Farmer in the Sky by Robert A. Heinlein(4)

"The heat trap! The heat trap is gone—the quake must have gotten the power house."


So we dug again, until we found what we had to have. It didn't take long; we knew where things had to be. It was just a case of getting the rocks off. The blankets were for the stretcher; Dad wrapped them around like a cocoon and tied them in place. "Okay, Bill," he said. "Quick march, nowl"

It was then that I heard Mabel bawl. I stopped and looked at Dad. He stopped too, with an agony of indecision on his face. "Oh, damn!" he said, the first time I had ever heard him really swear. "We can't just leave her to freeze; she's a member of the family. Come, Bill."

We put the stretcher down again and ran to the bam. It was a junk heap but we could tell by Mabel's complaints where she was. We dragged the roof off her and she got to her feet. She didn't seem to be hurt but I guess she had been knocked silly. She looked at us indignantly.

We had a time of it getting her over the slabs, with Dad pulling and me pushing. Dad handed the halter to Molly. "How about the chickens?" I asked, "And the rabbits?" Some of them had been crushed; the rest were loose around the place. I felt one—a rabbit —scurry between my feet

"No time!" snapped Dad. "We can't take them; all we could do for them would be to cut their throats. Come!"

Farmer in the Sky by Robert A. Heinlein(3)

Here is the way it was supposed to work: A colonist comes out from Earth with his family and lands at Leda. The Colonial Commission gives him an apartment in town on arrival, helps him pick out a piece of land to improve and helps him get a house up on it. The Commission will feed him and his family for one Earth year—that is, two Ganymede years—while he gets a couple of acres under cultivation. Then he has ten G-years in which to pay back the Commission by processing at least twenty acres for the Commission— and he is allowed to process as much land for himself as for the Commission during the time he is paying what he owes. At the end of five Earth years he owns a tidy little farm, free and clear. After that, he can spread out and acquire more land, get into trade, anything he likes. He has his toehold and has paid off his debt.


The Colonial Commission had a big expensive investment in having started the atmosphere project and made the planet fit to live on in the first place. The land processed by the colonists was its return on the investment; the day would come when the Colonial Commission would own thousands of acres of prime farmland on Ganymede which it could then sell Earthside to later settlers ... if you wanted to emigrate from Earth you would have to pay for the privilege and pay high. People like us would not be able to afford it.

By that time, although Ganymede would be closed to free immigration, Callisto would have an atmosphere and pioneers could move in there and do it all over again. It was what the bankers call "Self-liquidating," with the original investment coming from Earth.

But here is the way it actually did work out: when we landed there were only about thirty thousand people on Ganymede and they were geared to accept about five hundred immigrants an Earth year, which was about all the old-type ships could bring out. Remember, those power-pile ships took over five years for the round trip; it took a fleet of them to bring in that many a year.

Farmer in the Sky by Robert A. Heinlein(2)

I never did hear them say "one" or "fire" or whatever they said. About then something fell on me and I thought I was licked. Once, exploring a cave with the fellows, a bank collapsed on me and I had to be dug out. It was like that—but nobody dug me out.


My chest hurt My ribs seemed about to break. I couldn't lift a finger. I gulped and couldn't get my breath.

I wasn't scared, not really, because I knew we would take off with a high g, but I was awfully uncomfortable. I managed to turn my head a little and saw that the sky was already purple. While I watched, it turned black and the stars came out, millions of stars. And yet the Sun was still streaming in through the port.

The roar of the jets was unbelievable but the noise started to die out almost at once and soon you couldn't hear it at all. They say the old ships used to be noisy even after you passed the speed of sound; the Bifrost was not. It got as quiet as the inside of a bag of feathers.

There was nothing to do but lie there, stare out at that black sky, try to breathe, and try not to think about the weight sitting on you.

And then, so suddenly that it made your stomach turn flip-flops, you didn't weigh anything at all.

Farmer in the Sky by Robert A. Heinlein(1)

1. Earth

Our troop had been up in the High Sierras that day and we were late getting back. We had taken off from the camp field on time but Traffic Control swung us 'way east to avoid some weather. I didn't like it; Dad usually won't eat if I'm not home.

