Prevod

There was once a darning needle who thought herself so fine that she imagined she was a sewing needle. “Now mind what you’re doing!” the darning needle said to the fingers that picked her up. “Don’t drop me! If I fall on the floor, I may never be found again, I’m so fine!”

“Not quite so grand, please!” said the fingers, and they gripped her round the waist. “You see, I travel with a retinue!” said the darning needle, trailing a long thread behind her, though there was no knot in it.

The fingers steered the needle straight towards the kitchen maid’s slipper, where the leather upper had split and needed sewing together. “What degrading work!” said the darning needle. “I shall never get through. I shall break! I shall break!” And then she broke. “Didn’t I tell you?” said the darning needle. “I’m too fine!”

Now she’s no use at all, thought the fingers, but they still had to hold her while the kitchen maid dripped sealing wax on her and stuck her in the front of her neckerchief.

“Look, now I’m a brooch!” said the darning needle. “I knew I should rise to distinction. If you are somebody, you always become something!” And she laughed to herself, for you can never tell from the outside when a darning needle is laughing. There she sat, as proud as if she were riding in a carriage, looking about her on every side.

“May I have the honour of asking whether you are gold?” she asked the pin beside her. “You have a lovely appearance, and a head of your own, though it is small! You must see that it grows, for we cannot all have sealing wax put on our ends!” And the darning needle drew herself up so proudly that she slipped out of the neckerchief and into the sink, just as the kitchen maid was rinsing it out.

“Now we’re off on our travels!” said the darning needle. “I only hope I don’t get lost!” But she did. “I’m too fine for this world!” she said as she settled in the gutter. “I have a clear conscience, and that is always some small comfort!” And the darning needle held herself straight and did not lose her good humour.

All sorts of things went sailing over her: sticks, straws, scraps of newspaper. “Look how they sail along!” said the darning needle. “They don’t know what a sharp thing lies beneath them! I’m sharp, and here I sit. Look, there goes a stick: he thinks of nothing in the world but ‘stick,’ and that is himself. There floats a straw—look how he sways, look how he turns! Don’t think so much of yourself; you might bump into the cobblestones! There floats a newspaper! Everything written in it is forgotten, and yet how it spreads itself! I sit patiently and quietly. I know what I am, and that is what I shall remain!” One day something close by gleamed so beautifully that the darning needle thought it was a diamond, but it was a piece of broken bottle. Since it glittered, the darning needle spoke to it and introduced herself as a brooch. “You are a diamond, I suppose?” “Yes, something of that sort!” And each believed the other to be very precious, and they talked about how conceited the world was.

“Yes, I lived in a box with a young lady,” said the darning needle, “and that young lady was a kitchen maid. She had five fingers on each hand, but I have never known anything so conceited as those five fingers, though all they existed for was to hold me, take me out of my box, and put me back in it!”

“Was there any brilliance about them?” asked the piece of broken bottle. “Brilliance!” said the darning needle. “No, nothing but conceit! They were five brothers, all born ‘Fingers.’ They stood up straight beside one another, though they were of different heights. The outermost, Tommeltot, was short and fat; he stood apart from the ranks and had only one joint in his back, so he could bow only once. But he said that if he were cut off a man, that man would be quite unfit for military service. Slikpot dipped into sweet things and sour things, pointed at the sun and moon, and did the squeezing when they wrote. Langemand looked over the others’ heads; Guldbrand wore a gold ring round his middle; and little Per Spillemand did nothing at all, and was proud of it. It was boasting then and boasting ever after, and so I went down the sink!”

“And now we sit here glittering!” said the piece of glass. Just then more water came into the gutter; it overflowed its banks and swept the piece of glass away.

“There, now he has been promoted!” said the darning needle. “I stay where I am. I’m too fine, but that is my pride, and a respectable pride it is!” And she sat up straight and thought a great many thoughts.

“I could almost believe I was born of a sunbeam, I’m so fine! Doesn’t it seem as though the sun is always seeking me out beneath the water? Ah, I’m so fine that my mother cannot find me. If I still had my old eye, the one that broke off, I think I could cry! Though I wouldn’t do it—crying is not refined!”

One day some street boys were grubbing about in the gutter, finding old nails, pennies, and things of that sort. It was a filthy business, but they enjoyed it.

“Ow!” said one of them, pricking himself on the darning needle. “Here’s a sharp fellow!” “I’m not a fellow, I’m a young lady!” said the darning needle, but no one heard her. The sealing wax had come off and she had turned black, but black makes one look slimmer, so she thought herself finer than ever.

“Here comes an eggshell sailing along!” said the boys, and they stuck the darning needle into the shell. “White walls, and myself in black!” said the darning needle. “How becoming! At least people can see me now! I only hope I don’t get seasick, or I shall break!” But she did not get seasick, and she did not break.

“It’s a good thing, against seasickness, to have a stomach of steel, and always to remember that one is rather more than a human being! Now mine has passed. The finer one is, the more one can endure.”

“Crunch!” went the eggshell as a loaded cart rolled over it. “Oh, how it squeezes!” said the darning needle. “Now I really am getting seasick! I’m breaking! I’m breaking!” But she did not break, though a loaded cart rolled over her. She lay lengthwise—and there she may lie!