The Wonder Clock; or, four & twenty marvellous Tales: being one for each hour of the dayPyle, Howard
Science
The Wonder Clock; or, four & twenty marvellous Tales: being one for each hour of the day
Pyle, Howard
Children's poetry; Fairy tales
“Here,” says the lad to his father, “take this up to the queen at the
castle yonder, and she will pay you well for it.” Then he went and sat
down back of the stove again, and toasted his shins and stared at
nothing at all.
Up went the blacksmith to the queen’s castle with the golden bird and
the golden tree wrapped up in his pocket-handkerchief. Dear, dear, how
the queen did look and listen and wonder, when she saw how pretty it
was, and heard how sweetly the little golden bird sang. She called her
steward and bade him give the blacksmith a whole bag of gold and silver
money for it, and off went the man as pleased as pleased could be.
And now they lived upon the very best of good things over at the
blacksmith’s house; but good things cost money, and by and by the last
penny was spent of what the queen had given him, and nothing would do
but for the lad to go out and work a little while at the forge. So up he
got from back of the stove, and out he went into the forge. He made a
bed of coals and laid the iron upon it.
“Now,” says he to his father, “do you blow the bellows till I come
back,” and off he went.
Well, the old man took the handle and blew and blew, but the dwarf knew
what was going on this time, just as well as he had done before. He
changed himself into a fly, and came and lit on the blacksmith’s neck,
and dear, dear, how he did bite! The blacksmith shut his eyes and
grinned, but at last he could bear it no longer. He raised his hand and
slapped at the fly, but away it flew with never a hair hurt.
In came the lad and drew the iron out of the fire and plunged it into
the water, and there it was a beautiful golden comb that shone like
fire. But the lad was not satisfied with that. “You should have done as
I told you,” said he, “and have stopped at nothing; for now the work is
spoiled.”
The blacksmith vowed and declared that he had not stopped from blowing
the bellows, but the lad knew better than that; for there should have
been a golden looking-glass as well as the comb. The one was of no use
without the other, for when one looked in the golden looking-glass, and
combed one’s hair with the golden comb, one grew handsomer every day,
and the lad had intended both for the queen.
“All the same,” said the old man, “I will take the golden comb up to the
castle;” and it did no good for the lad to shake his head and say no.
“For,” says the father, “old heads are wise heads; and the queen will
like this as well as the other.” So up to the castle he would go, and up
to the castle he went.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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