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 remarkable.
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
transparent 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 sham fights, and
to give balls. The tin soldiers rattled in their box; they wanted to get out
and join the amusements, but they could not open the lid. The nutcrackers
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 draught, 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 downwards, 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 gutter, 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 countenance did not change; he
looked straight before him, and shouldered his musket. 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 toll, 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 eyelid, 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, warrior! ever brave,
Drifting onward 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, standing 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 cinder.
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