Fairy Tales

THE WILL-O’-THE-WISPS ARE IN TOWN

THERE WAS A MAN who at one time had known so many new fairy tales, but now they had come to an end, he said. The tale used to come by its own accord, but now it didn’t knock at his door anymore. And why didn’t it come? Well, it’s true enough that the man hadn’t thought about it for a whole year, had not expected it to come knocking, and it evidently hadn’t been around there either, since there was war without, and within the sorrow and distress that war carries with it.

The stork and the swallow returned from their long voyages. They didn’t think of any danger, but when they arrived their nests had been burned. People’s houses were burned, gates broken, or just entirely gone. The enemy’s horses trampled on the old graves. They were hard, dark times, but even those have an end.

And now it was over, they said, but the fairy tale still hadn’t come knocking, nor was it heard from.

“I guess it’s dead and gone along with many others,” said the man. But the fairy tale never dies!

And over a year passed, and he longed sorely for it.

“I wonder if the fairy tale will ever come knocking again?” And he remembered so vividly all the many shapes in which it had come to him. Sometimes young and beautiful, like spring itself, a lovely little girl with a wreath of woodruff in her hair and beech branches in her hand. Her eyes shone like deep forest lakes in the clear sunshine. Sometimes it had also come as a peddler, opened its pack of wares and let silk ribbons wave with verses and inscriptions from old memories. But still, it was most beautiful when it came as a little old woman with silvery white hair and with eyes so big and wise. She had told about the oldest times, long before princesses spun gold while dragons and serpents lay outside keeping watch. She told stories so vividly that the eyes of everyone who listened would go dim, and the floor would become black with human blood. Awful to see and to hear, and yet so delightful because it all happened so very long ago.

“I wonder if she’ll never come again!” the man said, and stared towards the door until he saw black spots in front of his eyes and black spots on the floor. He didn’t know if it was blood or mourning crepe from the heavy, dark days.

And as he sat, it occurred to him that maybe the fairy tale had gone into hiding, like the princesses in the old folk tales, and now had to be sought out. If she were found, she would shine with a new splendor, more beautiful than ever before.

“Who knows? Maybe she lies hidden in the littered straw that’s tilted at the edge of the well. Careful! Careful! Maybe she has hidden in a withered flower that’s lying in one of the big books on the shelf.”

And the man went to the shelf and opened one of the newest instructive books, but there was no flower there. It was about Holger the Dane, and the man read that the entire story had been invented and put together by a monk in France. That it was just a novel that had been “translated and published in the Danish language.” And that Holger the Dane had not existed at all and so would certainly never come again, as the Danes had sung about and so wanted to believe. Holger the Dane was just like William Tell, idle talk, not to be relied upon, and all this was written in this most scholarly book.

“Well, I believe what I believe,” said the man. “There’s no smoke without fire.”

And he shut the book, put it back on the shelf, and went over to the fresh flowers on the windowsill. Maybe the fairy tale had hidden there in the red tulip with the golden yellow edges, in the fresh rose, or the vibrantly colored camellia. Sunshine lay amongst the leaves, but no fairy tale.

“The flowers that were here during the sad times were all much more beautiful, but every one of them was cut off, bound into wreaths, and laid into coffins and over the folded flag. Maybe the fairy tale is buried with those flowers! But the flowers would have known about that, and the coffin would have sensed it. The earth would have sensed it too, and every little blade of grass that shoots forth would have told about it. The fairy tale never dies!”

“Maybe it was even here and knocked, but who at that time would have had an ear for it, or even a thought about it? We looked dark and heavily, almost angrily, at the sunshine of the spring, the twittering of birds, and all the pleasant greenery. Our tongues couldn’t sing the favorite old folk songs. They were put away with so many other things that had been dear to our hearts. The fairy tale could very well have knocked, but not have been heard, not welcomed, and so it just went away.”

“I will go out and find it. Into the country, out in the forest, along the sweeping seashore!”

An old manor house can be found out there with red brick walls, corbiestep gables, and a fluttering flag on the tower. The nightingale sings under the finely fringed beech leaves while it looks at the garden’s blooming apple blossoms and thinks they are roses. The bees are busy here in the summertime, and they swarm around their queen in buzzing song. The storms of autumn can tell about the wild hunt, about mankind, and the leaves of the forest that blow away. At Christmas time the wild swans sing from the open sea, while inside the old manor, by the side of the stove, people are in the mood for hearing songs and old stories.

