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It is more than a hundred years ago! At the border of the wood, near
a large lake, stood the old mansion: deep ditches surrounded it on
every side, in which reeds and bulrushes grew. Close by the
drawbridge, near the gate, there was an old willow tree, which bent
over the reeds.
From the narrow pass came the sound of bugles and the trampling of
horses' feet; therefore a little girl who was watching the geese
hastened to drive them away from the bridge, before the whole
hunting party came galloping up; they came, however, so quickly,
that the girl, in order to avoid being run over, placed herself on
one of the high corner-stones of the bridge. She was still half a
child and very delicately built; she had bright blue eyes, and a
gentle, sweet expression. But such things the baron did not notice;
while he was riding past the little goose-girl, he reversed his
hunting crop, and in rough play gave her such a push with it that
she fell backward into the ditch.
"Everything in the right place!" he cried. "Into the ditch with
you."
Then he burst out laughing, for that he called fun; the others
joined in—the whole party shouted and cried, while the hounds
barked.
While the poor girl was falling she happily caught one of the
branches of the willow tree, by the help of which she held herself
over the water, and as soon as the baron with his company and the
dogs had disappeared through the gate, the girl endeavoured to
scramble up, but the branch broke off, and she would have fallen
backward among the rushes, had not a strong hand from above seized
her at this moment. It was the hand of a pedlar; he had witnessed
what had happened from a short distance, and now hastened to assist
her.
"Everything in the right place," he said, imitating the noble baron,
and pulling the little maid up to the dry ground. He wished to put
the branch back in the place it had been broken off, but it is not
possible to put everything in the right place; therefore he stuck
the branch into the soft ground.
"Grow and thrive if you can, and produce a good flute for them
yonder at the mansion," he said; it would have given him great
pleasure to see the noble baron and his companions well thrashed.
Then he entered the castle—but not the banqueting hall; he was too
humble for that. No; he went to the servants' hall. The men-servants
and maids looked over his stock of articles and bargained with him;
loud crying and screaming were heard from the master's table above:
they called it singing—indeed, they did their best. Laughter and the
howls of dogs were heard through the open windows: there they were
feasting and revelling; wine and strong old ale were foaming in the
glasses and jugs; the favourite dogs ate with their masters; now and
then the squires kissed one of these animals, after having wiped its
mouth first with the tablecloth. They ordered the pedlar to come up,
but only to make fun of him. The wine had got into their heads, and
reason had left them. They poured beer into a stocking that he could
drink with them, but quick. That's what they called fun, and it made
them laugh. Then meadows, peasants, and farmyards were staked on one
card and lost.
"Everything in the right place!" the pedlar said when he had at last
safely got out of Sodom and Gomorrah, as he called it. "The open
high road is my right place; up there I did not feel at ease."
The little maid, who was still watching the geese, nodded kindly to
him as he passed through the gate.
Days and weeks passed, and it was seen that the broken willow-branch
which the peddlar had stuck into the ground near the ditch remained
fresh and green—nay, it even put forth fresh twigs; the little
goose-girl saw that the branch had taken root, and was very pleased;
the tree, so she said, was now her tree. While the tree was
advancing, everything else at the castle was going backward, through
feasting and gambling, for these are two rollers upon which nobody
stands safely. Less than six years afterwards the baron passed out
of his castle-gate a poor beggar, while the baronial seat had been
bought by a rich tradesman. He was the very pedlar they had made fun
of and poured beer into a stocking for him to drink; but honesty and
industry bring one forward, and now the pedlar was the possessor of
the baronial estate. From that time forward no card-playing was
permitted there.
"That's a bad pastime," he said; "when the devil saw the Bible for
the first time he wanted to produce a caricature in opposition to
it, and invented card-playing."
The new proprietor of the estate took a wife, and whom did he
take?—The little goose-girl, who had always remained good and kind,
and who looked as beautiful in her new clothes as if she had been a
lady of high birth. And how did all this come about? That would be
too long a tale to tell in our busy time, but it really happened,
and the most important events have yet to be told.
It was pleasant and cheerful to live in the old place now: the
mother superintended the household, and the father looked after
things out-of-doors, and they were indeed very prosperous.
Where honesty leads the way, prosperity is sure to follow. The old
mansion was repaired and painted, the ditches were cleaned and
fruit-trees planted; all was homely and pleasant, and the floors
were as white and shining as a pasteboard. In the long winter
evenings the mistress and her maids sat at the spinning-wheel in the
large hall; every Sunday the counsellor—this title the pedlar had
obtained, although only in his old days—read aloud a portion from
the Bible. The children (for they had children) all received the
best education, but they were not all equally clever, as is the case
in all families.