Besides that, I had had a new boy shoved off on me as co-pilot; my usual co-pilot and assistant patrol leader was sick, so our Scoutmaster, Mr. Kinski, gave me this twerp. Mr. Kinski rode in the other copter with the Cougar Patrol.

"Why don't you put on some speed?" the twerp wanted to know.

"Ever hear of traffic regulations?" I asked him.

The copter was on slave-automatic, controlled from the ground, and was cruising slowly, down a freight lane they had stuck us in.

The twerp laughed. "You can always have an emergency. Here—I'll show you." He switched on the mike. "Dog Fox Eight Three, calling traffic—"I switched it off, then switched on again when Traffic answered and told them that we had called by mistake. The twerp looked disgusted. "Mother's good little boy!" he said in sticky sweet tones.

That was just the wrong thing to say to me. "Go after," I told him, "and tell Slats Keifer to come up here."

"Why? He's not a pilot."

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page10)

rights, environmental, and anti-abortion movements, may also pose

a signifi cant threat, and can not be overlooked. Additionally, the new

millennium is an important apocalyptic milestone for many religious or

extremist cults. Many terrorist groups, both traditional and “new,” have

privatized their practices through a few standard business techniques

(fund-raising, use of technology, etc.)

APPENDIX 137

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page9)

5. Al Qaeda functioned both on its own and through some of the

terrorist organizations that operated under its umbrella, including:

Egyptian Islamic Jihad, and at times, the Islamic Group (also

known as “el Gamaa Islamia” or simply “Gamaa’t”), led by Sheik

Omar Abdel Rahman and later by Ahmed Refai Taha, a / k/a “Abu

Yasser al Masri,” named as co-conspirators but not as defendants

herein; and a number of jihad groups in other countries, including

the Sudan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Somalia, Eritrea,

Djibouti, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bosnia, Croatia, Albania, Algeria,

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page8)

decision resulted from a change of government rather than intimidation,


al-Qaeda claimed victory. Italy, too, left the coalition following the deaths

of 12 of its soldiers in Iraq.

On the eve of the 2004 presidential election, bin Laden spoke again

to the American people. He admonished them to repudiate the wicked

policies of their government and explained al-Qaeda’s long-term strategy

of attrition. “All we had to do was send two mujahedeen to the farthest

east to raise aloft a piece of rag with the words ‘al-Qaeda’ written on it, and

the [U.S.] generals came a-scurrying — causing America to suffer human,

economic, and political damages while accomplishing nothing worth

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page7)

NOTES


1 . Osama Rushdi, quoted in Peter Bergen, The Osama bin Laden I Know

( New York: Free Press), p. 106.

2 . Lawrence Wright, The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11

( New York: Knopf, 2006), p. 151.

3 . Abu Walid al Misiri, in Bergen, The Osama bin Laden I Know , p. 109.

FIGHTING THE GREAT SATAN 89

4 . Turki and Clarke quoted in Steve Coll, The Bin Ladens: An Arabian

Family in the American Century ( New York: Penguin, 2008), p. 46.

5 . Bruce Riedel, The Search for al-Qaeda: Its Leadership, Ideology, and Future

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page6)

boasting that he had 40,000 mujahedeen in Saudi Arabia alone and


could raise an army of more than 100,000 in three months. 7 Prince Turki

recalled that bin Laden “ believed that he was capable of preparing an

army to challenge Saddam’s forces.” Turki also noted a disturbing difference

in bin Laden. “ I saw radical changes in his personality as he

changed from a peaceful and gentle man interested in helping Muslims

into a person who believed that he would be able to amass and

command an army to liberate Kuwait,” Turki remembered. “ It revealed

his arrogance.” 8 Given the small numbers and, at best, mediocre performance

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page5)

the “ internecine fi ghting within the mujahedeen movement and among


the Arabs congregated around it in Pakistan. ” He also notes that Azzam

and the Egyptian radical Ayman al-Zawahiri competed for bin Laden’s

support and money.8 Other sources corroborate this competition.

