Fairy Tales

THE NIGHTINGALE

OF COURSE YOU KNOW that in China the emperor is Chinese, and all the people around him are Chinese. It was many years ago, but just because of that, it’s worth while hearing the story before it’s forgotten! The emperor’s palace was the most splendid in the world, completely made of fine porcelain—so expensive, but so brittle, so fragile to touch that you had to be really careful. There were the most remarkable flowers in the garden, and to the most beautiful were tied silver bells so that you couldn’t walk by without noticing the flower. Everything was so artful in the emperor’s garden, and it was so big that even the gardener didn’t know where it ended. If you kept walking, you would enter the loveliest forest with high trees and deep lakes. The forest went right down to the deep, blue sea. Big ships sailed right under the branches, and in the branches lived a nightingale that sang so sweetly that even the poor fisherman, who had so much else to do while pulling up his nets, lay still and listened when he was out at night and heard the nightingale. “Dear God, how beautifully it sings,” he said, but then he had to pay attention to his task and forget the bird. But when it sang again the next night, and the fisherman was out again, he said the same: “Dear God, how beautifully it sings!”

Travelers came to the emperor’s city from all the countries of the world, and they were astounded by it all: the palace and the garden, but when they heard the nightingale, they all said, “this is the best of all!”

And the travelers talked about the bird when they got home, and scholars wrote many books about the city, the palace, and the garden. But they didn’t forget the nightingale. It was placed at the very top of the wonders, and those who could write poetry wrote the most beautiful poems, all about the nightingale in the forest by the deep sea.

The books circulated around the world, and in the course of time one reached the emperor. He sat on his golden throne and read and read. He nodded his head constantly because he was pleased to hear the magnificent descriptions of the city, palace, and garden. “But the nightingale is the best of all!” it said in the book.

“What?!” said the emperor. “The nightingale! I don’t know anything about that bird at all! Is there such a bird in my kingdom, even here in my own garden? And I’ve never heard about it? I have to read about this?!”

And he called his chamberlain, who was so distinguished that when someone who was inferior to him dared to speak to him, or asked about something, he didn’t say anything but “P!” and it didn’t mean anything.

“There’s supposed to be a highly remarkable bird called a nightingale here,” said the emperor. “They say it’s the best thing in my entire kingdom! Why hasn’t anyone told me about it?”

“I’ve never before heard it mentioned,” said the chamberlain. “It’s never been presented at court.”

“I want it to come here this evening and sing for me,” said the emperor. “The whole world knows what I have, and I don’t know it myself!”

“I’ve never heard anything about it before,” said the chamberlain, “I’ll go find it.”

But where to find it? The chamberlain ran up and down all the steps, through the rooms and hallways. None of those he met had heard anything about the nightingale, and the chamberlain ran back to the emperor and said that it must have been a fable made up by those who wrote books. “Your royal majesty should not believe what is written! They are mostly made up, and something called black magic.”

“But the book I read it in,” said the emperor, “was sent to me by the powerful emperor of Japan, and so it can’t be untrue. I want to hear the nightingale! It shall be here this evening! It’s my greatest pleasure, and if it doesn’t come, the entire court will be thumped on the stomach after they’ve had dinner.”

“Tsing-pe!” said the chamberlain, who ran up and down all the steps again, through the rooms and hallways, and half the people at court ran along too because they didn’t want to be thumped on the stomach. They went asking about the remarkable nightingale which the whole world knew, but no one at court had heard of.

Finally, they met a poor little girl in the kitchen, and she said, “Oh God, the nightingale! I know it well. Oh my, how it can sing! Every evening I’m allowed to bring some of the scraps from the table home to my poor sick mother who lives down by the shore. When I walk back, I get tired, and rest in the woods. Then I hear the nightingale singing, and it brings tears to my eyes. It’s like being kissed by my mother.”

“Little kitchen maid,” said the chamberlain, “I’ll get you a permanent job in the kitchen and permission to watch the emperor eat if you can lead us to the nightingale. The emperor has ordered him to perform this evening!”

