When she saw her own face she was quite frightened, it was so brown and ugly; but when she wet her little hand and rubbed her eyes and forehead her white skin shone through again. Then she took off all her clothes and went into the fresh water. A more beautiful royal child than she could not be found in all the world.
When she had put on her clothes again and plaited her long hair she went to a sparkling spring, and drank some of the water out of the hollow of her hand. Then she wandered farther into the wood, though where she was going she had not the least idea. She thought of her brothers, and she thought of a merciful God who would not forsake her. He let the wild crab-apples grow to feed the hungry. He showed her a tree, the branches of which were bending beneath their weight of fruit. Here she made her midday meal, and, having put props under the branches, she walked on into the thickest part of the forest. It was so quiet that she heard her own footsteps; she heard every little withered leaf which bent under her feet. Not a bird was to be seen, not a ray of sunlight pierced the leafy branches, and the tall trunks were so close together that when she looked before her it seemed as if a thick fence of heavy beams hemmed her in on every side. The solitude was such as she had never known before.
It was a very dark night, not a single glow-worm sparkled in the marsh; sadly she lay down to sleep, and it seemed to her as if the branches above her parted asunder, and the Saviour looked down upon her with His loving eyes, and little angels’ heads peeped out above His head and under His arms.
When she woke in the morning she was not sure if she had dreamed this, or whether it was really true.
She walked a little farther, when she met an old woman with a basket full of berries, of which she gave her some. Elise asked if she had seen eleven princes ride through the wood. “No,” said the old woman, “but yesterday I saw eleven swans, with golden crowns upon their heads, swimming in the stream close by here.”
She led Elise a little farther to a slope, at the foot of which the stream meandered. The trees on either bank stretched out their rich, leafy branches towards each other, and where, from their natural growth, they could not reach each other, they had torn their roots out of the ground, and leaned over the water so as to interlace their branches.
Elise said good-bye to the old woman and walked along by the river till it flowed out into the great open sea.
The beautiful open sea lay before the maiden, but not a sail was to be seen on it—not a single boat. How was she ever to get any farther? She looked at the numberless little pebbles on the beach; they were all worn quite round by the water. Glass, iron, stone, whatever was washed up, had taken their shapes from the water, which yet was much softer than her little hand. “With all its rolling, it is untiring, and everything hard is smoothed down. I will be just as untiring! Thank you for your lesson, you clear rolling waves! Some time, so my poor heart tells me, you will bear me to my beloved brothers!”
Eleven white swans’ feathers were lying on the sea-weed; she picked them up and made a bunch of them. There were still drops of water on them. Whether these were dew or tears no one could tell. It was very lonely there by the shore, but she did not feel it, for the sea was ever changing. There were more changes on it in the course of a few hours than could be seen on an inland fresh-water lake in a year. If a big black cloud arose it was just as if the sea wanted to say, “I can look black too,” and then the wind blew up and the waves showed their white crests. But if the clouds were red and the wind dropped, the sea looked like a rose-leaf, now white, now green. But, however still it was, there was always a little gentle motion just by the shore; the water rose and fell softly, like the bosom of a sleeping child.
When the sun was just about to go down, Elise saw eleven wild swans with golden crowns upon their heads flying towards the shore. They flew in a swaying line, one behind the other, like a white ribbon streamer. Elise climbed up onto the bank and hid behind a bush; the swans settled close by her and flapped their great white wings.