THERE were once five-and-twenty tin soldiers, who were all
brothers, for they had been made out of the same old tin
spoon. They shouldered arms and looked straight before them,
and wore a splendid uniform, red and blue. The first thing in
the world they ever heard were the words, "Tin soldiers!"
uttered by a little boy, who clapped his hands with delight
when the lid of the box, in which they lay, was taken off.
They were given him for a birthday present, and he stood at
the table to set them up. The soldiers were all exactly alike,
excepting one, who had only one leg; he had been left to the
last, and then there was not enough of the melted tin to
finish him, so they made him to stand firmly on one leg, and
this caused him to be very remarkable¹.

    The table on which the tin soldiers stood, was covered
with other playthings, but the most attractive to the eye was
a pretty little paper castle. Through the small windows the
rooms could be seen. In front of the castle a number of little
trees surrounded a piece of looking-glass, which was intended
to represent a transparent² lake. Swans, made of wax, swam on
the lake, and were reflected in it. All this was very pretty,
but the prettiest of all was a tiny little lady, who stood at
the open door of the castle; she, also, was made of paper, and
she wore a dress of clear muslin, with a narrow blue ribbon
over her shoulders just like a scarf. In front of these was
fixed a glittering tinsel rose, as large as her whole face.
The little lady was a dancer, and she stretched out both her
arms, and raised one of her legs so high, that the tin soldier
could not see it at all, and he thought that she, like
himself, had only one leg. "That is the wife for me," he
thought; "but she is too grand, and lives in a castle, while I
have only a box to live in, five-and-twenty of us altogether,
that is no place for her. Still I must try and make her
acquaintance." Then he laid himself at full length on the
table behind a snuff-box that stood upon it, so that he could
peep at the little delicate lady, who continued to stand on
one leg without losing her balance. When evening came, the
other tin soldiers were all placed in the box, and the people
of the house went to bed. Then the playthings began to have
their own games together, to pay visits, to have sham³ fights,
and to give balls. The tin soldiers rattled⁴ in their box; they
wanted to get out and join the amusements, but they could not
open the lid. The nut-crackers played at leap-frog, and the
pencil jumped about the table. There was such a noise that the
canary woke up and began to talk, and in poetry too. Only the
tin soldier and the dancer remained in their places. She stood
on tiptoe, with her legs stretched out, as firmly as he did on
his one leg. He never took his eyes from her for even a
moment. The clock struck twelve, and, with a bounce, up sprang
the lid of the snuff-box; but, instead of snuff, there jumped
up a little black goblin; for the snuff-box was a toy puzzle.

    "Tin soldier," said the goblin, "don't wish for what does
not belong to you.

    But the tin soldier pretended not to hear.

    "Very well; wait till to-morrow, then," said the goblin.

    When the children came in the next morning, they placed
the tin soldier in the window. Now, whether it was the goblin
who did it, or the draught⁵, is not known, but the window flew
open, and out fell the tin soldier, heels over head, from the
third story, into the street beneath. It was a terrible fall;
for he came head downwards⁶, his helmet and his bayonet stuck
in between the flagstones, and his one leg up in the air. The
servant maid and the little boy went down stairs directly to
look for him; but he was nowhere to be seen, although once
they nearly trod upon him. If he had called out, "Here I am,"
it would have been all right, but he was too proud to cry out
for help while he wore a uniform.

    Presently it began to rain, and the drops fell faster and
faster, till there was a heavy shower. When it was over, two
boys happened to pass by, and one of them said, "Look, there
is a tin soldier. He ought to have a boat to sail in."

    So they made a boat out of a newspaper, and placed the tin
soldier in it, and sent him sailing down the gutter⁷, while the
two boys ran by the side of it, and clapped their hands. Good
gracious, what large waves arose in that gutter! and how fast
the stream rolled on! for the rain had been very heavy. The
paper boat rocked up and down, and turned itself round
sometimes so quickly that the tin soldier trembled; yet he
remained firm; his countenance⁸ did not change; he looked
straight before him, and shouldered his musket⁹. Suddenly the
boat shot under a bridge which formed a part of a drain, and
then it was as dark as the tin soldier's box.

