Thumbelina

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The little prince was very much frightened at the swallow; for it was quite a giant bird to him, who was so small and delicate. Then she laid her head on the bird’s breast, but she was alarmed, for it seemed as if something inside the bird went “thump, thump.

Thumbelina by Hans Christian Andersen | Goodreads

So Toad swam out to the centre of the stream and set the walnut shell down on the leaf of the biggest water lily. The corn which was sown in the field over the house of the field-mouse had grown high into the air; it was quite a thick wood for the poor little girl, who was only an inch in height. Specific objectives include increasing pupils’ familiarity with a range of texts ‘including fairy stories’ and ’traditional stories’. It was a swallow, its beautiful wings pressed close against its sides, its legs and head huddled into its feathers. There the sun shone much brighter than here, the sky seemed twice as high, on the hedges grew the most beautiful blue and green grapes, lemons and oranges hung in the woods, the air was fragrant with myrtles and balsams, and on the roads the loveliest children ran about, playing with the large gay butterflies.Here she slept at night, but during the day she amused herself on a table, where the peasant wife had placed a plate full of water. Neither the field-mouse nor the mole heard anything about it, for they did not like the poor swallow. Tommelise" had been disliked by the critics at the time, for being too informal and chatty, and lacking morals. So at last he had fallen to the ground, but he could remember nothing more, and did not know at all how he had come where she had found him.

Thumbelina | The Yellow Fairy Book | Andrew Lang | Lit2Go ETC Thumbelina | The Yellow Fairy Book | Andrew Lang | Lit2Go ETC

As soon as he saw Thumbelina he was very glad; and she told him how unwilling she was to have the ugly mole for her husband, and that she would have to live deep under the earth, where the sun never shone. Then they flew down with her off the tree, and set her upon a daisy, and she cried, because she was so ugly that the cockchafers would have nothing to say to her; and yet she was the loveliest little being one could imagine, and as tender and fair as the most beautiful rose-leaf. Thumbelina sailed past many towns, and the little birds in the bushes saw her and sang, “What a lovely little creature. A short time before he had dug a long passage through the ground from his own house to that of his neighbor; in this he gave the field-mouse and Thumbelina permission to walk as often as they liked. But she took courage, laid the wool more thickly over the poor swallow, and then took a leaf which she had used for her own counterpane and laid it over his head.

When the spring came, and the sun warmed the earth again, the swallow said farewell to Thumbelina, who opened the hole in the roof for him which the mole had made. She receives a pair of wings to accompany her husband on his travels from flower to flower, and a new name, Maia. She carried it to the dead bird and spread it over him, with some down from the flowers which she had found in the field mouse’s room. Fish rescue her by gnawing the lily pad loose so that it floats downstream but Thumbelina is once again snatched away, this time by a beetle. The field-mouse told her how rich and how wise he was, and how his house was more than twenty times larger than hers, that he had learning, but that he did not like the sun and beautiful flowers, and sneered at them, for he had never seen them.