And then they all went into the woods where the nightingale used to sing. Half the court went along. As they were starting out, they heard a cow mooing.

“Oh,” said the young court nobles, “Here we have it! What remarkable power in such a little animal! We have most assuredly heard it before.”

“No, those are cows mooing,” said the little kitchen maid. “We’re still far from the place.”

Then the frogs croaked in the pond.

“Lovely!” said the Chinese palace chaplain. “Now I hear it—like little church bells.”

“No, those are the frogs,” said the little kitchen maid. “But I think we’ll hear it pretty soon.”

And then the nightingale started singing.

“That’s it,” said the little girl. “Listen! listen! And there it is!” and she pointed at a little grey bird up in the branches.

“Is this possible?” asked the chamberlain. “I wouldn’t have imagined it to look like that. How plain it looks! It must have lost its colors from seeing so many distinguished people looking at it!”

“Little nightingale,” called the little kitchen maid quite loudly, “our Most Gracious Emperor so dearly wants you to sing for him!”

“With the greatest pleasure!” said the nightingale and sang so beautifully that it was a pleasure to hear.

“It sounds like glass bells,” said the chamberlain. “And look at its little throat, how it’s throbbing! It’s remarkable that we haven’t heard it before. It’ll be a big success at court!”

“Shall I sing one more time for the emperor?” asked the nightingale, who thought the emperor was with them.

“My splendid little nightingale,” said the chamberlain. “I have the great honor of summoning you to a court party this evening, where you will enchant his great Royal Highness the Emperor with your charming song!”

“It really sounds better out in the open air,” said the nightingale, but it gladly followed along when it heard that it was the emperor’s wish.

At the palace everything had been polished. The walls and floors of porcelain were shining with the light of many thousand golden lamps. The most beautiful flowers with their bells were lined up in the hallways. There was a running back and forth and a draft so that all the bells rang, and you couldn’t hear what anyone said.

In the middle of the big chamber where the emperor sat, a golden perch had been set up, and the nightingale was to sit on that. The entire court was there, and the little kitchen maid had been allowed to stand back by the door since she now had the official title of Real Kitchen Maid. They were all dressed up in their finest, and all looked at the little grey bird as the emperor nodded for it to begin.

And the nightingale sang so beautifully that it brought tears to the emperor’s eyes. They rolled down over his cheeks, and then the nightingale sang even more beautifully so it touched everyone’s heart. The emperor was very happy, and he said that the nightingale should have his golden slipper to wear around its neck. But the nightingale thanked him and said it had already had payment enough.

“I’ve seen tears in the emperor’s eyes, and that is the greatest treasure for me. An emperor’s tears have a remarkable power. God knows I have payment enough!” and then it sang again with its blessed, sweet voice.

“That’s the most delightful coquetry and flirtation we’ve ever seen,” said all the ladies, and they kept water in their mouths so they could cluck when someone talked to them. They thought they were nightingales too. Well, the footmen and chambermaids also let it be known that they were satisfied, and that says a lot since they are the most difficult to please. Yes, the nightingale was a great success!

It was going to remain at court and have its own cage, but freedom to walk out twice a day and once at night. Twelve servants were to go along with silk ribbons tied to the nightingale’s leg, and they were to hold on tightly. There was no pleasure to be had from walks like this!

The whole town talked about the remarkable bird, and if two people met each other, then the first said only “Night” and the other said “gale,” and then they sighed and understood each other. Eleven grocers named their children after the nightingale, but none of them could sing a note.

One day a big package came for the emperor, on the outside was written Nightingale.

“Here’s a new book about our famous bird,” said the emperor, but it wasn’t a book. It was a little work of art lying in a box: an artificial nightingale that was supposed to resemble the real one, but it was studded with diamonds, rubies and sapphires. As soon as you wound the artificial bird up, it would sing one of the songs the real bird could sing, and the tail bobbed up and down and sparkled silver and gold. Around its neck was a little ribbon, and on the ribbon was written: “The emperor of Japan’s nightingale is a trifling compared to the emperor of China’s.”