BIRTH OF AL-QAEDA

Al-Qaeda, Arabic for the “ the base, ” grew out of the Maktab al Khidmat

lil Mujadidin al Arab (Afghan Services Offi ce), founded in 1984 or 1985

by bin Laden and Azzam to facilitate recruitment and travel of foreign

mujahedeen to fi ght the Soviets in Afghanistan. Several accounts document

the formation of al-Qaeda, although they do not always agree on

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page4)

No records of bin Laden’s conversations with Azzam exist, but the


content is easy to conjecture from Azzam’s writing and bin Laden’s decision

to relocate to Pakistan in order to aid the jihad. He sought to raise

both money and recruits for the Afghan cause. While he understood the importance

of resources, he rejected the notion that sending money to help

the Afghan insurgents suffi ced. “There is no doubt that jihad by one’s person

is superior to jihad by one’s wealth,” he argued. “Consequently, the

rich in the time of the Prophet . . . were not excused from participating

with their persons, such as Uthman and Abdur Rahman Ibn Auf (ra). Because,

the purifi cation of the soul and the evolution of the spirit, is lifted

to great heights in the midst of the battle.”9

Azzam proclaimed jihad a sacred obligation incumbent upon Islamic

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page 3)

Islam is the last of three great monotheisms that trace their origins to


the patriarch Abraham. While Jews trace their lineage from Abraham

through his son Isaac, Muslims claim descent from Abraham’s son Ishmael.

According to Islamic teaching, the Archangel Gabriel appeared to the

Prophet Muhammad while he was fasting and praying in a cave outside

Mecca during the “night of power” in 610 c.e. Over the next several

years, the Archangel revealed divine truth to the Prophet. Written down

shortly after Mohammed’s death, these revelations became the Holy

Qu’ran, the sacred text of Islam. Gabriel proclaimed that God ( Allah

in Arabic) had spoken the same message twice before, fi rst to the Jews,

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page 2)

THE BIN LADENS

The rise of the bin Laden family to a position of unprecedented wealth

and power paralleled the emergence of Saudi Arabia as a modern state.

Bin Laden’s father, Mohammed bin Laden, was born in the Hadramut region

of Yemen in or around 1905. He left home in 1925 (again, the date

is uncertain) and settled in Jeddah, a major city in western Saudi Arabia.

4 OSAMA BIN LADEN

There he held menial jobs, fi nally settling down in the construction business,

a fi eld for which he demonstrated an aptitude. He founded his own

company in 1931, according to the Binladen Group offi cial history. 2 He

began building houses, worked as a bricklayer for the Arabian American

Oil Company, and eventually secured government contracts. His ability

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(page 1)

CONTENTS


Series Foreword ix

Preface xi

Introduction xiii

Timeline: Events in the Life of Osama bin Laden xix

Chapter 1 Osama bin Laden the Man 1

Chapter 2 Osama bin Laden’s Worldview 17

Chapter 3 Afghanistan 35

Chapter 4 Al-Qaeda 51

Chapter 5 Fighting the Great Satan 69

Chapter 6 Bin Laden and al-Qaeda, Post-9/11 91

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY(11)

Articles


Buchanan, Michael. “ London Bombs Cost Just Hundreds.” BBC Online. January

3, 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4576346.stm.

“Bundestagwahl im Visier von al-Qaieda.” Die Welt, July 5, 2009, p. 4.

Comas, Victor. “Al Qaeda Financing and Funding to Affi liate Groups.” Strategic

Insights 4, no. 1 ( January 2005). http://www.ccc.nps.navy.mil/si/2005/Jan/

comrasJan05.asp.

“ The CIA’s Intervention in Afghanistan.” Le Nouvel Observateur. Paris, January

15– 21, 1998. http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/ BRZ110A.html.

Starkey, Jerome. “Drugs for Guns: How the Afghan Heroin Trade is Fuelling the

Taliban insurgency.” The Independent (UK). April 29, 2008. http://www.

Osama bin Laden BIOGRAPHY

Anna Karenina(page 7)

141 of 1759
Before Vronsky and Oblonsky came back the ladies
heard the facts from the butler.
Oblonsky and Vronsky had both seen the mutilated
corpse. Oblonsky was evidently upset. He frowned and
seemed ready to cry.
‘Ah, how awful! Ah, Anna, if you had seen it! Ah, how
awful!’ he said.
Vronsky did not speak; his handsome face was serious,
but perfectly composed.
‘Oh, if you had seen it, countess,’ said Stepan
Arkadyevitch. ‘And his wife was there.... It was awful to
see her!.... She flung herself on the body. They say he was
the only support of an immense family. How awful!’
‘Couldn’t one do anything for her?’ said Madame
Karenina in an agitated whisper.
Vronsky glanced at her, and immediately got out of the
carriage.
‘I’ll be back directly, maman,’ he remarked, turning
round in the doorway.

