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Main > Fairy tale > All authors > Andersen Hans Christian > Fairy tale "Ib and Little Christine"

Ib and Little Christine

Then they started back again. They were going upstream now, but the wind was favorable, and with the sails hoisted they went as well as if two horses had been harnessed to the boat.

When they reached that point in the stream near which the assistant boatman lived, the boat was moored, and the two men went ashore, after ordering the children to be quiet and careful. But this they could not do, at least not for very long. They had to be peeping into the basket at the eels and the pig; they had to pull the pig out and hold it in their hands and turn it over and over. Then, when they both tried to hold it at the same time, they lost it and it slipped right into the water, and the pig drifted away down the stream. That was a terrible catastrophe!

Ib quickly jumped ashore and began running along the bank, while Christine leaped after him, shouting, "Take me with you!"

Soon the children disappeared in the bushes and could no longer see either the boat or the river. They ran on still farther, and then Christine fell down and began to cry. Ib picked her up.

"Come on!" he said. "The house is over that way!"

But the house was not over that way. On and on they walked, over dry, dead leaves and over fallen branches that crackled under their small feet. All of a sudden they heard a loud scream. They stopped and listened, and again the scream of an eagle sounded through the woods. It was and ugly cry, and frightened them, but they soon forgot it when they saw before them, in the thick wood, the most beautiful blueberries growing in unbelievably large numbers. They were so inviting that the children could not help stopping; and they stayed there, eating the blueberries until they had blue mouths and cheeks. And again they heard the eagle's cry.

"We'll get a beating on account of that pig," said Christine.

"Come on, let's go home," said Ib. "Our house is here in the woods somewhere."

So they went on until they came to a road, but it still did not lead them home; then darkness settled down, and both grew afraid.

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