Prevod

Once upon a time there was a little boy who had caught a cold. He had been out and got his feet wet, though nobody could imagine how, for the weather was perfectly dry. Now his mother undressed him, put him to bed, and had the tea urn brought in to make him a good cup of elderflower tea, for that warms you through! Just then, in through the door came the amusing old man who lived at the very top of the house. He lived all alone, for he had neither wife nor children, but he loved all children dearly and knew so many fairy tales and stories that it was a pleasure to hear him.

"Now drink your tea!" said his mother, "and perhaps you shall have a fairy tale." "Yes, if only I knew a new one!" said the old man, nodding kindly. "But how did the little fellow get his feet wet?" he asked.

"Yes, how indeed!" said his mother. "Nobody can make it out." "Shall I have a fairy tale?" asked the boy. "Well, can you tell me fairly exactly—for I must know this first—how deep the gutter is in that little street where you go to school?"

"Just halfway up my boots," said the boy, "but then I have to stand in the deep hole!" "So that is where the wet feet came from," said the old man. "Now I really ought to tell you a fairy tale, but I don't know any more!"

"You can make one up this very minute," said the little boy. "Mother says that everything you look at can turn into a fairy tale, and everything you touch can give you a story!"

"Yes, but those fairy tales and stories are no good! No, the real ones come of their own accord. They knock on my forehead and say, 'Here I am!'" "Won't there be a knock soon?" asked the little boy, and his mother laughed, put elderflowers into the pot, and poured boiling water over them.

"Tell me one! Tell me one!" "Yes, if only a fairy tale would come of its own accord, but a fairy tale is a grand creature and comes only when it pleases—stop!" he said suddenly. "There we have it! Look out, there is one on the teapot now!"

And the little boy looked towards the teapot. The lid rose higher and higher, and the elderflowers came out, so fresh and white. They sent out great long branches, spreading in every direction even from the spout, and growing bigger and bigger. It was the loveliest elder bush, a whole tree, reaching into the bed and pushing the curtains aside. Oh, how it blossomed and how sweetly it smelled! And in the middle of the tree sat a kindly old woman in a strange dress. It was quite green, like the leaves of the elder tree, and covered with great white elderflowers; at first you could not tell whether it was cloth or living leaves and flowers.

"What is that woman's name?" asked the little boy. "Well, those Romans and Greeks," said the old man, "called her a dryad, but we don't understand that. Out in Nyboder they have a better name for her: there she is called 'Elder Mother,' and she is the one you must watch now. Just listen, and look at the lovely elder tree:

Just such a great blossoming tree stands out in Nyboder. It grew in the corner of a little humble courtyard. One afternoon, in the loveliest sunshine, two old people sat beneath it: a very, very old sailor and his very, very old wife. They were great-grandparents and would soon be celebrating their golden wedding, but they could not quite remember the date. Elder Mother sat in the tree looking as pleased as she does here. 'I know very well when the golden wedding is!' she said, but they did not hear her; they were talking about the old days.

'Yes, do you remember,' said the old sailor, 'when we were tiny children, running about and playing? It was in this very courtyard where we are sitting now, and we stuck twigs in the ground and made a garden.'

'Yes,' said the old woman, 'I remember it well! And we watered the twigs, and one of them was an elder twig. It took root and sent out green shoots, and now it has become the great tree we old people are sitting under.'

'Indeed it has!' he said. 'And over there in the corner stood a tub of water where I sailed my boat. I had carved it myself—how it could sail! But before long I was off on quite a different sort of voyage!'

'Yes, but first we went to school and learned something!' she said. 'And then we were confirmed. We both cried; but in the afternoon we walked hand in hand up the Round Tower and looked out at the world, over Copenhagen and the water. Then we went to Frederiksberg, where the king and queen were sailing along the canals in their splendid boats.'

'But I came to sail in quite a different way, and for many years, far away on long voyages!' 'Yes, I often cried for you!' she said. 'I thought you were dead and gone, left to drift about down in the deep water! Many a night I got up to see whether the weather vane had turned. Oh yes, it turned, but you did not come! I remember so clearly how the rain poured down one day. The dustman came to the house where I was in service, and I went down with the rubbish pail and stood by the door. What dreadful weather it was! And as I stood there, the postman came up beside me and gave me a letter. It was from you! Oh, how far it had travelled! I tore straight into it and read. I laughed and I cried; I was so happy! It said you were in the hot countries where coffee beans grow. What a blessed land that must be! You told me so much, and I could see it all as the rain poured down and I stood there with the pail. Just then someone put his arm round my waist—!'