Down in the old part of the garden, where the big avenue of wild chestnut trees lures you into the shade, the man who was seeking the fairy tale was walking. The wind had once whispered to him here of Valdemar Daa and His Daughters. The dryad in the tree, none other than Mother fairy tale herself, had told him The Old Oak Tree’s Dream here. In grandmother’s time trimmed hedges stood here, but now only ferns and nettles grew there. They spread over the abandoned remains of old statuary. Moss grew from their stony eyes, although they could see just as well as before, but the man looking for the fairy tale couldn’t. He couldn’t see the fairy tale. Where was it? Above him and over the old trees hundreds of crows flew crying, “Fly from here, from here!”

And he walked from the garden over the manor’s moat, and into the grove of alders. There was a little six-sided house here and a hen and duck yard. In the middle of the room sat the old woman who ruled all of this. She knew about every egg that was laid, and every chick that came from the egg, but she was not the fairy tale the man was looking for. She could prove that with a Christian baptism certificate and a vaccination certificate, both lying in the chest of drawers.

Outside, not far from the house, was a hill filled with red hawthorn and laburnum. There’s an old tombstone there that had come from the churchyard in the market town. It was carved to honor one of the town’s councilmen. His wife and his five daughters, all with folded hands and ruffed collars, were standing around him, chiseled from stone. If you looked at it long enough, it somehow affected your thoughts, and those thoughts in turn affected the stone so that it told about the old times. Anyway, that’s how it happened for the man searching for the fairy tale. As he arrived here now, he saw a liv ing butterfly sitting on the forehead of the carved councilman. It fluttered its wings, flew a short distance, and then landed again right by the tombstone as if to show him what was growing there. It was a four-leaf clover, and there were seven of them, side by side. When luck comes, it comes in earnest! He picked the clovers and put them in his pocket. Good luck is just as good as ready money, although a new lovely fairy tale would have been even better, thought the man. But he didn’t find it there.

The sun set, red and huge. Fog rose from the meadow. The bog witch was brewing.

It was late in the evening. He stood alone in his room, looking out over the garden and meadow, the moor and the seashore. The moon was shining clearly and there was a mist hanging over the meadow as if it were a big lake. There had been one there once, according to legend, and in the moonlight you could see for yourself. Then the man thought about what he had read in town, how William Tell and Holger the Dane had not existed, but in folklore they became, like the sea out there, living visions for legend. Yes, Holger the Dane would return!

As he was standing there and thinking, something hit the window quite strongly. Was it a bird? A bat or an owl? Well, you don’t let them in if they knock! The window sprang open by it self, and an old woman looked in at the man.

“What’s this?” he said. “Who is she? She’s looking right into the second story. Is she standing on a ladder?”

“You have a four-leaf clover in your pocket,” she said. “You actually have seven, one of which is a six-leaf clover!”

“Who are you?” asked the man.

“The bog witch!” she said. “The bog witch, and I’m brewing. I was in the process of doing that, and the tap was in the barrel, but one of the frisky little bog children drew the tap out in fun and flung it up here against the house where it hit the window. Now the beer’s running out of the barrel, and that’s not a good thing for anyone!”

“Well, but tell me—” said the man.

“Wait a moment,” said the bog witch. “I have other things to attend to,” and then she was gone.

The man was about to close the window, and then she reappeared.

“Now that’s done,” she said, “but half of the beer I’ll have to brew again tomorrow if the weather holds. Now what did you want to ask about? I came back because I always keep my word, and you have seven four-leaf clovers in your pocket, one of which has six-leaves and that earns respect. They’re badges that grow by the road, but aren’t found by everyone. What did you want to ask about? Don’t just stand there like a silly sap. I have to get back to my barrel and tap.”

And the man asked about the fairy tale, asked if the bog witch had seen it on her way.

“Oh, for brewing sassafras!” said the witch. “Haven’t you had enough of fairy tales yet? I do believe that most people have. There are other things to take care of and be concerned about. Even the children have outgrown them. Give the little boys a cigar and the little girls a new petticoat—they care more about that! Listen to fairy tales? No, there are other things to attend to, more important things to do!”

“What do you mean by that?” the man said. “And what do you know of the world? You only see frogs and will-o’-the-wisps!”

“Well, watch out for the will-o’-the-wisps!” said the witch. “They’re out! They’re on the loose. We should talk about them. Come to me in the bog, where I need to be now. I’ll tell you all about it, but hurry while your seven four-leaf clovers with the one sixer are fresh, and the moon is still up!”

