The Flower Princess

by Abbie Farwell Brown

The Miller was a thoughtful fellow, as the folk of the Land of Windmills are apt to be; and he had ideas. When his first son was born he sat down and thought for a long time. His baby had fine lungs; he cried louder and longer than any baby of whom the Miller had ever heard, so that the father had to go out of doors to think.

"He is a very remarkable child!" said the Miller to himself. "His talents in the way of lung-power are extraordinary; they must be developed. I believe in deciding as soon as possible what a child shall be, according to his earliest inclinations. With his fine lungs he must become a Blower of some kind; a Musician,—perhaps a Corneter or a Flutist. But that we can decide later. I shall begin to train him immediately."

So the Miller trained the lungs of his son. His first gift to the baby was an ivory whistle, and the little fellow soon learned to blow it so that his mother was nearly deafened. When he grew stronger he had a penny trumpet, and then there was a racket, to be sure! But the more noise he made the more were the Miller and his good wife delighted. For they said to each other: "What wonderful talents has our son! Surely he will become a great blowing Musician in the days that are to be."

Before he was a year old Hans could blow a little bugle so loudly that all the dogs of the neighborhood would rush to the house and surround it, barking. But he made no tunes on the bugle; only noise.

Not long after this came a little brother for Hans; and this baby showed the same talents as the first one, by day and by night filling the cottage with his sturdy bellows. You might think that this would have disturbed the peace of the Miller and his wife, who could get no sleep at all. But no, indeed! They were twice delighted.

"Look now!" they said, "we shall have two little Blowers in the family,—perhaps a flute and a trombone; perhaps a cornet and a fife,—who knows?" And they began to put Piet through the same training that Hans had received; which was very pleasant for the little brothers, as you can imagine. There was no crying of "Oh, children! Don't make such a racket!" in that house. There was no hiding of whistles and trumpets and bugles. When one noisy toy wore out they were immediately given a new one, for fear that they should forget how to blow. And they played at nothing else all day long but blowing, and blowing, and blowing. The house was so noisy that the neighbors did not often visit the Miller's wife. But she cared nothing at all for that.

Then another baby came; and as the years went by more little brothers blessed the Miller's cottage, each with the same wonderful lung-power, the same puffy cheeks, the same fondness for blowing. Till before the Miller fairly had counted them all, he found himself sitting at the head of a table around which ten little Blowers kicked their heels and blew on their porridge to cool it.

Now ten little Blowers, each blowing all day long for dear life, have ten big appetites; and the Miller had hard work to supply them with food. The children were not helping him by earning money. Oh no! They were too busy blowing,—practicing on the flutes, trombones, trumpets, bugles, fifes, horns, oboes, cornets, bassoons, and piccolos which their father had bought them, hoping that they would be Musicians. But it was very strange; although they were becoming skillful indeed in making a loud noise, they had never yet made any music. The more they practiced the further they seemed to be from any tune. When they all got together and blew their instruments as hard as they could, you cannot imagine a more wonderful noise than that which they produced! They could blow the panes out of the windows and the leaves from the trees, but they could not make the least little tune to save their lives.

At last the poor Miller saw that they never would make any tune, because there was no music in them, not in one of them. They could never be Musicians, though they were wonderful Blowers. You see, unless they could blow tunes on their instruments no one would ever pay merely to hear them blow; indeed, nowadays folk seldom ventured near the mill, the family made such a din. And this blew trade away, even on windy days. The Miller was growing poorer and poorer, and it seemed unlikely that his children would ever help him to earn their bread, for they had been brought up to blow, and that was all they knew how to do.

One morning the Miller went out to grind some grain which Farmer Huss had left the night before. Huss, who was stone deaf, was the only neighbor who cared nowadays to come to the noisy mill, and naturally the Miller was anxious to please him. But when he looked up at the cloudless sky he saw that there would be no grinding done that morning. There was no breeze anywhere, and the mill was sound asleep. The windmill was lazy, like all its race, and unless an urging wind was blowing it would not work at all. On breezeless days the mill slept from morning until night, and then the farmers who had brought their grain grumbled and were angry with the poor Miller; which, of course, was very unreasonable. Farmer Huss had vowed that if his grain was not ground before noon he would never come near the Miller again; and that would be bad indeed, for, deaf though he was, he remained the Miller's best customer. Worst of all, there was not a crust in the house, not a penny to buy bread. And although the children were now so busy blowing that they had forgotten to be hungry, before night they would be crying for food. What was to be done?