“It’s lovely,” they all said, and the one who had brought the artificial bird was immediately given the title of Most Imperial Nightingale Bringer.

“They have to sing together. A duet!”

And so they had to sing together, but it didn’t really work since the real nightingale sang in his way, and the artificial bird sang on cylinders. “It’s not its fault,” said the court conductor. “It keeps perfect time and fits quite into my school of music theory.” Then the artificial bird was to sing alone and was just as well received as the real bird. Moreover it was so much more beautiful to look at, for it glittered like bracelets and brooches.

Thirty three times it sang the same song, and it never got tired. People would gladly have listened to it again, but the emperor thought that now the live nightingale should also sing a little—but where was it? No one had noticed that it had flown out of the open window, away to its green forest.

“What’s the meaning of this?” cried the emperor, and all the members of the court scolded the bird, and thought that the nightingale was a most ungrateful creature. “We still have the best bird,” they said, and then the artificial bird had to sing again, and that was the thirty-fourth time they heard the same piece, but they didn’t quite know it yet for it was so long, and the conductor praised the bird so extravagantly. He insisted that it was better than the real nightingale, not just in appearance with its many lovely diamonds, but also on the inside.

“You see, ladies and gentlemen, Your Royal Majesty! You can never know what to expect from the real nightingale, but everything is determined in the artificial bird. It will be so-and-so, and no different! You can explain it; you can open it up and show the human thought—how the cylinders are placed, how they work, and how one follows the other!”

“My thoughts exactly,” everyone said, and on the following Sunday the conductor was allowed to exhibit the bird for the public. The emperor also said that they were to hear it sing, and they were so pleased by it as if they had drunk themselves merry on tea (for that is so thoroughly Chinese), and they all said “Oh” and stuck their index fingers in the air and nodded. But the poor fisherman, who had heard the real nightingale, said, “It sounds good enough, and sounds similar too, but there’s something missing. I don’t know what.”

The real nightingale was banished from the country and the empire.

The artificial bird had its place on a silk pillow right by the emperor’s bed. All the gifts it had received, gold and gems, were lying around it, and it had been given the title of Most Imperial Nightstand Singer of the First Rank to the Left because the emperor considered the side towards the heart to be the most distinguished. The heart is on the left side also in emperors. The Royal Conductor wrote twenty-five volumes about the ar-tificial bird that were very learned and very long and included all the longest Chinese words. All the people said that they had read and understood the books. Otherwise they would have been stupid, of course, and would have been thumped on the stomach.

The artificial bird had its place on a silk pillow right by the emperor’s bed.

It continued this way for a whole year. The emperor, the court, and all the other Chinamen knew every little cluck in the artificial bird’s song, but they were therefore all the more happy with it—they could sing along, and they did. The street urchins sang “zizizi, klukklukkluk,” and the emperor sang it, too. Yes, it was certainly lovely.

But one evening, as the artificial bird was singing beautifully, and the emperor was lying in bed listening, there was suddenly a “svupp” sound inside the bird, and something snapped: “Surrrrrr.” All the wheels went around, and the music stopped.

The emperor leaped out of bed at once and had his court physician summoned, but what good could he do? So they called for the watchmaker and after a lot of talk and a lot of tinkering, he managed to more or less fix the bird, but he said it had to be used sparingly because the threads were so worn, and it wasn’t possible to install new ones without the music becoming uneven. This was a great tragedy! The artificial bird could only sing once a year, if that. But then the Court Conductor would give a little speech with big words and say that it was as good as before, and so it was as good as before.

Five years went by and the whole country was greatly saddened because it was said that the emperor was sick and wouldn’t live much longer. The people had been very fond of him, but a new emperor had already been selected. His subjects stood out on the street and asked the chamberlain how the old emperor was doing.

“P!” he said and shook his head.

