格林童话选 英文版 Grimms' Fairy Tales
格林兄弟 Brüder Grimm
TOM THUMB
A poor woodman sat in his cottage one night, smoking his pipe by thefireside, while his wife sat by his side spinning. 'How lonely it is,wife,' said he, as he puffed out a long curl of smoke, 'for you and meto sit here by ourselves, without any children to play about and amuseus while other people seem so happy and merry with their children!''What you say is very true,' said the wife, sighing, and turning roundher wheel; 'how happy should I be if I had but one child! If it wereever so small--nay, if it were no bigger than my thumb--I should bevery happy, and love it dearly.' Now--odd as you may think it--it cameto pass that this good woman's wish was fulfilled, just in the veryway she had wished it; for, not long afterwards, she had a little boy,who was quite healthy and strong, but was not much bigger than mythumb. So they said, 'Well, we cannot say we have not got what wewished for, and, little as he is, we will love him dearly.' And theycalled him Thomas Thumb.
They gave him plenty of food, yet for all they could do he never grewbigger, but kept just the same size as he had been when he was born.Still, his eyes were sharp and sparkling, and he soon showed himselfto be a clever little fellow, who always knew well what he was about.
One day, as the woodman was getting ready to go into the wood to cutfuel, he said, 'I wish I had someone to bring the cart after me, for Iwant to make haste.' 'Oh, father,' cried Tom, 'I will take care ofthat; the cart shall be in the wood by the time you want it.' Then thewoodman laughed, and said, 'How can that be? you cannot reach up tothe horse's bridle.' 'Never mind that, father,' said Tom; 'if mymother will only harness the horse, I will get into his ear and tellhim which way to go.' 'Well,' said the father, 'we will try for once.'
When the time came the mother harnessed the horse to the cart, and putTom into his ear; and as he sat there the little man told the beasthow to go, crying out, 'Go on!' and 'Stop!' as he wanted: and thus thehorse went on just as well as if the woodman had driven it himselfinto the wood. It happened that as the horse was going a little toofast, and Tom was calling out, 'Gently! gently!' two strangers cameup. 'What an odd thing that is!' said one: 'there is a cart goingalong, and I hear a carter talking to the horse, but yet I can see noone.' 'That is queer, indeed,' said the other; 'let us follow thecart, and see where it goes.' So they went on into the wood, till atlast they came to the place where the woodman was. Then Tom Thumb,seeing his father, cried out, 'See, father, here I am with the cart,all right and safe! now take me down!' So his father took hold of thehorse with one hand, and with the other took his son out of thehorse's ear, and put him down upon a straw, where he sat as merry asyou please.
The two strangers were all this time looking on, and did not know whatto say for wonder. At last one took the other aside, and said, 'Thatlittle urchin will make our fortune, if we can get him, and carry himabout from town to town as a show; we must buy him.' So they went upto the woodman, and asked him what he would take for the little man.'He will be better off,' said they, 'with us than with you.' 'I won'tsell him at all,' said the father; 'my own flesh and blood is dearerto me than all the silver and gold in the world.' But Tom, hearing ofthe bargain they wanted to make, crept up his father's coat to hisshoulder and whispered in his ear, 'Take the money, father, and letthem have me; I'll soon come back to you.'
So the woodman at last said he would sell Tom to the strangers for alarge piece of gold, and they paid the price. 'Where would you like tosit?' said one of them. 'Oh, put me on the rim of your hat; that willbe a nice gallery for me; I can walk about there and see the countryas we go along.' So they did as he wished; and when Tom had takenleave of his father they took him away with them.
They journeyed on till it began to be dusky, and then the little mansaid, 'Let me get down, I'm tired.' So the man took off his hat, andput him down on a clod of earth, in a ploughed field by the side ofthe road. But Tom ran about amongst the furrows, and at last slippedinto an old mouse-hole. 'Good night, my masters!' said he, 'I'm off!mind and look sharp after me the next time.' Then they ran at once tothe place, and poked the ends of their sticks into the mouse-hole, butall in vain; Tom only crawled farther and farther in; and at last itbecame quite dark, so that they were forced to go their way withouttheir prize, as sulky as could be.
When Tom found they were gone, he came out of his hiding-place. 'Whatdangerous walking it is,' said he, 'in this ploughed field! If I wereto fall from one of these great clods, I should undoubtedly break myneck.' At last, by good luck, he found a large empty snail-shell.'This is lucky,' said he, 'I can sleep here very well'; and in hecrept.
Just as he was falling asleep, he heard two men passing by, chattingtogether; and one said to the other, 'How can we rob that richparson's house of his silver and gold?' 'I'll tell you!' cried Tom.'What noise was that?' said the thief, frightened; 'I'm sure I heardsomeone speak.' They stood still listening, and Tom said, 'Take mewith you, and I'll soon show you how to get the parson's money.' 'Butwhere are you?' said they. 'Look about on the ground,' answered he,'and listen where the sound comes from.' At last the thieves found himout, and lifted him up in their hands. 'You little urchin!' they said,'what can you do for us?' 'Why, I can get between the iron window-barsof the parson's house, and throw you out whatever you want.' 'That's agood thought,' said the thieves; 'come along, we shall see what youcan do.'