And the bog witch was gone.

The clock struck twelve on the tower clock, and before it struck the quarter hour the man was out of the yard, out of the garden and standing in the meadow. The fog had lifted, and the bog witch had stopped brewing.

“It took a long time for you to get here,” said the bog witch. “Trolls get around faster than people, and I’m glad I was born of troll folk.”

“What do you have to tell me?” asked the man. “Is it something about the fairy tale?”

“Can’t you think of anything but that?” said the witch.

“Well, can you tell me about the poetry of the future then?” asked the man.

“Don’t be so hifalutin,” said the witch, “and I’ll answer you. You only think about poetry, and ask about the fairy tale, as if she’s the one who gets everything going. But she’s just the oldest, although she is always taken for the youngest. I certainly know her. I have been young too, and that’s not a childhood illness. I was once quite a pretty elf maiden, and danced with the others in the moonlight, listened to the nightingale, walked in the forests and met the fairy tale maiden, who was always out gadding about. Sometimes she spent the night in a partly opened tulip or in a globe flower. Sometimes she slipped into the church and wrapped herself in the mourning crepe that hung from the altar candles.”

“You have a lot of lovely information,” said the man.

“Well, I should hope I know as much as you do anyway!” said the bog witch. “Fairy tales and poetry—Well, they’re two of a kind. They can go lie down wherever they want. All their work and talk can be brewed both better and cheaper than they do it. You can get them from me for nothing. I have a whole cupboard full of poetry in bottles. It’s the essence of it, the best, the actual herb, both the sweet and the bitter. I have bottles of all the poetry people need, so they can put some on their handkerchiefs to smell on Sundays and holidays.”

“You’re saying some really strange things,” said the man. “You have bottled poetry?”

“More than you can stand!” said the witch. “You must know the story about the girl who stepped on bread to avoid dirtying her new shoes? It’s been both written and printed.”

“I wrote that story myself,” said the man.

“Well, then you know it.” said the witch, “And you know that the girl sank right down into the ground to the bog witch just as the devil’s great-grandmother was visiting to see the brewery. She saw the girl who sank and requested her for a pedestal, a souvenir of her visit. She got her, and I got a gift that I have no use for: a portable apothecary, a whole cupboard of poetry in bottles. Great-grandmother decided where it was to stand, and it’s still standing there. Just look! You have your seven four-leaf clovers, one of which is a six-leaf clover, in your pocket so I’m sure you’ll be able to see it.”

And truly, right in the middle of the bog there was a sort of big hollow alder stump, and that was great-grandmother’s cupboard. It was open to her and to everyone in all countries and in all times, the bog witch said, as long as they knew where the cupboard was. It could be opened in the front and the back, and on all sides and corners. It was a real work of art, but just looked like an old alder stump. The poets of all countries, especially our own, were copied there. Their essence was figured out, reviewed, cleaned up, concentrated and bottled. With sure instinct (as it’s called when one doesn’t want to say “genius” ) great-grandmother had taken the taste of this and that poet from nature, added a little witchcraft, and then she had his poetry bottled for eternity.

“Let me look!” said the man.

“But there are more important things to hear,” said the bog witch.

“But we’re right here by the cupboard,” said the man and looked inside. “There are bottles of all sizes here. What’s in that one? And that one there?”

“Here is what they call Essence of May,” said the bog witch. “I haven’t tried it, but I know that if you splash just a little on the floor, you’ll immediately get a lovely forest lake with water lilies, rushes, and curled mint. Only two drops on an old notebook, even from the elementary grades, and the book turns into a fragrant fantasy play that can be produced with a scent strong enough to put you to sleep. I’m sure it’s meant as a courtesy to me that it’s labeled ‘Bog Witch’s Brewery.’ ”

“Here is the Scandal Flagon. It looks like it only has dirty water in it, and it is dirty water, but with fizz powder of city-chatter added: three portions of lies to two grains of truth. It was stirred with a birch branch, but not from one soaked in salt and used on a criminal’s bloody back, or from one used by a schoolmaster for spanking, but taken directly from the broom that sweeps the gutters.”

“And here is the bottle with pious poetry, to be used for hymns. Every drop has the sound of hell’s gates slamming shut and is made of the blood and sweat of punishment. Some say it’s just bile of dove, but doves are the best and gentlest of creatures and have no bile. That’s what people who know nothing of zoology say.”

