The Ice Maiden Page #3

"The Ice Maiden" is a captivating fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen about Rudy, a young Swiss man with a tragic past and an unusual ability to communicate with animals. Rudy grows up and falls in love with beautiful Babette, but their love is threatened by the sinister Ice Maiden, a supernatural being who claims the lives of those who venture into her icy realm. The book explores themes like love, death, and destiny, melded with a chilling supernatural narrative and picturesque depictions of Swiss landscapes.

• Children

								

all the dogs and men on this side of the mountain. It is not my
habit to talk much; but now that we have so little time to converse
together, I will say something more than usual. I will relate to you a
story, which I have reflected upon for a long time. I do not
understand it, and very likely you will not, but that is of no
consequence. I have, however, learnt from it that in this world things
are not equally divided, neither for dogs nor for men. All are not
born to lie on the lap and to drink milk: I have never been petted
in this way, but I have seen a little dog seated in the place of a
gentleman or lady, and travelling inside a post-chaise. The lady,
who was his mistress, or of whom he was master, carried a bottle of
milk, of which the little dog now and then drank; she also offered him
pieces of sugar to crunch. He sniffed at them proudly, but would not
eat one, so she ate them herself. I was running along the dirty road
by the side of the carriage as hungry as a dog could be, chewing the
cud of my own thoughts, which were rather in confusion. But many other
things seemed in confusion also. Why was not I lying on a lap and
travelling in a coach? I could not tell; yet I knew I could not
alter my own condition, either by barking or growling."

This was Ajola's farewell speech, and Rudy threw his arms round
the dog's neck and kissed his cold nose. Then he took the cat in his
arms, but he struggled to get free.

"You are getting too strong for me," he said; "but I will not
use my claws against you. Clamber away over the mountains; it was I
who taught you to climb. Do not fancy you are going to fall, and you
will be quite safe." Then the cat jumped down and ran away; he did not
wish Rudy to see that there were tears in his eyes.

The hens were hopping about the floor; one of them had no tail;
a traveller, who fancied himself a sportsman, had shot off her tail,
he had mistaken her for a bird of prey.

"Rudy is going away over the mountains," said one of the hens.

"He is always in such a hurry," said the other; "and I don't
like taking leave," so they both hopped out.

But the goats said farewell; they bleated and wanted to go with
him, they were so very sorry.

Just at this time two clever guides were going to cross the
mountains to the other side of the Gemmi, and Rudy was to go with them
on foot. It was a long walk for such a little boy, but he had plenty
of strength and invincible courage. The swallows flew with him a
little way, singing, "We and you--you and we." The way led across
the rushing Lutschine, which falls in numerous streams from the dark
clefts of the Grindelwald glaciers. Trunks of fallen trees and
blocks of stone form bridges over these streams. After passing a
forest of alders, they began to ascend, passing by some blocks of
ice that had loosened themselves from the side of the mountain and lay
across their path; they had to step over these ice-blocks or walk
round them. Rudy crept here and ran there, his eyes sparkling with
joy, and he stepped so firmly with his iron-tipped mountain shoe, that
he left a mark behind him wherever he placed his foot.

The earth was black where the mountain torrents or the melted
ice had poured upon it, but the bluish green, glassy ice sparkled
and glittered. They had to go round little pools, like lakes, enclosed
between large masses of ice; and, while thus wandering out of their
path, they came near an immense stone, which lay balanced on the
edge of an icy peak. The stone lost its balance just as they reached
it, and rolled over into the abyss beneath, while the noise of its
fall was echoed back from every hollow cliff of the glaciers.

They were always going upwards. The glaciers seemed to spread
above them like a continued chain of masses of ice, piled up in wild
confusion between bare and rugged rocks. Rudy thought for a moment
of what had been told him, that he and his mother had once lain buried
in one of these cold, heart-chilling fissures; but he soon banished
such thoughts, and looked upon the story as fabulous, like many
other stories which had been told him. Once or twice, when the men
thought the way was rather difficult for such a little boy, they
held out their hands to assist him; but he would not accept their
assistance, for he stood on the slippery ice as firmly as if he had
been a chamois. They came at length to rocky ground; sometimes
stepping upon moss-covered stones, sometimes passing beneath stunted
fir-trees, and again through green meadows. The landscape was always
changing, but ever above them towered the lofty snow-clad mountains,
whose names not only Rudy but every other child knew--"The
Jungfrau," "The Monk and the Eiger."

Rudy had never been so far away before; he had never trodden on
the wide-spreading ocean of snow that lay here with its immovable
billows, from which the wind blows off the snowflake now and then,
as it cuts the foam from the waves of the sea. The glaciers stand here
so close together it might almost be said they are hand-in-hand; and
each is a crystal palace for the Ice Maiden, whose power and will it
is to seize and imprison the unwary traveller.

The sun shone warmly, and the snow sparkled as if covered with
glittering diamonds. Numerous insects, especially butterflies and
bees, lay dead in heaps on the snow. They had ventured too high, or
the wind had carried them here and left them to die of cold.

Around the Wetterhorn hung a feathery cloud, like a woolbag, and a
threatening cloud too, for as it sunk lower it increased in size,
and concealed within was a "fohn," fearful in its violence should it
break loose. This journey, with its varied incidents,--the wild paths,
the night passed on the mountain, the steep rocky precipices, the
hollow clefts, in which the rustling waters from time immemorial had
worn away passages for themselves through blocks of stone,--all
these were firmly impressed on Rudy's memory.

In a forsaken stone building, which stood just beyond the seas
of snow, they one night took shelter. Here they found some charcoal
and pine branches, so that they soon made a fire. They arranged
couches to lie on as well as they could, and then the men seated
themselves by the fire, took out their pipes, and began to smoke. They
also prepared a warm, spiced drink, of which they partook and Rudy was
not forgotten--he had his share. Then they began to talk of those
mysterious beings with which the land of the Alps abounds; the hosts
of apparitions which come in the night, and carry off the sleepers
through the air, to the wonderful floating town of Venice; of the wild
herds-man, who drives the black sheep across the meadows. These flocks
are never seen, yet the tinkle of their little bells has often been
heard, as well as their unearthly bleating. Rudy listened eagerly, but
without fear, for he knew not what fear meant; and while he
listened, he fancied he could hear the roaring of the spectral herd.
It seemed to come nearer and roar louder, till the men heard it also
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