'—Yes, but you gave him such a slap on the ear that it fairly rang!' 'Well, I didn't know it was you! You had arrived as soon as your letter, and you were so handsome!—You still are, of course. You had a long yellow silk handkerchief in your pocket and a shiny hat on your head. You looked so fine! Good heavens, what weather it was, and what a state the street was in!'

'Then we were married!' he said. 'Do you remember? And then we had our first little boy, and then Marie and Niels and Peter and Hans Christian!' 'Yes, and how they have all grown up into good people whom everyone loves!'

'And their children have little ones of their own!' said the old sailor. 'Yes, those great-grandchildren are a sturdy lot! Still, I do believe it was about this time of year that we were married—!'

'Yes, this very day is your golden wedding day!' said Elder Mother, putting her head right between the two old people. They thought it was their neighbour nodding to them. They looked at each other and clasped hands. A little later their children and grandchildren came; they knew very well it was the golden wedding day and had already congratulated them that morning, but the old people had forgotten, though they remembered so clearly everything that had happened many years before. The elder tree smelled so sweet, and the sun, which was setting, shone straight into their faces. They both looked so rosy-cheeked, and the youngest grandchild danced round them, shouting joyfully that there was to be a real feast that evening: they were going to have hot potatoes! And Elder Mother nodded in the tree and shouted hurrah with all the others.—"

—"But that wasn't a fairy tale!" said the little boy who had been listening. "Well, you must judge for yourself!" said the storyteller. "But let us ask Elder Mother!"

"That was not a fairy tale," said Elder Mother, "but now it is coming! The most wonderful fairy tales grow out of real life; otherwise my lovely elder bush could never have sprung out of the teapot!" And she lifted the little boy out of bed and held him to her breast, and the elder branches, laden with blossoms, closed round them. They sat as though in the thickest leafy bower, and it flew with them through the air. It was incomparably lovely. Elder Mother had suddenly become a pretty young girl, but her dress was still made of the same green, white-flowered stuff that Elder Mother had worn. On her breast she wore a real elderflower, and round her golden curls a whole wreath of elderflowers. Her eyes were so large and so blue; oh, she was a joy to look upon! She and the boy kissed, and then they were the same age and shared the same delights.

Hand in hand they stepped out of the leafy bower and found themselves in the beautiful flower garden at home. Beside the fresh green lawn, Father's walking stick was tethered to a peg. To the children there was life in the stick: as soon as they sat astride it, its polished knob changed into a magnificent neighing head, a long black mane streamed out, and four slender, powerful legs sprang forth. The creature was strong and spirited; round the lawn they galloped. Hurrah! "Now we shall ride miles and miles away!" said the boy. "We shall ride to the manor house where we went last year!" And they rode and rode round the lawn, while the little girl, who, as we know, was none other than Elder Mother, kept calling out, "Now we are in the country! Do you see the farmhouse with the great baking oven, like an enormous egg in the wall facing the road? The elder tree spreads its branches over it, and the cock is scratching for the hens. Look how proudly he struts!—Now we are at the church! It stands high on the hill among the great oak trees, one of which is half dead!—Now we are at the smithy, where the fire burns and the half-naked men strike with their hammers, sending sparks flying far and wide. Away, away to the splendid manor house!" And everything the little girl seated behind him on the stick spoke of went flying past. The boy saw it all, and yet they were only going round the lawn. Then they played in the side path and scratched out a little garden in the earth. She took an elderflower from her hair and planted it, and it grew just as it had for the old people in Nyboder when they were little, as we have already heard. They walked hand in hand, just as the old people had done as children, but not up the Round Tower or to Frederiksberg Gardens. No, the little girl put her arm round the boy's waist, and they flew far and wide over all Denmark. It was spring and it became summer; it was autumn and it became winter, and a thousand pictures were reflected in the boy's eyes and heart. All the while the little girl sang to him, "You will never forget this!" And throughout their flight the elder tree smelled so sweet and lovely. He noticed the roses and the fresh beech trees, but the elder tree's fragrance was more wonderful still, for its blossoms lay against the little girl's heart, and often as they flew he rested his head there.

