it, and what sort you will grow to be again, only worse, if you
don't mind. Now that you are sorry, my poor bird will be better.

Look up, my dovey.'
The pigeon gave a flutter, and spread out one of its red-spotted

wings across the old woman's bosom.
'I will mend the little angel,' she said, 'and in a week or two it

will be flying again. So you may ease your heart about the
pigeon.'

'Oh, thank you! Thank you!' cried Curdie. 'I don't know how to
thank you.'

'Then I will tell you. There is only one way I care for. Do
better, and grow better, and be better. And never kill anything

without a good reason for it.'
'Ma'am, I will go and fetch my bow and arrows, and you shall burn

them yourself.'
'I have no fire that would burn your bow and arrows, Curdie.'

'Then I promise you to burn them all under my mother's porridge pot
tomorrow morning.'

'No, no, Curdie. Keep them, and practice with them every day, and
grow a good shot. There are plenty of bad things that want

killing, and a day will come when they will prove useful. But I
must see first whether you will do as I tell you.'

'That I will!' said Curdie. 'What is it, ma'am?'
'Only something not to do,' answered the old lady; 'if you should

hear anyone speak about me, never to laugh or make fun of me.'
'Oh, ma'am!' exclaimed Curdie, shocked that she should think such

a request needful.
'Stop, stop,' she went on. 'People hereabout sometimes tell very

odd and in fact ridiculous stories of an old woman who watches what
is going on, and occasionally interferes. They mean me, though

what they say is often great nonsense. Now what I want of you is
not to laugh, or side with them in any way; because they will take

that to mean that you don't believe there is any such person a bit
more than they do. Now that would not be the case - would it,

Curdie?'
'No, indeed, ma'am. I've seen you.'

The old woman smiled very oddly.
'Yes, you've seen me,' she said. 'But mind,' she continued, 'I

don't want you to say anything - only to hold your tongue, and not
seem to side with them.'

'That will be easy,'said Curdie,'now that I've seen you with my
very own eyes, ma'am.'

'Not so easy as you think, perhaps,' said the old lady, with
another curious smile. 'I want to be your friend,' she added after

a little pause, 'but I don't quite know yet whether you will let
me.'

'Indeed I will, ma'am,' said Curdie.
'That is for me to find out,' she rejoined, with yet another

strange smile. 'in the meantime all I can say is, come to me again
when you find yourself in any trouble, and I will see what I can do

for you - only the canning depends on yourself. I am greatly
pleased with you for bringing me my pigeon, doing your best to set

right what you had set wrong.'
As she spoke she held out her hand to him, and when he took it she

made use of his to help herself up from her stool, and - when or
how it came about, Curdie could not tell - the same instant she

stood before him a tall, strong woman - plainly very old, but as
grand as she was old, and only rather severe-looking. Every trace

of the decrepitude and witheredness she showed as she hovered like
a film about her wheel, had vanished. Her hair was very white, but

it hung about her head in great plenty, and shone like silver in
the moonlight. Straight as a pillar she stood before the

astonished boy, and the wounded bird had now spread out both its
wings across her bosom, like some great mystical ornament of

frosted silver.
'Oh, now I can never forget you!' cried Curdie. 'I see now what

you really are!'
'Did I not tell you the truth when I sat at my wheel?' said the old

lady.
'Yes, ma'am,' answered Curdie.

'I can do no more than tell you the truth now,' she rejoined. 'It
is a bad thing indeed to forget one who has told us the truth. Now

go.'
Curdie obeyed, and took a few steps toward the door. 'Please,

ma'am - what am I to call you?' he was going to say; but when he
turned to speak, he saw nobody. Whether she was there or not he

could not tell, however, for the moonlight had vanished, and the
room was utterly dark. A great fear, such as he had never before

known, came upon him, and almost overwhelmed him. He groped his
way to the door, and crawled down the stair - in doubt and anxiety

as to how he should find his way out of the house in the dark. And
the stair seemed ever so much longer than when he came up. Nor was

that any wonder, for down and down he went, until at length his
foot struck a door, and when he rose and opened it, he found

himself under the starry, moonless sky at the foot of the tower.
He soon discovered the way out of the garden, with which he had

some acquaintance already, and in a few minutes was climbing the
mountain with a solemn and cheerful heart. It was rather dark, but

he knew the way well. As he passed the rock from which the poor
pigeon fell wounded with his arrow, a great joy filled his heart at

the thought that he was delivered from the blood of the little
bird, and he ran the next hundred yards at full speed up the hill.