In the meantime the willow tree near the drawbridge had grown up
into a splendid tree, and stood there, free, and was never clipped.
"It is our genealogical tree," said the old people to their
children, "and therefore it must be honoured."
A hundred years had elapsed. It was in our own days; the lake had
been transformed into marsh land; the whole baronial seat had, as it
were, disappeared. A pool of water near some ruined walls was the
only remainder of the deep ditches; and here stood a magnificent old
tree with overhanging branches—that was the genealogical tree. Here
it stood, and showed how beautiful a willow can look if one does not
interfere with it. The trunk, it is true, was cleft in the middle
from the root to the crown; the storms had bent it a little, but it
still stood there, and out of every crevice and cleft, in which wind
and weather had carried mould, blades of grass and flowers sprang
forth. Especially above, where the large boughs parted, there was
quite a hanging garden, in which wild raspberries and hart's-tongue
ferns throve, and even a little mistletoe had taken root, and grew
gracefully in the old willow branches, which were reflected in the
dark water beneath when the wind blew the chickweed into the corner
of the pool. A footpath which led across the fields passed close by
the old tree. High up, on the woody hillside, stood the new mansion.
It had a splendid view, and was large and magnificent; its window
panes were so clear that one might have thought there were none
there at all. The large flight of steps which led to the entrance
looked like a bower covered with roses and broad-leaved plants. The
lawn was as green as if each blade of grass was cleaned separately
morning and evening. Inside, in the hall, valuable oil paintings
were hanging on the walls. Here stood chairs and sofas covered with
silk and velvet, which could be easily rolled about on castors;
there were tables with polished marble tops, and books bound in
morocco with gilt edges. Indeed, well-to-do and distinguished people
lived here; it was the dwelling of the baron and his family. Each
article was in keeping with its surroundings. "Everything in the
right place" was the motto according to which they also acted here,
and therefore all the paintings which had once been the honour and
glory of the old mansion were now hung up in the passage which led
to the servants' rooms. It was all old lumber, especially two
portraits—one representing a man in a scarlet coat with a wig, and
the other a lady with powdered and curled hair holding a rose in her
hand, each of them being surrounded by a large wreath of willow
branches. Both portraits had many holes in them, because the baron's
sons used the two old people as targets for their crossbows. They
represented the counsellor and his wife, from whom the whole family
descended. "But they did not properly belong to our family," said
one of the boys; "he was a pedlar and she kept the geese. They were
not like papa and mamma." The portraits were old lumber, and
"everything in its right place." That was why the great-grandparents
had been hung up in the passage leading to the servants' rooms.
The son of the village pastor was tutor at the mansion. One day he
went for a walk across the fields with his young pupils and their
elder sister, who had lately been confirmed. They walked along the
road which passed by the old willow tree, and while they were on the
road she picked a bunch of field-flowers. "Everything in the right
place," and indeed the bunch looked very beautiful. At the same time
she listened to all that was said, and she very much liked to hear
the pastor's son speak about the elements and of the great men and
women in history. She had a healthy mind, noble in thought and deed,
and with a heart full of love for everything that God had created.
They stopped at the old willow tree, as the youngest of the baron's
sons wished very much to have a flute from it, such as had been cut
for him from other willow trees; the pastor's son broke a branch
off. "Oh, pray do not do it!" said the young lady; but it was
already done. "That is our famous old tree. I love it very much.
They often laugh at me at home about it, but that does not matter.
There is a story attached to this tree." And now she told him all
that we already know about the tree—the old mansion, the pedlar and
the goose-girl who had met there for the first time, and had become
the ancestors of the noble family to which the young lady belonged.
"They did not like to be knighted, the good old people," she said;
"their motto was 'everything in the right place,' and it would not
be right, they thought, to purchase a title for money. My
grandfather, the first baron, was their son. They say he was a very
learned man, a great favourite with the princes and princesses, and
was invited to all court festivities. The others at home love him
best; but, I do not know why, there seemed to me to be something
about the old couple that attracts my heart! How homely, how
patriarchal, it must have been in the old mansion, where the
mistress sat at the spinning-wheel with her maids, while her husband
read aloud out of the Bible!"
"They must have been excellent, sensible people," said the pastor's
son. And with this the conversation turned naturally to noblemen and
commoners; from the manner in which the tutor spoke about the
significance of being noble, it seemed almost as if he did not
belong to a commoner's family.
