“What on earth possesses you?” she asked. “You have nothing to do; that is why you get these freaks into your head. Lay some eggs or take to purring, and you will get over it.”
“But it is so delicious to float, on the water,” said the duckling; “so delicious to feel it rushing over your head when you dive to the bottom.”
“That would be a fine amusement,” said the hen. “I think you have gone mad. Ask the cat about it, he is the wisest creature I know; ask him if he is fond of floating on the water or diving under it. I say nothing about myself. Ask our mistress yourself, the old woman; there is no one in the world cleverer than she is. Do you suppose she has any desire to float on the water or to duck underneath it?”
“You do not understand me,” said the duckling.
“Well, if we don’t understand you, who should? I suppose you don’t consider yourself cleverer than the cat or the old woman, not to mention me. Don’t make a fool of yourself, child, and thank your stars for all the good we have done you! Have you not lived in this warm room, and in such society that you might have learned something? But you are an idiot, and there is no pleasure in associating with you. You may believe me I mean you well, I tell you home truths, and there is no surer way than that of knowing who are one’s friends. You just see about laying some eggs, or learn to purr, or to emit sparks.”
“I think I will go out into the wide world,” said the duckling.
“Oh, do so by all means!” said the hen.
So away went the duckling; he floated on the water and ducked underneath it, but he was looked askance at by every living creature for his ugliness. Now the autumn came on, the leaves in the woods turned yellow and brown; the wind took hold of them, and they danced about. The sky looked very cold, and the clouds hung heavy with snow and hail. A raven stood on the fence and croaked Caw! Caw! from sheer cold; it made one shiver only to think of it. The poor duckling certainly was in a bad case.
One evening the sun was just setting in wintry splendor when a flock of beautiful large birds appeared out of the bushes. The duckling had never seen anything so beautiful. They were dazzlingly white with long waving necks; they were swans; and, uttering a peculiar cry, they spread out their magnificent broad wings, and flew away from the cold regions to warmer lands and open seas. They mounted so high, so very high, and the ugly little duckling became strangely uneasy; he circled round and round in the water like a wheel, craning his neck up into the air after them. Then he uttered a shriek so piercing and so strange that he was quite frightened by it himself. Oh, he could not forget those beautiful birds, those happy birds! And as soon as they were out of sight he ducked right down to the bottom, and when he came up again he was quite beside himself. He did not know what the birds were or whither they flew, but all the same he was more drawn towards them than he had ever been by any creatures before. He did not even envy them in the least. How could it occur to him even to wish to be such a marvel of beauty; he would have been thankful if only the ducks would have tolerated him among them—the poor ugly creature!
The winter was so bitterly cold that the duckling was obliged to swim about in the water to keep it from freezing, but every night the hole in which he swam got smaller and smaller. Then it froze so hard that the surface ice cracked, and the duckling had to use his legs all the time, so that the ice should not close in round him; at last he was so weary that he could move no more, and he was frozen fast into the ice.