Anna Karenina(page 6)

Vronsky looked at Levin and Countess Nordston, and
smiled.
‘Are you always in the country?’ he inquired. ‘I should
think it must be dull in the winter.’
‘It’s not dull if one has work to do; besides, one’s not
dull by oneself,’ Levin replied abruptly.
‘I am fond of the country,’ said Vronsky, noticing, and
affecting not to notice, Levin’s tone.
‘But I hope, count, you would not consent to live in
the country always,’ said Countess Nordston.
Anna Karenina
113 of 1759
‘I don’t know; I have never tried for long. I experience
a queer feeling once,’ he went on. ‘I never longed so for
the country, Russian country, with bast shoes and
peasants, as when I was spending a winter with my mother
in Nice. Nice itself is dull enough, you know. And
indeed, Naples and Sorrento are only pleasant for a short
time. And it’s just there that Russia comes back to me
most vividly, and especially the country. It’s as though..’
He talked on, addressing both Kitty and Levin, turning
his serene, friendly eyes from one to the other, and saying
obviously just what came into his head.

Anna Karenina(page 5)

87 of 1759
good-natured fellow, as I’ve found out here—he’s a
cultivated man, too, and very intelligent; he’s a man
who’ll make his mark.’
Levin scowled and was dumb.
‘Well, he turned up here soon after you’d gone, and as
I can see, he’s over head and ears in love with Kitty, and
you know that her mother..’
‘Excuse me, but I know nothing,’ said Levin, frowning
gloomily. And immediately he recollected his brother
Nikolay and how hateful he was to have been able to
forget him.
‘You wait a bit, wait a bit,’ said Stepan Arkadyevitch,
smiling and touching his hand. ‘I’ve told you what I
know, and I repeat that in this delicate and tender matter,
as far as one can conjecture, I believe the chances are in
your favor.’
Levin dropped back in his chair; his face was pale.
‘But I would advise you to settle the thing as soon as
may be,’ pursued Oblonsky, filling up his glass.

Anna Karenina(page 4)

63 of 1759
on the ice. There were crack skaters there, showing off
their skill, and learners clinging to chairs with timid,
awkward movements, boys, and elderly people skating
with hygienic motives. They seemed to Levin an elect
band of blissful beings because they were here, near her.
All the skaters, it seemed, with perfect self-possession,
skated towards her, skated by her, even spoke to her, and
were happy, quite apart from her, enjoying the capital ice
and the fine weather.
Nikolay Shtcherbatsky, Kitty’s cousin, in a short jacket
and tight trousers, was sitting on a garden seat with his
skates on. Seeing Levin, he shouted to him:
‘Ah, the first skater in Russia! Been here long? Firstrate
ice—do put your skates on.’
‘I haven’t got my skates,’ Levin answered, marveling at
this boldness and ease in her presence, and not for one
second losing sight of her, though he did not look at her.
He felt as though the sun were coming near him. She was
in a corner, and turning out her slender feet in their high
boots with obvious timidity, she skated towards him. A
boy in Russian dress, desperately waving his arms and
bowed down to the ground, overtook her. She skated a
little uncertainly; taking her hands out of the little muff
that hung on a cord, she held them ready for emergency,

Anna Karenina(page 3)

he went up to Oblonsky with some papers, and began,
under pretense of asking a question, to explain some
objection. Stepan Arkadyevitch, without hearing him out,
laid his hand genially on the secretary’s sleeve.
‘No, you do as I told you,’ he said, softening his words
with a smile, and with a brief explanation of his view of
the matter he turned away from the papers, and said: ‘So
do it that way, if you please, Zahar Nikititch.’
The secretary retired in confusion. During the
consultation with the secretary Levin had completely
recovered from his embarrassment. He was standing with
his elbows on the back of a chair, and on his face was a
look of ironical attention.
‘I don’t understand it, I don’t understand it,’ he said.
‘What don’t you understand?’ said Oblonsky, smiling as
brightly as ever, and picking up a cigarette. He expected
some queer outburst from Levin.
‘I don’t understand what you are doing,’ said Levin,
shrugging his shoulders. ‘How can you do it seriously?’
‘Why not?’