When they came to the parson's house, Tom slipped through the window-bars into the room, and then called out as loud as he could bawl,'Will you have all that is here?' At this the thieves were frightened,and said, 'Softly, softly! Speak low, that you may not awakenanybody.' But Tom seemed as if he did not understand them, and bawledout again, 'How much will you have? Shall I throw it all out?' Now thecook lay in the next room; and hearing a noise she raised herself upin her bed and listened. Meantime the thieves were frightened, and ranoff a little way; but at last they plucked up their hearts, and said,'The little urchin is only trying to make fools of us.' So they cameback and whispered softly to him, saying, 'Now let us have no more ofyour roguish jokes; but throw us out some of the money.' Then Tomcalled out as loud as he could, 'Very well! hold your hands! here itcomes.'
The cook heard this quite plain, so she sprang out of bed, and ran toopen the door. The thieves ran off as if a wolf was at their tails:and the maid, having groped about and found nothing, went away for alight. By the time she came back, Tom had slipped off into the barn;and when she had looked about and searched every hole and corner, andfound nobody, she went to bed, thinking she must have been dreamingwith her eyes open.
The little man crawled about in the hay-loft, and at last found a snugplace to finish his night's rest in; so he laid himself down, meaningto sleep till daylight, and then find his way home to his father andmother. But alas! how woefully he was undone! what crosses and sorrowshappen to us all in this world! The cook got up early, beforedaybreak, to feed the cows; and going straight to the hay-loft,carried away a large bundle of hay, with the little man in the middleof it, fast asleep. He still, however, slept on, and did not awaketill he found himself in the mouth of the cow; for the cook had putthe hay into the cow's rick, and the cow had taken Tom up in amouthful of it. 'Good lack-a-day!' said he, 'how came I to tumble intothe mill?' But he soon found out where he really was; and was forcedto have all his wits about him, that he might not get between thecow's teeth, and so be crushed to death. At last down he went into herstomach. 'It is rather dark,' said he; 'they forgot to build windowsin this room to let the sun in; a candle would be no bad thing.'
Though he made the best of his bad luck, he did not like his quartersat all; and the worst of it was, that more and more hay was alwayscoming down, and the space left for him became smaller and smaller. Atlast he cried out as loud as he could, 'Don't bring me any more hay!Don't bring me any more hay!'
The maid happened to be just then milking the cow; and hearing someonespeak, but seeing nobody, and yet being quite sure it was the samevoice that she had heard in the night, she was so frightened that shefell off her stool, and overset the milk-pail. As soon as she couldpick herself up out of the dirt, she ran off as fast as she could toher master the parson, and said, 'Sir, sir, the cow is talking!' Butthe parson said, 'Woman, thou art surely mad!' However, he went withher into the cow-house, to try and see what was the matter.
Scarcely had they set foot on the threshold, when Tom called out,'Don't bring me any more hay!' Then the parson himself was frightened;and thinking the cow was surely bewitched, told his man to kill her onthe spot. So the cow was killed, and cut up; and the stomach, in whichTom lay, was thrown out upon a dunghill.
Tom soon set himself to work to get out, which was not a very easytask; but at last, just as he had made room to get his head out, freshill-luck befell him. A hungry wolf sprang out, and swallowed up thewhole stomach, with Tom in it, at one gulp, and ran away.
Tom, however, was still not disheartened; and thinking the wolf wouldnot dislike having some chat with him as he was going along, he calledout, 'My good friend, I can show you a famous treat.' 'Where's that?'said the wolf. 'In such and such a house,' said Tom, describing hisown father's house. 'You can crawl through the drain into the kitchenand then into the pantry, and there you will find cakes, ham, beef,cold chicken, roast pig, apple-dumplings, and everything that yourheart can wish.'
The wolf did not want to be asked twice; so that very night he went tothe house and crawled through the drain into the kitchen, and theninto the pantry, and ate and drank there to his heart's content. Assoon as he had had enough he wanted to get away; but he had eaten somuch that he could not go out by the same way he came in.
This was just what Tom had reckoned upon; and now he began to set up agreat shout, making all the noise he could. 'Will you be easy?' saidthe wolf; 'you'll awaken everybody in the house if you make such aclatter.' 'What's that to me?' said the little man; 'you have had yourfrolic, now I've a mind to be merry myself'; and he began, singing andshouting as loud as he could.
The woodman and his wife, being awakened by the noise, peeped througha crack in the door; but when they saw a wolf was there, you may wellsuppose that they were sadly frightened; and the woodman ran for hisaxe, and gave his wife a scythe. 'Do you stay behind,' said thewoodman, 'and when I have knocked him on the head you must rip him upwith the scythe.' Tom heard all this, and cried out, 'Father, father!I am here, the wolf has swallowed me.' And his father said, 'Heaven bepraised! we have found our dear child again'; and he told his wife notto use the scythe for fear she should hurt him. Then he aimed a greatblow, and struck the wolf on the head, and killed him on the spot! andwhen he was dead they cut open his body, and set Tommy free. 'Ah!'said the father, 'what fears we have had for you!' 'Yes, father,'answered he; 'I have travelled all over the world, I think, in one wayor other, since we parted; and now I am very glad to come home and getfresh air again.' 'Why, where have you been?' said his father. 'I havebeen in a mouse-hole--and in a snail-shell--and down a cow's throat--and in the wolf's belly; and yet here I am again, safe and sound.'
'Well,' said they, 'you are come back, and we will not sell you againfor all the riches in the world.'
Then they hugged and kissed their dear little son, and gave him plentyto eat and drink, for he was very hungry; and then they fetched newclothes for him, for his old ones had been quite spoiled on hisjourney. So Master Thumb stayed at home with his father and mother, inpeace; for though he had been so great a traveller, and had done andseen so many fine things, and was fond enough of telling the wholestory, he always agreed that, after all, there's no place like HOME!