' answered the yard-dog. 'Really people who have
only been in the world one day know very little.' That's the conclusion
I have come to. Now I have age and wisdom; I know everyone in the house,
and I can remember a time when I was not lying here in a cold kennel.
Bow-wow!'

'The cold is splendid,' said the Snow-man. 'Tell me some more. But don't
rattle your chain so, it makes me crack!'

'Bow-wow!' barked the yard-dog. 'They used to say I was a pretty little
fellow; then I lay in a velvet-covered chair in my master's house. My
mistress used to nurse me, and kiss and fondle me, and call me her dear,
sweet little Alice! But by-and-by I grew too big, and I was given to the
housekeeper, and I went into the kitchen. You can see into it from where
you are standing; you can look at the room in which I was master, for so
I was when I was with the housekeeper. Of course it was a smaller place
than upstairs, but it was more comfortable, for I wasn't chased about
and teased by the children as I had been before. My food was just as
good, or even better. I had my own pillow, and there was a stove there,
which at this time of year is the most beautiful thing in the world. I
used to creep right under that stove. Ah me! I often dream of that stove
still! Bow-wow!'

'Is a stove so beautiful?' asked the Snow-man. 'Is it anything like me?'

'It is just the opposite of you! It is coal-black, and has a long neck
with a brass pipe. It eats firewood, so that fire spouts out of its
mouth. One has to keep close beside it-quite underneath is the nicest of
all. You can see it through the window from where you are standing.'

And the Snow-man looked in that direction, and saw a smooth polished
object with a brass pipe. The flicker from the fire reached him across
the snow. The Snow-man felt wonderfully happy, and a feeling came over
him which he could not express; but all those who are not snow-men know
about it.

'Why did you leave her?' asked the Snow-man. He had a feeling that such
a being must be a lady. 'How could you leave such a place?'

'I had to!' said the yard-dog. 'They turned me out of doors, and chained
me up here. I had bitten the youngest boy in the leg, because he took
away the bone I was gnawing; a bone for a bone, I thought! But they were
very angry, and from that time I have been chained here, and I have lost
my voice. Don't you hear how hoarse I am? Bow-wow! I can't speak like
other dogs. Bow-wow! That was the end of happiness!'

The Snow-man, however, was not listening to him any more; he was looking
into the room where the housekeeper lived, where the stove stood on its
four iron legs, and seemed to be just the same size as the Snow-man.

'How something is cracking inside me!' he said. 'Shall I never be able
to get in there? It is certainly a very innocent wish, and our innocent
wishes ought to be fulfilled. I must get there, and lean against the
stove, if I have to break the window first!'

'You will never get inside there!' said the yard-dog; 'and if you were
to reach the stove you would disappear. Bow-wow!'

'I'm as good as gone already!' answered the Snow-man. 'I believe I'm
breaking up!'

The whole day the Snow-man looked through the window; towards dusk the
room grew still more inviting; the stove gave out a mild light, not at
all like the moon or even the sun; no, as only a stove can shine, when
it has something to feed upon. When the door of the room was open, it
flared up-this was one of its peculiarities; it flickered quite red upon
the Snow-man's white face.

'I can't stand it any longer!' he said. 'How beautiful it looks with its
tongue stretched out like that!'

It was a long night, but the Snow-man did not find it so; there he
stood, wrapt in his pleasant thoughts, and they froze, so that he
cracked.

Next morning the panes of the kitchen window were covered with ice, and
the most beautiful ice-flowers that even a snow-man could desire, only
they blotted out the stove. The window would not open; he couldn't see
the stove which he thought was such a lovely lady. There was a cracking
and cracking inside him and all around; there was just such a frost as a
snow-man would delight in. But this Snow-man was different: how could he
feel happy?

'Yours is a bad illness for a Snow-man!' said the yard-dog. 'I also
suffered from it, but I have got over it. Bow-wow!' he barked. 'The
weather is going to change!' he added.

The weather did change. There came a thaw.

When this set in the Snow-man set off. He did not say anything, and he
did not complain, and those are bad signs.

One morning he broke up altogether. And lo! where he had stood there
remained a broomstick standing upright, round which the boys had built
him!

'Ah! now I understand why he loved the stove,' said the yard-dog.
'That is the raker they use to clean out the stove! The Snow-man had a
stove-raker in his body! That's what was the matter with him! And now
it's all over with him! Bow-wow!'

And before long it was all over with the winter too! 'Bow-wow!' barked
the hoarse yard-dog.