Anna Karenina(page 2)

20 of 1759
‘How is mamma?’ he asked, passing his hand over his
daughter’s smooth, soft little neck. ‘Good morning,’ he
said, smiling to the boy, who had come up to greet him.
He was conscious that he loved the boy less, and always
tried to be fair; but the boy felt it, and did not respond
with a smile to his father’s chilly smile.
‘Mamma? She is up,’ answered the girl.
Stepan Arkadyevitch sighed. ‘That means that she’s not
slept again all night,’ he thought.
‘Well, is she cheerful?’
The little girl knew that there was a quarrel between
her father and mother, and that her mother could not be
cheerful, and that her father must be aware of this, and
that he was pretending when he asked about it so lightly.
And she blushed for her father. He at once perceived it,
and blushed too.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘She did not say we must do
our lessons, but she said we were to go for a walk with
Miss Hoole to grandmamma’s.’

Anna Karenina(page 1)

Anna Karenina
2 of 1759
PART ONE
Anna Karenina
3 of 1759
Chapter 1
Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is
unhappy in its own way.
Everything was in confusion in the Oblonskys’ house.
The wife had discovered that the husband was carrying on
an intrigue with a French girl, who had been a governess
in their family, and she had announced to her husband
that she could not go on living in the same house with
him. This position of affairs had now lasted three days, and
not only the husband and wife themselves, but all the
members of their family and household, were painfully
conscious of it. Every person in the house felt that there
was so sense in their living together, and that the stray
people brought together by chance in any inn had more in
common with one another than they, the members of the
family and household of the Oblonskys. The wife did not
leave her own room, the husband had not been at home
for three days. The children ran wild all over the house;
the English governess quarreled with the housekeeper, and
wrote to a friend asking her to look out for a new

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 12)

Little Tuk looked, and all was red and green before his
eyes; but as soon as the confusion of colors was somewhat
over, all of a sudden there appeared a wooded slope close
Andersen’s Fairy Tales
242 of 260
to the bay, and high up above stood a magnificent old
church, with two high pointed towers. From out the hillside
spouted fountains in thick streams of water, so that
there was a continual splashing; and close beside them sat
an old king with a golden crown upon his white head:
that was King Hroar, near the fountains, close to the town
of Roeskilde, as it is now called. And up the slope into the
old church went all the kings and queens of Denmark,
hand in hand, all with their golden crowns; and the organ
played and the fountains rustled. Little Tuk saw all, heard
all. ‘Do not forget the diet,’ said King Hroar.*
* Roeskilde, once the capital of Denmark. The town
takes its name from King Hroar, and the many fountains
in the neighborhood. In the beautiful cathedral the greater
number of the kings and queens of Denmark are interred.
In Roeskilde, too, the members of the Danish Diet
assemble.

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 11)

knowledge I have, not to speak of my position in life, my
excellent circumstances—I certainly wish that you would
say YOU* to me!’
* It is the custom in Denmark for intimate
acquaintances to use the second person singular, ‘Du,’
(thou) when speaking to each other. When a friendship is
formed between men, they generally affirm it, when
occasion offers, either in public or private, by drinking to
each other and exclaiming, ‘thy health,’ at the same time
striking their glasses together. This is called drinking
‘Duus": they are then, ‘Duus Brodre,’ (thou brothers) and
ever afterwards use the pronoun ‘thou,’ to each other, it
being regarded as more familiar than ‘De,’ (you). Father
and mother, sister and brother say thou to one another—
without regard to age or rank. Master and mistress say
thou to their servants the superior to the inferior. But
servants and inferiors do not use the same term to their
masters, or superiors—nor is it ever used when speaking to
a stranger, or anyone with whom they are but slightly
acquainted —they then say as in English—you.

