Wonderful Stories for Children

by H. C. Andersen

There grew a great many waterlilies in the river, with their broad green leaves, which seemed to float upon the water. The old frog swam to the leaf which was the farthest out in the river, and which was the largest also, and there she set the walnut-shell, with little Tommelise.

The poor little tiny thing awoke quite early in the morning, and when she saw where she was she began to cry bitterly, for there was water on every side of the large green leaf, and she could not get to land.

The old frog sat down in the mud, and decked her house with sedge and yellow water-reeds, that it might be regularly beautiful when her new daughter-in-law came. After this was done, she and her fat son swam away to the lily leaf, where Tommelise stood, that they might fetch her pretty little bed, and so have every thing ready before she herself came to the house.

The old frog courtesied to her in the water, and said,—"Allow me to introduce my son to you, who is to be your husband, and you shall live together, so charmingly, down in the mud!"

"Koax, koax, brekke-ke-kex!" that was all that the son could say.

So they took the pretty little bed, and swam away with it; but Tommelise sat, quite alone, and wept, upon the green leaf, for she did not wish to live with the queer-looking, yellow frog, nor to have her ugly son for her husband. The little fishes which swam down in the water had seen the frog, and had heard what she said; they put up, therefore, their heads, to look at the little girl. The moment they saw her they thought her very pretty; and they felt very sorry that she should have to go down into the mud and live with the frog. No, never should it be! They therefore went down into the water in a great shoal, and gathered round the green stalk of the leaf upon which she stood; they gnawed the stalk in two with their teeth, and thus the leaf floated down the river. Slowly and quietly it floated away, a long way off, where the frog could not come to it.

Tommelise sailed past a great many places, and the little birds sat in the bushes, looked at her, and sang,—"What a pretty little maiden!" The leaf on which she stood floated away farther and farther, and, at last, she came to a foreign land.

A pretty little white butterfly stayed with her, and flew round about her, and, at length, seated itself upon the leaf; for it knew little Tommelise so well and she was so pleased, for she knew that now the frog could not come near her, and the land to which she had come was very beautiful. The sun shone upon the water, and it was like the most lovely gold. She took off her girdle, therefore, and bound one end of it to the butterfly, and the other end of it to the leaf, and thus she glided on more swiftly than ever, and she stood upon the leaf as it went.

As she was thus sailing on charmingly, a large stag-beetle came flying towards her; it paused for a moment to look at her, then clasped its claws around her slender waist, and flew up into a tree with her, but the green lily leaf floated down the stream, and the white butterfly with it, because it was fastened to it, and could not get loose.

Poor Tommelise! how frightened she was when the stag-beetle flew away with her up into the tree! but she was most of all distressed for the lovely white butterfly which she had fastened to the leaf. But that did not trouble the stag-beetle at all. It seated itself upon one of the largest green leaves of the tree, gave her the honey of the flowers to eat, and said that she was very pretty, although she was not at all like a stag-beetle. Before long, all the other stag-beetles that lived in the tree came to pay her a visit; they looked at Tommelise; and the misses stag-beetle, they examined her with their antennæ, and said,—"Why, she has only two legs, that is very extraordinary!" "She has no antennæ!" said the others. "She has such a thin body! Why she looks just like a human being!" "How ugly she is!" said all the lady stag-beetles; and yet Tommelise was exceedingly pretty.