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Main > Fairy tale > All authors > Andersen Hans Christian > Fairy tale "The Wind Tells about Valdemar Daae and His Daughters"

The Wind Tells about Valdemar Daae and His Daughters

"In the smoke and ashes, beset by sorrow and sleepless nights, Valdemar's hair and beard turned gray, his skin grew coarse and yellowish; his eyes still looked greedily for gold - the long hoped-for gold!

"I blew ashes and smoke into his face and beard. I whistled through the broken panes and open cracks and blew into the daughters' chest of drawers, where they kept their clothes, which now were faded and threadbare from constant use, but which had to last them. The poor dears never had such a song as this sung at their cradles; but none, save I, sang any song at all in the great hall now. The life of abundance had turned into one of poverty," said the Wind. "I snowed them in, and it is said that snow puts one in a good humor. They had no firewood, for the forest was destroyed. There came a sharp frost, and while I sprang through holes and passages and over walls and roofs to keep myself warm, the highborn daughters huddled in bed against the cold, and their father crept beneath a covering of rude skins. Nothing to eat, nothing to burn!

"It was a hard lesson they had to learn!

"Whew, whew, whew! But Valdemar Daae couldn't learn. 'After winter comes the spring,' he said, 'and after troubles come the good times; we have only to wait, wait! Now the mansion is mortgaged! Now it is high time indeed - and so we shall have gold! By Easter!' And then I saw him watching a spider at work, and heard him mutter, 'Good, industrious little weaver, you teach me to persevere! Your web may be broken, but you only begin it again; again it may be torn asunder, but all undismayed you return again and again to your work, and you are rewarded at last!'

"Then Easter morning came, and the bells rang and the sun shone in the heavens. He had awakened in a feverish heat; he had boiled and seethed and distilled and compounded. I heard him sigh like a lost soul and I heard him pray; I felt that he was holding his breath. The lamp had gone out, but he did not notice it. I blew on the coals until a flame shone on his chalk-white face and lighted up those staring eyes.

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