Some dark shadows passed him: he did not even care to think what
they were, but let them run. When he reached home, he found his

father and mother waiting supper for him.
CHAPTER 4

Curdie's Father and Mother
The eyes of the fathers and mothers are quick to read their

children's looks, and when Curdie entered the cottage, his parents
saw at once that something unusual had taken place. When he said

to his mother, 'I beg your pardon for being so late,' there was
something in the tone beyond the politeness that went to her heart,

for it seemed to come from the place where all lovely things were
born before they began to grow in this world. When he set his

father's chair to the table, an attention he had not shown him for
a long time, Peter thanked him with more gratitude than the boy had

ever yet felt in all his life. It was a small thing to do for the
man who had been serving him since ever he was born, but I suspect

there is nothing a man can be so grateful for as that to which he
has the most right.

There was a change upon Curdie, and father and mother felt there
must be something to account for it, and therefore were pretty sure

he had something to tell them. For when a child's heart is all
right, it is not likely he will want to keep anything from his

parents. But the story of the evening was too solemn for Curdie to
come out with all at once. He must wait until they had had their

porridge, and the affairs of this world were over for the day.
But when they were seated on the grassy bank of the brook that went

so sweetly blundering over the great stones of its rocky channel,
for the whole meadow lay on the top of a huge rock, then he felt

that the right hour had come for sharing with them the wonderful
things that had come to him. It was perhaps the loveliest of all

hours in the year. The summer was young and soft, and this was the
warmest evening they had yet had - dusky, dark even below, while

above, the stars were bright and large and sharp in the blackest
blue sky. The night came close around them, clasping them in one

universal arm of love, and although it neither spoke nor smiled,
seemed all eye and ear, seemed to see and hear and know everything

they said and did. It is a way the night has sometimes, and there
is a reason for it. The only sound was that of the brook, for

there was no wind, and no trees for it to make its music upon if
there had been, for the cottage was high up on the mountain, on a

great shoulder of stone where trees would not grow.
There, to the accompaniment of the water, as it hurried down to the

valley and the sea, talking busily of a thousand true things which
it could not understand, Curdie told his tale, outside and in, to

his father and mother. What a world had slipped in between the
mouth of the mine and his mother's cottage! Neither of them said

a word until he had ended.
'Now what am I to make of it, Mother? it's so strange!' he said,

and stopped.
'It's easy enough to see what Curdie has got to make of it, isn't

it, Peter?' said the good woman, turning her face toward all she
could see of her husband's.

'it seems so to me,' answered Peter, with a smile which only the
night saw, but his wife felt in the tone of his words. They were

the happiest couple in that country, because they always understood
each other, and that was because they always meant the same thing,

and that was because they always loved what was fair and true and
right better, not than anything else, but than everything else put

together.
'Then will you tell Curdie?' said she.

'You can talk best, Joan,' said he. 'You tell him, and I will
listen - and learn how to say what I think,' he added.

'I,' said Curdie, 'don't know what to think.'
'it does not matter so much,' said his mother. 'If only you know

what to make of a thing, you'll know soon enough what to think of
it. Now I needn't tell you, surely, Curdie, what you've got to do

with this?'
'I suppose you mean, Mother,' answered Curdie, 'that I must do as

the old lady told me?'
'That is what I mean: what else could it be? Am I not right,

Peter?'
'Quite right, Joan,' answered Peter, 'so far as my judgement goes.

It is a very strange story, but you see the question is not about
believing it, for Curdie knows what came to him.'

'And you remember, Curdie,' said his mother, 'that when the
princess took you up that tower once before, and there talked to

her great-great-grandmother, you came home quite angry with her,
and said there was nothing in the place but an old tub, a heap of

straw - oh, I remember your inventory quite well! - an old tub, a
heap of straw, a withered apple, and a sunbeam. According to your

eyes, that was all there was in the great, old, musty garret. But
now you have had a glimpse of the old princess herself!'

'Yes, Mother, I did see her - or if I didn't -' said Curdie very
thoughtfully - then began again. 'The hardest thing to believe,

though I saw it with my own eyes, was when the thin, filmy creature
that seemed almost to float about in the moonlight like a bit of

the silver paper they put over pictures, or like a handkerchief
made of spider threads, took my hand, and rose up. She was taller

and stronger than you, Mother, ever so much! - at least, she looked
so.'

