FAIRY TALES OF HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN: THE DUMB BOOK

                                       1872

                     FAIRY TALES OF HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN

                                 THE DUMB BOOK

                           by Hans Christian Andersen

    IN the high-road which led through a wood stood a solitary

farm-house; the road, in fact, ran right through its yard. The sun was

shining and all the windows were open; within the house people were

very busy. In the yard, in an arbour formed by lilac bushes in full

bloom, stood an open coffin; thither they had carried a dead man,

who was to be buried that very afternoon. Nobody shed a tear over him;

his face was covered over with a white cloth, under his head they

had placed a large thick book, the leaves of which consisted of folded

sheets of blotting-paper, and withered flowers lay between them; it

was the herbarium which he had gathered in various places and was to

be buried with him, according to his own wish. Every one of the

flowers in it was connected with some chapter of his life.

    "Who is the dead man?" we asked.

    "The old student," was the reply. "They say that he was once an

energetic young man, that he studied the dead languages, and sang

and even composed many songs; then something had happened to him,

and in consequence of this he gave himself up to drink, body and mind.

When at last he had ruined his health, they brought him into the

country, where someone paid for his board and residence. He was gentle

as a child as long as the sullen mood did not come over him; but

when it came he was fierce, became as strong as a giant, and ran about

in the wood like a chased deer. But when we succeeded in bringing

him home, and prevailed upon him to open the book with the dried-up

plants in it, he would sometimes sit for a whole day looking at this

or that plant, while frequently the tears rolled over his cheeks.

God knows what was in his mind; but he requested us to put the book

into his coffin, and now he lies there. In a little while the lid will

be placed upon the coffin, and he will have sweet rest in the grave!"

    The cloth which covered his face was lifted up; the dead man's

face expressed peace- a sunbeam fell upon it. A swallow flew with

the swiftness of an arrow into the arbour, turning in its flight,

and twittered over the dead man's head.

    What a strange feeling it is- surely we all know it- to look

through old letters of our young days; a different life rises up out

of the past, as it were, with all its hopes and sorrows. How many of

the people with whom in those days we used to be on intimate terms

appear to us as if dead, and yet they are still alive- only we have

not thought of them for such a long time, whom we imagined we should

retain in our memories for ever, and share every joy and sorrow with

them.

    The withered oak leaf in the book here recalled the friend, the

schoolfellow, who was to be his friend for life. He fixed the leaf

to the student's cap in the green wood, when they vowed eternal

friendship. Where does he dwell now? The leaf is kept, but the

friendship does no longer exist. Here is a foreign hothouse plant, too

tender for the gardens of the North. It is almost as if its leaves

still smelt sweet! She gave it to him out of her own garden- a

nobleman's daughter.

    Here is a water-lily that he had plucked himself, and watered with

salt tears- a lily of sweet water. And here is a nettle: what may

its leaves tell us? What might he have thought when he plucked and

kept it? Here is a little snowdrop out of the solitary wood; here is

an evergreen from the flower-pot at the tavern; and here is a simple

blade of grass.

    The lilac bends its fresh fragrant flowers over the dead man's

head; the swallow passes again- "twit, twit;" now the men come with

hammer and nails, the lid is placed over the dead man, while his

head rests on the dumb book- so long cherished, now closed for ever!

                            THE END