But the young girl sang:

     Woods, your bright green garments don!
     Willows, your woolly gloves put on!
     Lark and cuckoo, daily sing--     February has brought the spring!
     My heart joins in your song so sweet;
     Come out, dear sun, the world to greet!

And no one thought of the Snow-man.

A poor woodcutter lived with his wife and three daughters in a little
hut on the borders of a great forest.

One morning as he was going to his work, he said to his wife, 'Let our
eldest daughter bring me my lunch into the wood; and so that she shall
not lose her way, I will take a bag of millet with me, and sprinkle the
seed on the path.'

When the sun had risen high over the forest, the girl set out with a
basin of soup. But the field and wood sparrows, the larks and finches,
blackbirds and green finches had picked up the millet long ago, and the
girl could not find her way.

She went on and on, till the sun set and night came on. The trees
rustled in the darkness, the owls hooted, and she began to be very much
frightened. Then she saw in tile distance a light that twinkled between
the trees. 'There must be people living yonder,' she thought, 'who will
take me in for the night,' and she began walking towards it.

Not long afterwards she came to a house with lights in the windows.

She knocked at the door, and a gruff voice called, 'Come in!'

The girl stepped into the dark entrance, and tapped at the door of the
room.

'Just walk in,' cried the voice, and when she opened the door there sat
an old gray-haired man at the table. His face was resting on his hands,
and his white beard flowed over the table almost down to the ground.

By the stove lay three beasts, a hen, a cock, and a brindled cow. The
girl told the old man her story, and asked for a night's lodging.

The man said:

     Pretty cock,
     Pretty hen,
     And you, pretty brindled cow,
     What do you say now?

'Duks,' answered the beasts; and that must have meant, 'We are quite
willing,' for the old man went on, 'Here is abundance; go into the back
kitchen and cook us a supper.'

The girl found plenty of everything in the kitchen, and cooked a good
meal, but she did not think of the beasts.

She placed the full dishes on the table, sat down opposite the
gray-haired man, and ate till her hunger was appeased.

When she was satisfied, she said, 'But now I am so tired, where is a bed
in which I can sleep? '

The beasts answered:

     You have eaten with him,
     You have drunk with him,
     Of us you have not thought,
     Sleep then as you ought!

Then the old man said, 'Go upstairs, and there you will find a bedroom;
shake the bed, and put clean sheets on, and go to sleep.'

The maiden went upstairs, and when she had made the bed, she lay down.

After some time the gray-haired man came, looked at her by the light
of his candle, and shook his head. And when he saw that she was sound
asleep, he opened a trapdoor and let her fall into the cellar.

The woodcutter came home late in the evening, and reproached his wife
for leaving him all day without food.

'No, I did not,' she answered; 'the girl went off with your dinner. She
must have lost her way, but will no doubt come back to-morrow.'

But at daybreak the woodcutter started off into the wood, and this time
asked his second daughter to bring his food.

'I will take a bag of lentils,' said he; 'they are larger than millet,
and the girl will see them better and be sure to find her way.'

At midday the maiden took the food, but the lentils had all gone; as on
the previous day, the wood birds had eaten them all.

The maiden wandered about the wood till nightfall, when she came in
the same way to the old man's house, and asked for food and a night's
lodging.

The man with the white hair again asked the beasts:

     Pretty cock,
     Pretty hen,
     And you, pretty brindled cow,
     What do you say now?

The beasts answered, 'Duks,' and everything happened as on the former
day.

The girl cooked a good meal, ate and drank with the old man, and did not
trouble herself about the animals.

And when she asked for a bed, they replied:

     You have eaten with him
     You have drunk with him,
     Of us you have not thought,

Now sleep as you ought!

And when she was asleep, the old man shook his head over her, and let
her fall into the cellar.

On the third morning the woodcutter said to his wife, 'Send our youngest
child to-day with my dinner. She is always good and obedient, and will
keep to the right path, and not wander away like her sisters, idle
drones!'

But the mother said, 'Must I lose my dearest child too?'

'Do not fear,' he answered; 'she is too clever and intelligent to lose
her way. I will take plenty of peas with me and strew them along; they
are even larger than lentils, and will show her the way.'

But when the maiden started off with the basket on her arm, the wood
pigeons had eaten up the peas, and she did not know which way to go. She
was much distressed, and thought constantly of her poor hungry father
and her anxious mother. At last, when it grew dark, she saw the little
light, and came to the house in the wood. She asked prettily if she
might stay there for the night, and the man with the white beard asked
his beasts again:

     Pretty cock,
     Pretty hen,
     And you, pretty brindled cow,
     What do you say now?