"It is good fortune to be of a family who have distinguished
themselves, and to possess as it were a spur in oneself to advance
to all that is good. It is a splendid thing to belong to a noble
family, whose name serves as a card of admission to the highest
circles. Nobility is a distinction; it is a gold coin that bears the
stamp of its own value. It is the fallacy of the time, and many
poets express it, to say that all that is noble is bad and stupid,
and that, on the contrary, the lower one goes among the poor, the
more brilliant virtues one finds. I do not share this opinion, for
it is wrong. In the upper classes one sees many touchingly beautiful
traits; my own mother has told me of such, and I could mention
several. One day she was visiting a nobleman's house in town; my
grandmother, I believe, had been the lady's nurse when she was a
child. My mother and the nobleman were alone in the room, when he
suddenly noticed an old woman on crutches come limping into the
courtyard; she came every Sunday to carry a gift away with her.
"'There is the poor old woman,' said the nobleman; 'it is so
difficult for her to walk.'
"My mother had hardly understood what he said before he disappeared
from the room, and went downstairs, in order to save her the
troublesome walk for the gift she came to fetch. Of course this is
only a little incident, but it has its good sound like the poor
widow's two mites in the Bible, the sound which echoes in the depth
of every human heart; and this is what the poet ought to show and
point out—more especially in our own time he ought to sing of this;
it does good, it mitigates and reconciles! But when a man, simply
because he is of noble birth and possesses a genealogy, stands on
his hind legs and neighs in the street like an Arabian horse, and
says when a commoner has been in a room: 'Some people from the
street have been here,' there nobility is decaying; it has become a
mask of the kind that Thespis created, and it is amusing when such a
person is exposed in satire."
Such was the tutor's speech; it was a little long, but while he
delivered it he had finished cutting the flute.
There was a large party at the mansion; many guests from the
neighbourhood and from the capital had arrived. There were ladies
with tasteful and with tasteless dresses; the big hall was quite
crowded with people. The clergymen stood humbly together in a
corner, and looked as if they were preparing for a funeral, but it
was a festival—only the amusement had not yet begun. A great concert
was to take place, and that is why the baron's young son had brought
his willow flute with him; but he could not make it sound, nor could
his father, and therefore the flute was good for nothing.
There was music and songs of the kind which delight most those that
perform them; otherwise quite charming!
"Are you an artist?" said a cavalier, the son of his father; "you
play on the flute, you have made it yourself; it is genius that
rules—the place of honour is due to you."
"Certainly not! I only advance with the time, and that of course one
can't help."
"I hope you will delight us all with the little instrument—will you
not?" Thus saying he handed to the tutor the flute which had been
cut from the willow tree by the pool; and then announced in a loud
voice that the tutor wished to perform a solo on the flute. They
wished to tease him—that was evident, and therefore the tutor
declined to play, although he could do so very well. They urged and
requested him, however, so long, that at last he took up the flute
and placed it to his lips.
That was a marvellous flute! Its sound was as thrilling as the
whistle of a steam engine; in fact it was much stronger, for it
sounded and was heard in the yard, in the garden, in the wood, and
many miles round in the country; at the same time a storm rose and
roared; "Everything in the right place." And with this the baron, as
if carried by the wind, flew out of the hall straight into the
shepherd's cottage, and the shepherd flew—not into the hall, thither
he could not come—but into the servants' hall, among the smart
footmen who were striding about in silk stockings; these haughty
menials looked horror-struck that such a person ventured to sit at
table with them. But in the hall the baron's daughter flew to the
place of honour at the end of the table—she was worthy to sit there;
the pastor's son had the seat next to her; the two sat there as if
they were a bridal pair. An old Count, belonging to one of the
oldest families of the country, remained untouched in his place of
honour; the flute was just, and it is one's duty to be so. The
sharp-tongued cavalier who had caused the flute to be played, and
who was the child of his parents, flew headlong into the fowl-house,
but not he alone.
The flute was heard at the distance of a mile, and strange events
took place. A rich banker's family, who were driving in a coach and
four, were blown out of it, and could not even find room behind it
with their footmen. Two rich farmers who had in our days shot up
higher than their own corn-fields, were flung into the ditch; it was
a dangerous flute. Fortunately it burst at the first sound, and that
was a good thing, for then it was put back into its owner's
pocket—"its right place."
The next day, nobody spoke a word about what had taken place; thus
originated the phrase, "to pocket the flute." Everything was again
in its usual order, except that the two old pictures of the peddlar
and the goose-girl were hanging in the banqueting-hall. There they
were on the wall as if blown up there; and as a real expert said
that they were painted by a master's hand, they remained there and
were restored. "Everything in the right place," and to this it will
come. Eternity is long, much longer indeed than this story.
Everything in the Right Place
A Classic Children's Short Story
by
Hans Christian Andersen |