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 10)

And she pressed the thorn-bush to her breast, so firmly,
that it might be thoroughly warmed, and the thorns went
right into her flesh, and her blood flowed in large drops,
but the thornbush shot forth fresh green leaves, and there
Andersen’s Fairy Tales
200 of 260
came flowers on it in the cold winter night, the heart of
the afflicted mother was so warm; and the thorn-bush told
her the way she should go.
She then came to a large lake, where there was neither
ship nor boat. The lake was not frozen sufficiently to bear
her; neither was it open, nor low enough that she could
wade through it; and across it she must go if she would
find her child! Then she lay down to drink up the lake,
and that was an impossibility for a human being, but the
afflicted mother thought that a miracle might happen
nevertheless.

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 9)

The Sunday following, the little boy took something,
and wrapped it up in a piece of paper, went downstairs,
and stood in the doorway; and when the man who went
on errands came past, he said to him—
Andersen’s Fairy Tales
180 of 260
‘I say, master! will you give this to the old man over
the way from me? I have two pewter soldiers—this is one
of them, and he shall have it, for I know he is so very,
very lonely.’
And the old errand man looked quite pleased, nodded,
and took the pewter soldier over to the old house.
Afterwards there came a message; it was to ask if the little
boy himself had not a wish to come over and pay a visit;
and so he got permission of his parents, and then went
over to the old house.
And the brass balls on the iron railings shone much
brighter than ever; one would have thought they were
polished on account of the visit; and it was as if the
carved-out trumpeters-for there were trumpeters, who
stood in tulips, carved out on the door—blew with all
their might, their cheeks appeared so much rounder than
before. Yes, they blew—‘Trateratra! The little boy comes!
Trateratra!’—and then the door opened.

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 8)

‘‘To be sure,’ said he. ‘And there in the corner stood a
waterpail, where I used to swim my boats.’
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Andersen’s Fairy Tales
160 of 260
‘‘True; but first we went to school to learn somewhat,’
said she; ‘and then we were confirmed. We both cried;
but in the afternoon we went up the Round Tower, and
looked down on Copenhagen, and far, far away over the
water; then we went to Friedericksberg, where the King
and the Queen were sailing about in their splendid barges.’
‘‘But I had a different sort of sailing to that, later; and
that, too, for many a year; a long way off, on great
voyages.’
‘‘Yes, many a time have I wept for your sake,’ said she.
‘I thought you were dead and gone, and lying down in the
deep waters. Many a night have I got up to see if the wind
had not changed: and changed it had, sure enough; but
you never came. I remember so well one day, when the
rain was pouring down in torrents, the scavengers were

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 7)

137 of 260
down just over the wood, as we lay in our nest. She blew
upon us young ones; and all died except we two. Coo!
Coo!’
‘What is that you say up there?’ cried little Gerda.
‘Where did the Snow Queen go to? Do you know
anything about it?’
‘She is no doubt gone to Lapland; for there is always
snow and ice there. Only ask the Reindeer, who is
tethered there.’
‘Ice and snow is there! There it is, glorious and
beautiful!’ said the Reindeer. ‘One can spring about in the
large shining valleys! The Snow Queen has her summertent
there; but her fixed abode is high up towards the
North Pole, on the Island called Spitzbergen.’
‘Oh, Kay! Poor little Kay!’ sighed Gerda.
‘Do you choose to be quiet?’ said the robber maiden.
‘If you don’t, I shall make you.’

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 6)

She now led Gerda into the flower-garden. Oh, what
odour and what loveliness was there! Every flower that
one could think of, and of every season, stood there in
fullest bloom; no picture-book could be gayer or more
beautiful. Gerda jumped for joy, and played till the sun set
behind the tall cherry-tree; she then had a pretty bed, with
a red silken coverlet filled with blue violets. She fell asleep,
Andersen’s Fairy Tales
115 of 260
and had as pleasant dreams as ever a queen on her
wedding-day.
The next morning she went to play with the flowers in
the warm sunshine, and thus passed away a day. Gerda
knew every flower; and, numerous as they were, it still
seemed to Gerda that one was wanting, though she did
not know which. One day while she was looking at the
hat of the old woman painted with flowers, the most
beautiful of them all seemed to her to be a rose. The old
woman had forgotten to take it from her hat when she
made the others vanish in the earth. But so it is when
one’s thoughts are not collected. ‘What!’ said Gerda. ‘Are
there no roses here?’ and she ran about amongst the

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 5)

