He kissed the letter, and it waslaid, with its enclosure of verses, in a box, in which there were manybeautiful verses, but all of them without flowers; she was thefirst, the only one, as the Sunbeams had called her; and it was apleasant thing to think of that.
  She had time enough, moreover, to think about it; she thought ofit while the summer passed away, and the long winter went by, andthe summer came again, before she appeared once more. But now theyoung man was not pleased at all. He took hold of the letter veryroughly, and threw the verses away, so that the Flower fell on theground. Flat and faded she certainly was, but why should she be thrownon the ground? Still, it was better to be here than in the fire, wherethe verses and the paper were being burnt to ashes. What had happened?What happens so often:- the Flower had made a gauk of him, that wasa jest; the girl had made a fool of him, that was no jest, she had,during the summer, chosen another friend.
  Next morning the sun shone in upon the little flattenedSnowdrop, that looked as if it had been painted upon the floor. Theservant girl, who was sweeping out the room, picked it up, and laid itin one of the books which were upon the table, in the belief that itmust have fallen out while the room was being arranged. Again theflower lay among verses- printed verses- and they are better thanwritten ones- at least, more money has been spent upon them.
  And after this years went by. The book stood upon thebook-shelf, and then it was taken up and somebody read out of it. Itwas a good book; verses and songs by the old Danish poet, AmbrosiusStub, which are well worth reading. The man who was now reading thebook turned over a page.
  "Why, there's a flower!" he said; "a snowdrop, a summer gauk, apoet gauk! That flower must have been put in there with a meaning!Poor Ambrosius Stub! he was a summer fool too, a poet fool; he cametoo early, before his time, and therefore he had to taste the sharpwinds, and wander about as a guest from one noble landed proprietor toanother, like a flower in a glass of water, a flower in rhymed verses!Summer fool, winter fool, fun and folly- but the first, the only,the fresh young Danish poet of those days. Yes, thou shalt remain as atoken in the book, thou little snowdrop: thou hast been put there witha meaning."
  And so the Snowdrop was put back into the book, and felt equallyhonored and pleased to know that it was a token in the glorious bookof songs, and that he who was the first to sing and to write hadbeen also a snowdrop, had been a summer gauk, and had been looked uponin the winter-time as a fool. The Flower understood this, in herway, as we interpret everything in our way.
  That is the story of the Snowdrop.
  THE END.
  1872
  FAIRY TALES OF HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN
  THE STORKS
  by Hans Christian Andersen
  ON the last house in a little village the storks had built a nest,and the mother stork sat in it with her four young ones, who stretchedout their necks and pointed their black beaks, which had not yetturned red like those of the parent birds. A little way off, on theedge of the roof, stood the father stork, quite upright and stiff; notliking to be quite idle, he drew up one leg, and stood on the other,so still that it seemed almost as if he were carved in wood. "Itmust look very grand," thought he, "for my wife to have a sentryguarding her nest. They do not know that I am her husband; they willthink I have been commanded to stand here, which is quitearistocratic;" and so he continued standing on one leg.
  In the street below were a number of children at play, and whenthey caught sight of the storks, one of the boldest amongst the boysbegan to sing a song about them, and very soon he was joined by therest. These are the words of the song, but each only sang what hecould remember of them in his own way.
  "Stork, stork, fly away,
  Stand not on one leg, I pray,
  See your wife is in her nest,
  With her little ones at rest.
  They will hang one,
  And fry another;
  They will shoot a third,
  And roast his brother."
  "Just hear what those boys are singing," said the young storks;"they say we shall be hanged and roasted."
  "Never mind what they say; you need not listen," said themother. "They can do no harm."
  But the boys went on singing and pointing at the storks, andmocking at them, excepting one of the boys whose name was Peter; hesaid it was a shame to make fun of animals, and would not join withthem at all. The mother stork comforted her young ones, and toldthem not to mind. "See," she said, "How quiet your father stands,although he is only on one leg."
  "But we are very much frightened," said the young storks, and theydrew back their heads into the nests.
  The next day when the children were playing together, and sawthe storks, they sang the song again-
  "They will hang one,
  And roast another."
  "Shall we be hanged and roasted?"