    "Where am I going now?" thought he. "This is the black
goblin's fault, I am sure. Ah, well, if the little lady were
only here with me in the boat, I should not care for any
darkness."

    Suddenly there appeared a great water-rat, who lived in
the drain.

    "Have you a passport?" asked the rat, "give it to me at
once." But the tin soldier remained silent and held his musket
tighter than ever. The boat sailed on and the rat followed it.
How he did gnash his teeth and cry out to the bits of wood and
straw, "Stop him, stop him; he has not paid toll¹⁰, and has not
shown his pass." But the stream rushed on stronger and
stronger. The tin soldier could already see daylight shining
where the arch ended. Then he heard a roaring sound quite
terrible enough to frighten the bravest man. At the end of the
tunnel the drain fell into a large canal over a steep place,
which made it as dangerous for him as a waterfall would be to
us. He was too close to it to stop, so the boat rushed on, and
the poor tin soldier could only hold himself as stiffly as
possible, without moving an eyelid¹¹, to show that he was not
afraid. The boat whirled round three or four times, and then
filled with water to the very edge; nothing could save it from
sinking. He now stood up to his neck in water, while deeper
and deeper sank the boat, and the paper became soft and loose
with the wet, till at last the water closed over the soldier's
head. He thought of the elegant little dancer whom he should
never see again, and the words of the song sounded in his
ears-

                     "Farewell, warrior¹²! ever brave,
                      Drifting onward¹³ to thy grave."

    Then the paper boat fell to pieces, and the soldier sank
into the water and immediately afterwards was swallowed up by
a great fish. Oh how dark it was inside the fish! A great deal
darker than in the tunnel, and narrower too, but the tin
soldier continued firm, and lay at full length shouldering his
musket. The fish swam to and fro, making the most wonderful
movements, but at last he became quite still. After a while, a
flash of lightning seemed to pass through him, and then the
daylight approached, and a voice cried out, "I declare here is
the tin soldier." The fish had been caught, taken to the
market and sold to the cook, who took him into the kitchen and
cut him open with a large knife. She picked up the soldier and
held him by the waist between her finger and thumb, and
carried him into the room. They were all anxious to see this
wonderful soldier who had travelled about inside a fish; but
he was not at all proud. They placed him on the table, and-
how many curious things do happen in the world!- there he was
in the very same room from the window of which he had fallen,
there were the same children, the same playthings, standing¹⁴ on
the table, and the pretty castle with the elegant little
dancer at the door; she still balanced herself on one leg, and
held up the other, so she was as firm as himself. It touched
the tin soldier so much to see her that he almost wept tin
tears, but he kept them back. He only looked at her and they
both remained silent. Presently one of the little boys took up
the tin soldier, and threw him into the stove. He had no
reason for doing so, therefore it must have been the fault of
the black goblin who lived in the snuff-box. The flames
lighted up the tin soldier, as he stood, the heat was very
terrible, but whether it proceeded from the real fire or from
the fire of love he could not tell. Then he could see that the
bright colors were faded from his uniform, but whether they
had been washed off during his journey or from the effects of
his sorrow, no one could say. He looked at the little lady,
and she looked at him. He felt himself melting away, but he
still remained firm with his gun on his shoulder. Suddenly the
door of the room flew open and the draught of air caught up
the little dancer, she fluttered like a sylph right into the
stove by the side of the tin soldier, and was instantly in
flames and was gone. The tin soldier melted down into a lump,
and the next morning, when the maid servant took the ashes out
of the stove, she found him in the shape of a little tin
heart. But of the little dancer nothing remained but the
tinsel rose, which was burnt black as a cinder¹⁶.


                            THE END

上一篇：THE BUCKWHEAT 下一篇：THE BUTTERFLY