There stood the mother of all bottles! It took over half the cupboard—the bottle of Everyday Stories.1 It was wrapped in both pigskin and bladder so it wouldn’t lose its strength. Each nation could make its own soup here, depending on how you turned and tipped the bottle. There was old German blood stew with robber dumplings, and also thin crofter’s soup with real courtiers at the bottom, and a pat of philosophy floating in the middle. There was English governess gruel and the French potage à la Kock,2 made from cock bones and sparrow eggs. In Danish it’s called cancan soup. But the best soup was the Copenhagian, that’s what the family said.

Tragedy was bottled in champagne bottles that start out with a bang, as tragedy should. Comedy looked like fine sand that could be thrown in people’s eyes. That is to say, the finer comedy. The coarse kind was also in bottles, but these were made up only of future playbills, where the name of the piece was the most powerful. There were excellent comedy titles, such as “Do you Dare to Spit in the Mechanism?” “One on the Jaw,” “The Sweet Ass,” and “She’s Dead Drunk.”

The man became lost in thought from all this, but the bog witch was thinking ahead, and she wanted an end to it.

“You’ve looked long enough at that junk box,” she said. “Now you know what’s here, but you still don’t know the most important thing you should know! The will-o’-the-wisps are in town! That’s more important than poetry or fairy tales. I shouldn’t say anything about it, but there must be some guidance, a fate, something that has overtaken me. Something has stuck in my throat the wrong way and must come out! The will-o’ -the-wisps are in town! They are on the loose! Just watch out, people!”

“I don’t understand a word you’re saying,” said the man.

“Please sit down there on the cupboard,” she said. “But don’t fall in and break the bottles. You know what’s in them. I’ll tell you about the great event; it just happened yesterday, and it’s happened before. There are still three hundred and sixty four days to go. Well, I guess you know how many days are in a year?”

And the bog witch told the following:

“There was great excitement in the swamp yesterday! A big celebration! A little will-o‘-the-wisp was born. Actually twelve of them were born, by that brood of will-o’-the-wisps who have the ability, if they wish, to appear as people, and act and rule among them as if they were born human beings. That’s a big event in the swamp, and that’s why all the will-o‘-the-wisp males and females danced as little lights over the bog and meadows. There are female ones you see, but we’re not talking about them. I sat on the cupboard there and had all twelve little newborns on my lap. They were shining like glowworms and had already begun to hop around. They grew bigger by the minute, so that before a quarter hour had passed, they were as big as their father or uncle. It’s an old innate law and privilege that when the moon is in the precise position it was last night, and the wind blows as it blew yesterday, then all will-o’-the-wisps born at that hour and minute can become human beings. And each of them flits around for a whole year exercising their power. A will-o‘-the-wisp can travel around the country and the world too, if he’s not afraid to fall in the sea, or to be blown out in a great storm. He can get right inside a person, speak for him, and make all the movements he wants to. The will-o’-the-wisp can take any form, male or female, act in their minds, but with all his own nature, so he can get what he wants. In one year he must show that he can lead three hundred and sixty five people astray, and in grand fashion. He must lead them away from what’s true and right. Then he’ll obtain the highest a will-o‘-the-wisp can aspire to: becoming a runner in front of the Devil’s finest coach. He’ll receive a glowing orange uniform and breathe fire from his throat. That’s something a common will-o’-the-wisp can really lick his lips over. But there’s also danger and a lot of worry for an ambitious will-o‘-the-wisp who intends to play a part. If a person becomes aware of who he is, he can blow him away, and the will-o’-the-wisp is put out and must return to the swamp. And if the will-o‘-the-wisp is moved by longing for his family before the year is over and betrays himself, then he’s also out of it. He no longer burns clearly and soon goes out and can’t be relit. And if the year ends without him leading three hundred and sixty five people away from truth, and what’s good and beautiful, then he’s sentenced to lie in a rotten tree and shine without moving, and that’s the worst possible punishment for a lively will-o’-the-wisp. I knew all of this, and I told all of it to the twelve little will-o’ -the-wisps, who were sitting on my lap. They were wild with joy. I told them that it was surest and most comfortable to give up glory and not do anything. But the young licks didn’t want that. They already saw themselves in glowing orange with flames coming out of their mouths.

“‘Stay with us!’ said some of the elders.

“‘Trick the humans!’ said others. ‘People are drying out our meadows, draining them. What will become of our descendants?’

“‘We want to go blow blazes!’ said the newborn will-o’-the-wisps, and so it was decided.