'Duks,' they said. Then the maiden stepped up to the stove where the
animals were lying, and stroked the cock and the hen, and scratched the
brindled cow between its horns.

And when at the bidding of the old man she had prepared a good supper,
and the dishes were standing on the table, she said, 'Shall I have
plenty while the good beasts have nothing? There is food to spare
outside; I will attend to them first.'

Then she went out and fetched barley and strewed it before the cock and
hen, and brought the cow an armful of sweet-smelling hay.

'Eat that, dear beasts,' she said,' and when you are thirsty you shall
have a good drink.'

Then she fetched a bowl of water, and the cock and hen flew on to the
edge, put their beaks in, and then held up their heads as birds do when
they drink, and the brindled cow also drank her fill. When the beasts
were satisfied, the maiden sat down beside the old man at the table and
ate what was left for her. Soon the cock and hen began to tuck their
heads under their wings, and the brindled cow blinked its eyes, so the
maiden said, 'Shall we not go to rest now?'

     Pretty cock,
     Pretty hen,
     And you, pretty brindled cow,
     What do you say now?

The animals said, 'Duks:

     You have eaten with us,
     You have drunk with us,
     You have tended us right,
     So we wish you good night.'

The maiden therefore went upstairs, made the bed and put on clean sheets
and fell asleep. She slept peacefully till midnight, when there was such
a noise in the house that she awoke. Everything trembled and shook; the
animals sprang up and dashed themselves in terror against the wall; the
beams swayed as if they would be torn from their foundations, it seemed
as if the stairs were tumbling down, and then the roof fell in with a
crash. Then all became still, and as no harm came to the maiden she lay
down again and fell asleep. But when she awoke again in broad daylight,
what a sight met her eyes! She was lying in a splendid room furnished
with royal splendour; the walls were covered with golden flowers on a
green ground; the bed was of ivory and the counterpane of velvet, and on
a stool near by lay a pair of slippers studded with pearls. The maiden
thought she must be dreaming, but in came three servants richly dressed,
who asked what were her commands. 'Go,' said the maiden, 'I will get up
at once and cook the old man's supper for him, and then I will feed the
pretty cock and hen and the brindled cow.'

But the door opened and in came a handsome young man, who said, 'I am a
king's son, and was condemned by a wicked witch to live as an old man
in this wood with no company but that of my three servants, who were
transformed into a cock, a hen, and a brindled cow. The spell could only
be broken by the arrival of a maiden who should show herself kind
not only to men but to beasts. You are that maiden, and last night at
midnight we were freed, and this poor house was again transformed into
my royal palace.

As they stood there the king's son told his three servants to go and
fetch the maiden's parents to be present at the wedding feast.

'But where are my two sisters?' asked the maid.

'I shut them up in the cellar, but in the morning they shall be led
forth into the forest and shall serve a charcoal burner until they have
improved, and will never again suffer poor animals to go hungry.'

There was once a hard-working student who lived in an attic, and he had
nothing in the world of his own. There was also a hard-working grocer
who lived on the first floor, and he had the whole house for his own.

The Goblin belonged to him, for every Christmas Eve there was waiting
for him at the grocer's a dish of jam with a large lump of butter in the
middle.

The grocer could afford this, so the Goblin stayed in the grocer's shop;
and this teaches us a good deal. One evening the student came in by the
back door to buy a candle and some cheese; he had no one to send, so he
came himself.


He got what he wanted, paid for it, and nodded a good evening to the
grocer and his wife (she was a woman who could do more than nod; she
could talk).

When the student had said good night he suddenly stood still, reading
the sheet of paper in which the cheese had been wrapped.

It was a leaf torn out of an old book--a book of poetry

'There's more of that over there!' said the grocer 'I gave an old woman
some coffee for the book. If you like to give me twopence you can have
the rest.'

'Yes,' said the student, 'give me the book instead of the cheese. I can
eat my bread without cheese. It would be a shame to leave the book to
be torn up. You are a clever and practical man, but about poetry you
understand as much as that old tub over there!'

And that sounded rude as far as the tub was concerned, but the grocer
laughed, and so did the student. It was only said in fun.

But the Goblin was angry that anyone should dare to say such a thing to
a grocer who owned the house and sold the best butter.