"How lovely it is here in spring!" said the young girl, and they stood in the newly leafed beechwood, where the green woodruff scented the ground at their feet and the pale pink anemones looked so lovely among the green. "Oh, if only it were always spring in the fragrant Danish beechwood!"

"How lovely it is here in summer!" she said, and they flew past old manor houses from the days of chivalry, their red walls and stepped gables reflected in the canals, where swans swam and gazed up into the old, cool avenues of trees. In the fields the corn rippled like a sea; the ditches were full of red and yellow flowers, the hedges covered in wild hops and flowering bindweed. In the evening the moon rose large and round, and the haystacks in the meadows smelled so sweet. "This will never be forgotten!"

"How lovely it is here in autumn!" said the little girl, and the sky grew twice as high and blue. The woods took on the loveliest colours of red, yellow, and green; the hounds raced away, and whole flocks of game birds flew crying over the ancient burial mound, where brambles trailed about the old stones. The sea was blue-black, dotted with white sails, and on the threshing floor old women, girls, and children sat picking hops into a great tub. The young people sang songs, while the old ones told fairy tales of household sprites and trolls. Nothing could have been better! "How lovely it is here in winter!" said the little girl. All the trees were covered in hoarfrost and looked like white coral; the snow creaked underfoot as though one were always wearing new boots, and shooting star after shooting star fell from the sky. Indoors the Christmas tree was lit, and there were presents and good cheer. In the country a fiddle rang out in the farmhouse parlour, and round apple fritters were tossed out for everyone to scramble after. Even the poorest child said, "How lovely winter is!"

Yes, it was lovely! And the little girl showed the boy everything, and always the elder tree breathed its fragrance, and always the red flag with the white cross waved—the flag under which the old sailor in Nyboder had sailed. And the boy grew into a young man, and he was to go out into the wide world, far away to the hot countries where coffee grows. But as they said farewell, the little girl took an elderflower from her breast and gave it to him to keep. It was laid in his hymnbook, and whenever he opened the book in a foreign land, it was always at the place where the flower of remembrance lay. The longer he looked at it, the fresher it grew. He seemed to catch a fragrance from the Danish woods, and among the petals he could plainly see the little girl peeping out with her clear blue eyes. Then she whispered, "How lovely it is here in spring, in summer, in autumn and winter!" And a hundred pictures passed through his mind.

So many years went by, and now he was an old man, sitting with his old wife beneath a blossoming tree. They held hands, just as the great-grandfather and great-grandmother had done out in Nyboder, and like them they talked about the old days and their golden wedding. The little girl with the blue eyes and the elderflowers in her hair sat up in the tree, nodded to them both, and said, "Today is your golden wedding day!" Then she took two flowers from her wreath and kissed them. First they shone like silver, then like gold, and when she laid them on the old people's heads, each flower became a golden crown. There they both sat like a king and queen beneath the fragrant tree, which looked in every way exactly like an elder tree, and he told his old wife the story of Elder Mother, just as it had been told to him when he was a little boy. They both thought there was a great deal in it that resembled their own story, and those were the parts they liked best.

"Yes, that is how it is!" said the little girl in the tree. "Some call me Elder Mother, others call me a dryad, but my real name is Memory. It is I who sit in the tree that grows and grows. I can remember, I can tell stories! Let me see whether you still have your flower!"

And the old man opened his hymnbook. There lay the elderflower, as fresh as though it had only just been put there, and Memory nodded. The two old people with their golden crowns sat in the red evening sunshine. They closed their eyes, and—and—yes, then the fairy tale was over!

The little boy lay in his bed. He did not know whether he had dreamed it or heard it told. The teapot stood on the table, but no elder tree grew out of it, and the old man who had told the story was just going out through the door, and out he went.

"How lovely it was!" said the little boy. "Mother, I have been to the hot countries!" "Yes, I can well believe it!" said his mother. "When you have two great cupfuls of elderflower tea inside you, you are bound to find yourself in the hot countries!" And she tucked him up snugly so that he would not catch a chill. "You must have been asleep while I sat arguing with him about whether it was a story or a fairy tale!"

"And where is Elder Mother?" asked the boy. "She is on the teapot!" said his mother, "and there she can stay!"