“They immediately had a minute-long dance. It couldn’t have been shorter. The elf maidens swung around three times with all the others because they didn’t want to appear haughty. They actually preferred to dance by themselves. Then it was time for the godparents’ gifts. ‘Skipping stones’ as it’s called. The presents flew like small stones across the bog water. Each of the elf maidens gave a piece of her veil. ‘Take it!’ they said, ‘and then you will right away at a pinch know the higher forms of dance with the most difficult swings and turns. You’ll have the proper carriage and can appear at the most elegant parties.’ The nightjar³ taught each of the young will-o’-the-wisps to say, ‘Braaa, braaa, braaa’ and to say it at the right times, and that’s a big gift that pays off. The owl and the stork also gave something, but they said it wasn’t worth mentioning so we won’t talk about it.

“Just then King Valdemar on his wild hunt⁴ came thundering over the bog, and when that company heard about the celebration, they sent a couple of fine dogs as gifts, dogs who could hunt with the wind and could surely carry a will-o‘-the-wisp or three. Two old nightmares, who make a living by riding, were at the party. They taught the young will-o’-the-wisps the art of slipping through keyholes, which would open every door to them. They offered to convey the young will-o’-the-wisps to town, where they knew their way around. Usually they ride through the air on their own long manes, that they tie into knots to sit firmly on, but this time each of them straddled the back of a wild hunt dog and took the young Wills who were to trick and bewilder people on their laps. Swoosh! They were gone.

“That was all last night. Now the will-o’-the-wisps are in town. They have set to work. But how and what they are doing, you tell me! I have a pain in my big toe because of a weather wire that always tells me something is up!”

“But this is a whole fairy tale!” said the man.

“Well, it’s really just the beginning of one,” said the bog witch. “Can you tell me how the will-o’-the-wisps are romping about and carrying on, and in what shape they are appearing in order to lead people astray?”

“I do think,” said the man, “that a whole novel could be writ ten about the will-o‘-the-wisps with twelve chapters, one for each will-o’-the-wisp; or maybe even better, an entire folk comedy!”

“You should write that!” said the bog witch, “or maybe it’s best to let it go.”

“Yes, that’s more comfortable and pleasant,” said the man. “Then you avoid being staked in the newspapers which is just as hard as it is for a will-o’-the-wisp to lie in a rotten tree, shining but unable to say a word!”

“It’s all the same to me,” said the bog witch. “But just let the others write, those who are able and those who are not. I’ll give an old tap from my barrel that will open up the cupboard with poetry in bottles, and from there they can get what they’re lacking. As for you, my good man, it seems to me that you have gotten enough ink on your fingers and have reached the age and maturity not to run after fairy tales every year, when there are much more important things to do here now. You must have understood what is going on, haven’t you?”

“The will-o‘-the-wisps are in town!” said the man. “I have heard it, and I understand it! But what do you want me to do about it? I’ll just be raked over the coals if I see one and tell people: Look! There goes a will-o’-the-wisp in the guise of an honest man.”

“They also wear skirts!” said the bog witch. “The will-o’-the-wisp can assume all shapes and appear in all places. He goes to church, not for the Lord’s sake, but maybe he’s gone into the minister! He speaks on election day, not for the country’s sake, but just for his own. He’s an artist, both in the painter’s paint jar and the theater’s make-up jar, but when he gets complete power, then there’s the end of it: the jar’s empty. I talk and talk, but I must get out of my throat what’s stuck there, even though it harms my own family. I’m going to be the savior of humanity. It’s truly not something I can help, and I’m not doing it for the sake of a medal. But I’m doing the craziest thing I could—I’m telling a poet, so then the whole town will soon know about it!”

“The town won’t pay any attention,” said the man. “It won’t affect a single person. They’ll all think I’m telling a fairy tale when I tell them in complete seriousness ‘The will-o’-the-wisps are in town,’ said the bog witch. ‘Beware! ”’

NOTES

1 Reference to En Hverdagshistorie (1828; A Story of Everyday Life) by Thomasine Gyllembourg; the novella gave its name to a whole genre of stories about contemporary Copenhagen. Andersen did not like the genre.

2 Reference to Paul de Kock ( 1793-1871 ) , French author of popular novels of Parisian life.

3 In Danish the word the nightjar teaches the will-o’-the-wisps to say is bra, which means “fine” or “good.”

4 According to legend, fourteenth-century King Valdemar mocked God by preferring hunting to heaven. Hence he was condemned to ride and hunt the Danish countryside every night.