When it was night and the shop was shut, and everyone was in bed except
the student, the Goblin went upstairs and took the grocer's wife's
tongue. She did not use it when she was asleep, and on whatever object
in the room he put it that thing began to speak, and spoke out its
thoughts and feelings just as well as the lady to whom it belonged. But
only one thing at a time could use it, and that was a good thing, or
they would have all spoken together.

The Goblin laid the tongue on the tub in which were the old newspapers.

'Is it true,' he asked, ' that you know nothing about poetry?'

'Certainly not!' answered the tub. 'Poetry is something that is in the
papers, and that is frequently cut out. I have a great deal more in
me than the student has, and yet I am only a small tub in the grocer's
shop.'

And the Goblin put the tongue on the coffee-mill, and how it began to
grind! He put it on the butter-cask, and on the till, and all were
of the same opinion as the waste-paper tub. and one must believe the
majority.

'Now I will tell the student!' and with these words he crept softly up
the stairs to the attic where the student lived.

There was a light burning, and the Goblin peeped through the key-hole
and saw that he was reading the torn book that he had bought in the
shop.


But how bright it was! Out of the book shot a streak of light which grew
into a large tree and spread its branches far above the student. Every
leaf was alive, and every flower was a beautiful girl's head, some with
dark and shining eyes, others with wonderful blue ones. Every fruit was
a glittering star, and there was a marvellous music in the student's
room. The little Goblin had never even dreamt of such a splendid sight,
much less seen it.

He stood on tiptoe gazing and gazing, till the candle in the attic
was put out; the student had blown it out and had gone to bed, but the
Goblin remained standing outside listening to the music, which very
softly and sweetly was now singing the student a lullaby.

'I have never seen anything like this!' said the Goblin. 'I never
expected this! I must stay with the student.'

The little fellow thought it over, for he was a sensible Goblin. Then he
sighed, 'The student has no jam!'

And on that he went down to the grocer again. And it was a good thing
that he did go back, for the tub had nearly worn out the tongue. It had
read everything that was inside it, on the one side, and was just going
to turn itself round and read from the other side when the Goblin came
in and returned the tongue to its owner.

But the whole shop, from the till down to the shavings, from that night
changed their opinion of the tub, and they looked up to it, and had such
faith in it that they were under the impression that when the grocer
read the art and drama critiques out of the paper in the evenings, it
all came from the tub.

But the Goblin could no longer sit quietly listening to the wisdom and
intellect downstairs. No, as soon as the light shone in the evening
from the attic it seemed to him as though its beams were strong ropes
dragging him up, and he had to go and peep through the key-hole. There
he felt the sort of feeling we have looking at the great rolling sea in
a storm, and he burst into tears. He could not himself say why he wept,
but in spite of his tears he felt quite happy. How beautiful it must be
to sit under that tree with the student, but that he could not do; he
had to content himself with the key-hole and be happy there!

There he stood out on the cold landing, the autumn wind blowing through
the cracks of the floor. It was cold--very cold, but he first found it
out when the light in the attic was put out and the music in the wood
died away. Ah! then it froze him, and he crept down again into his warm
corner; there it was comfortable and cosy.

When Christmas came, and with it the jam with the large lump of butter,
ah! then the grocer was first with him.

But in the middle of the night the Goblin awoke, hearing a great noise
and knocking against the shutters--people hammering from outside. The
watchman was blowing his horn: a great fire had broken out; the whole
town was in flames.

Was it in the house? or was it at a neighbour's? Where was it?

The alarm increased. The grocer's wife was so terrified that she took
her gold earrings out of her ears and put them in her pocket in order
to save something. The grocer seized his account books. and the maid her
black silk dress.

Everyone wanted to save his most valuable possession; so did the Goblin,
and in a few leaps he was up the stairs and in the student's room. He
was standing quietly by the open window looking at the fire that was
burning in the neighbour's house just opposite. The Goblin seized the
book lying on the table, put it in his red cap, and clasped it with both
hands. The best treasure in the house was saved, and he climbed out on
to the roof with it--on to the chimney. There he sat, lighted up by the
flames from the burning house opposite, both hands holding tightly on
his red cap, in which lay the treasure; and now he knew what his heart
really valued most--to whom he really belonged. But when the fire was
put out, and the Goblin thought it over--then--

'I will divide myself between the two,' he said. 'I cannot quite give up
the grocer, because of the jam!'

And it is just the same with us. We also cannot quite give up the
grocer--because of the jam.