Story Time

The storks tell many, many stories to their young ones, all about the bogs and marshes. In general each story is suited to the age and sense of the little storks. While the youngest ones are satisfied with, "Kribble-krabble, plurry-murry," and think it a very fine story, the older ones demand something with more sense to it, or at least something about the family.

In the city of Florence, not far from the Piazza del Granduca, there is a little cross street which I think is called Porta Rossa. In front of a sort of market in this street, where vegetables are sold, stands an artificial but beautifully fashioned metal pig. A fountain of fresh clear water gushes out of the animal's mouth. Age has turned it dark green; only its snout shines as if it had been polished, and so it has by the many hundreds of children and poor people who take hold of it with their hands when they put their mouths to its mouth to drink the water.

There were so many toys in the nursery. On the top of the cabinet stood the penny bank, made of clay in the shape of a little pig. Of course, he had a slit in his back, which had been enlarged with a knife so that silver dollars also could be put in; and two such dollars had been slipped into the box, along with a great number of pennies. The Money Pig was stuffed so full he could no longer rattle, which is the highest honor a Money Pig can attain. There he stood, high up on the shelf, looking down on everything else in the room.

I am a poor lad, and live in one of the narrowest of lanes; but I have plenty of light: my room is high up in the house, and there is a good prospect over the roofs of the opposite houses. During the first few days I lived in the town, I felt very lonely and low-spirited. Instead of the forest and the green hills of the country, I had nothing but black chimney-pots on the horizon of my view. And then I had not a single friend, nor one familiar face to greet me.

The Neighbouring Families: One would certainly think that something quite unusual had happened in the duckpond to cause such a commotion, but nothing really had happened.

The Emperor of China is a Chinaman, as you most likely know, and everyone around him is a Chinaman too. It's been a great many years since this story happened in China, but that's all the more reason for telling it before it gets forgotten.