‘It is dreadfully cold,’ said the Mouse. ‘But for that, it
would be delightful here, old Fir, wouldn’t it?’
‘I am by no means old,’ said the Fir Tree. ‘There’s
many a one considerably older than I am.’
‘Where do you come from,’ asked the Mice; ‘and what
can you do?’ They were so extremely curious. ‘Tell us
Andersen’s Fairy Tales
92 of 260
about the most beautiful spot on the earth. Have you
never been there? Were you never in the larder, where
cheeses lie on the shelves, and hams hang from above;
where one dances about on tallow candles: that place
where one enters lean, and comes out again fat and
portly?’
‘I know no such place,’ said the Tree. ‘But I know the
wood, where the sun shines and where the little birds
sing.’ And then he told all about his youth; and the little
Mice had never heard the like before; and they listened
and said,

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 4)

constabulary force without a chastisement. Besides, you
good-for-nothing rascal, it is strictly forbidden to catch
birds in the royal gardens of Fredericksburg; but your blue
uniform betrays where you come from.’ This fine tirade
sounded, however, to the ungodly sailor-boy like a mere
‘Pippi-pi.’ He gave the noisy bird a knock on his beak,
and walked on.
He was soon met by two schoolboys of the upper classthat
is to say as individuals, for with regard to learning
they were in the lowest class in the school; and they
bought the stupid bird. So the copying-clerk came to
Copenhagen as guest, or rather as prisoner in a family
living in Gother Street.
‘‘Tis well that I’m dreaming,’ said the clerk, ‘or I really
should get angry. First I was a poet; now sold for a few
pence as a lark; no doubt it was that accursed poetical
nature which has metamorphosed me into such a poor
harmless little creature. It is really pitiable, particularly

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 3)

*A Danish mile is nearly 4 3/4 English.
In a few seconds the watchman had done the fifty-two
thousand of our miles up to the moon, which, as everyone
knows, was formed out of matter much lighter than our
earth; and is, so we should say, as soft as newly-fallen
snow. He found himself on one of the many circumjacent
mountain-ridges with which we are acquainted by means
of Dr. Madler’s ‘Map of the Moon.’ Within, down it sunk
perpendicularly into a caldron, about a Danish mile in
depth; while below lay a town, whose appearance we can,
in some measure, realize to ourselves by beating the white
of an egg in a glass Of water. The matter of which it was
built was just as soft, and formed similar towers, and
domes, and pillars, transparent and rocking in the thin air;
while above his head our earth was rolling like a large fiery
ball.

THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES(Page 2)

* A.D. 1482-1513
While the conversation turned on this subject, and was
only for a moment interrupted by the arrival of a journal
that contained nothing worth reading, we will just step
out into the antechamber, where cloaks, mackintoshes,
sticks, umbrellas, and shoes, were deposited. Here sat two
female figures, a young and an old one. One might have
thought at first they were servants come to accompany
their mistresses home; but on looking nearer, one soon
saw they could scarcely be mere servants; their forms were
too noble for that, their skin too fine, the cut of their dress
too striking. Two fairies were they; the younger, it is true,
was not Dame Fortune herself, but one of the waitingmaids
of her handmaidens who carry about the lesser good
things that she distributes; the other looked extremely
gloomy—it was Care. She always attends to her own
serious business herself, as then she is sure of having it
done properly.
Andersen’s Fairy Tales
24 of 260

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THE EMPEROR’S NEW

CLOTHES

2 of 260

Many years ago, there was an Emperor, who was so
excessively fond of new clothes, that he spent all his
money in dress. He did not trouble himself in the least
about his soldiers; nor did he care to go either to the
theatre or the chase, except for the opportunities then
afforded him for displaying his new clothes. He had a
different suit for each hour of the day; and as of any other
king or emperor, one is accustomed to say, ‘he is sitting in
council,’ it was always said of him, ‘The Emperor is sitting
in his wardrobe.’
Time passed merrily in the large town which was his
capital; strangers arrived every day at the court. One day,
two rogues, calling themselves weavers, made their
appearance. They gave out that they knew how to weave
stuffs of the most beautiful colors and elaborate patterns,
the clothes manufactured from which should have the
wonderful property of remaining invisible to everyone
who was unfit for the office he held, or who was
extraordinarily simple in character.