Cold and pale, the emperor lay in his big magnificent bed. The whole court thought he was dead, and all of them ran to greet the new emperor. The chamber attendants ran about to talk about it, and the palace maids had their usual gossip. There were cloth runners spread in all the rooms and hallways so that you couldn’t hear anyone walk, and therefore it was very quiet—so quiet. But the emperor wasn’t dead yet. Stiff and pale, he lay in the magnificent bed with the long velvet curtains and the heavy gold tassels. High on the wall a window was open, and the moonlight shone on the emperor and the artificial bird.

The poor emperor was barely able to draw a breath; it was as if something was sitting on his chest. He opened his eyes, and then he saw that it was Death sitting there. He had put on the emperor’s golden crown and held in one hand his golden sword, and in the other his magnificent banner. Round about in the folds of the velvet bed curtains strange heads were peeping out, some quite terrible and others blessedly mild. They were the emperor’s good and evil deeds looking at him, now that Death was sitting on his heart.

“Do you remember that?” whispered one after the other. “Do you remember that?” and then they spoke to him of so many things that the sweat sprang out on his forehead.

“I knew nothing about that!” said the emperor. “Music, music, the big Chinese drum!” he called, “so that I won’t hear everything that they’re saying.”

But they continued, and Death nodded like a Chinaman along with everything that was said.

“Music, music!” cried the emperor. “You little blessed golden bird. Sing, just sing! I have given you gold and precious things. I have myself hung my golden slipper around your neck. Sing, oh sing!”

But the bird stood still. There was no one to wind it up, and otherwise it didn’t sing, but Death with his big empty eye sockets continued to look at the emperor, and it was quiet, so terribly quiet.

Suddenly outside the window came a beautiful song. It was the little, live nightingale, sitting on the branch outside. It had heard about the emperor’s sorrows and had come to sing with comfort and hope for him, and as it sang, the figures became paler and paler, the blood flowed quicker and quicker in the emperor’s weak limbs, and Death itself listened and said: “Sing on, little nightingale, sing on.”

“Music, music!” cried the emperor.

“You little blessed golden bird. Sing, just sing!”

“Will you give me the magnificent golden sword? Will you give me the precious banner? Will you give me the emperor’s crown?”

And Death gave each treasure for a song, and the nightingale continued to sing. It sang about the quiet churchyard, where the white roses grow, where the elder trees emit their scent, and where the fresh grass is watered by tears of the survivors. Then Death felt a longing for his garden and glided, like a cold, white fog, out the window.

“Thank you, thank you,” said the emperor. “You heavenly little bird, I know you well. I chased you away from my country and my empire, and yet your song has cast away the evil sights from my bed and taken Death from my heart! How shall I reward you?”

“You have rewarded me,” said the nightingale. “I received tears from your eyes the first time I sang for you, and I’ll never forget that. Those are the jewels that enrich a singer’s heart. But rest now and become healthy and strong. I’ll sing for you.”

It sang—and the emperor fell into a sweet sleep, a gentle restoring sleep.

The sun shone through the windows on him when he awoke, stronger and healthy. None of his servants had come back because they thought he was dead, but the nightingale was still sitting there singing.

“You must stay with me always,” said the emperor. “You’ll only sing when you want to, and I’ll crush the artificial bird into a thousand pieces.”

“Don’t do that!” said the nightingale. “It has done what good it could. Keep it as always. I can’t live here at the palace, but let me come when I want to, and in the evenings I’ll sit on the branch by the window and sing for you so you can be happy and thoughtful too. I’ll sing about the happy and about those who suffer. I’ll sing about the good and evil that is hidden from you! Your little songbird flies far and wide to the poor fishermen, to the farmer’s roof, to everywhere that’s far from you and your palace. I love your heart more than your crown, and yet your crown has a scent of something sacred about it!—I’ll come, I’ll sing for you.—But you must promise me one thing.”

“Everything!” said the emperor, standing there in his royal clothing that he’d put on himself. He was holding the sword, heavy with gold, up to his heart.

“I ask you this one thing. Don’t tell anyone that you have a little bird that tells you everything. Then things will go even better.”

And the nightingale flew away.

Soon after the servants entered the room to see to their dead emperor—there they stood, and the emperor said, “Good morning.”