'And most certainly was so, Curdie, if she looked so,' said Mrs
Peterson.

'Well, I confess,' returned her son, 'that one thing, if there were
no other, would make me doubt whether I was not dreaming, after

all, wide awake though I fancied myself to be.'
'Of course,' answered his mother, 'it is not for me to say whether

you were dreaming or not if you are doubtful of it yourself; but it
doesn't make me think I am dreaming when in the summer I hold in my

hand the bunch of sweet peas that make my heart glad with their
colour and scent, and remember the dry, withered-looking little

thing I dibbled into the hole in the same spot in the spring. I
only think how wonderful and lovely it all is. It seems just as

full of reason as it is of wonder. How it is done I can't tell,
only there it is! And there is this in it, too, Curdie - of which

you would not be so ready to think - that when you come home to
your father and mother, and they find you behaving more like a

dear, good son than you have behaved for a long time, they at least
are not likely to think you were only dreaming.'

'Still,' said Curdie, looking a little ashamed, 'I might have

• pigeon [pidʒin] n.鸽子 (初中英语单词)
• flutter [´flʌtə] vi.飘扬；摆 n.拍动 (初中英语单词)
• occasionally [ə´keiʒənəli] ad.偶然地；非经常地 (初中英语单词)
• meantime [´mi:ntaim] n.&ad.其间；同时 (初中英语单词)
• instant [´instənt] a.立即的 n.紧迫；瞬间 (初中英语单词)
• plainly [´pleinli] ad.平坦地；简单地 (初中英语单词)
• moonlight [´mu:nlait] n.&a.月光(的) (初中英语单词)
• ornament [´ɔ:nəmənt] n.装饰(物) vt.装饰 (初中英语单词)
• acquaintance [ə´kweintəns] n.相识；熟人，相识的人 (初中英语单词)
• solemn [´sɔləm] a.严肃的；隆重的 (初中英语单词)
• cheerful [´tʃiəful] a.快乐的；高兴的 (初中英语单词)
• waiting [´weitiŋ] n.等候；伺候 (初中英语单词)
• cottage [´kɔtidʒ] n.村舍；小屋；小别墅 (初中英语单词)
• unusual [ʌn´ju:ʒuəl] a.不平常的；异常的 (初中英语单词)
• pardon [´pɑ:dən] n.&vt.原谅；饶恕；赦免 (初中英语单词)
• gratitude [´grætitju:d] n.感激，感谢 (初中英语单词)
• grateful [´greitful] a.感谢的；令人愉快的 (初中英语单词)
• account [ə´kaunt] vi.说明 vt.认为 n.帐目 (初中英语单词)
• therefore [´ðeəfɔ:] ad.&conj.因此；所以 (初中英语单词)
• meadow [´medəu] n.草地；牧场 (初中英语单词)
• judgement [´dʒʌdʒmənt] n.审判；报应；批评 (初中英语单词)
• glimpse [glimps] n.&v.瞥见 (初中英语单词)
• princess [,prin´ses] n.公主；王妃；亲王夫人 (初中英语单词)
• spider [´spaidə] n.蜘蛛；三角架 (初中英语单词)
• ashamed [ə´ʃeimd] a.惭愧；不好意思 (初中英语单词)
• ridiculous [ri´dikjuləs] a.荒谬的；可笑的 (高中英语单词)
• nonsense [´nɔnsəns] n.胡说 int.胡说!废话 (高中英语单词)
• pillar [´pilə] n.支柱 vt.用柱支持 (高中英语单词)
• sweetly [´swi:tli] ad.甜蜜地；美妙地 (高中英语单词)
• hurried [´hʌrid] a.仓促的，慌忙的 (高中英语单词)
• sunbeam [´sʌnbi:m] n.日光 (高中英语单词)
• doubtful [´dautful] a.怀疑的，可疑的 (高中英语单词)
• starry [´stɑ:ri] a.星光照耀的，闪亮的 (英语四级单词)
• grassy [´grɑ:si] a.多草的；青草味的 (英语四级单词)
• accompaniment [ə´kʌmpənimənt] n.伴随物；伴奏(唱) (英语四级单词)
• busily [´bizili] ad.忙碌地 (英语四级单词)
• garret [´gærit] n.阁楼，顶楼 (英语四级单词)
• politeness [pə´laitnis] n.礼貌；文雅；温和 (英语六级单词)