Ганс Христиан Андерсен
The Sand-Hills of Jutland

The Wind relates the Story of Waldemar Daae and his Daughters

When the wind sweeps over the grass it ripples like water; when it sweeps over the corn, it undulates like waves of the sea. All that is the wind's dance. But listen to what the wind tells. It sings it aloud, and it is repeated amidst the trees in the wood, and carried through the loopholes and the chinks in the wall. Look how the wind chases the skies up yonder, as if they were a flock of sheep! Listen how the wind howls below through the half-open gate, as if it were the warder blowing his horn! Strangely does it sound down the chimney and in the fireplace; the fire flickers under it; and the flames, instead of ascending, shoot out towards the room, where it is warm and comfortable to sit and listen to it. Let the wind speak. It knows more tales and adventures than all of us put together. Hearken now to what it is about to relate.

It blew a tremendous blast: that was a prelude to its story.

"There lay close to the Great Belt an old castle with thick red walls," said the wind. "I knew every stone in it. I had seen them before, when they were in Marshal Stig's castle at the Næs. It was demolished. The stones were used again, and became new walls – a new building – at another place, and that was Borreby Castle as it now stands. I have seen and known the high-born ladies and gentlemen, the various generations that have dwelt in it; and now I shall tell about Waldemar Daae and his Daughters.

"He held his head so high: he was of royal extraction. He could do more than hunt a stag and drain a goblet: that would be proved some day, he said to himself.

"His proud lady, apparelled in gold brocade, walked erect over her polished inlaid floor. The tapestry was magnificent, the furniture costly, and beautifully carved; vessels of gold and silver she had in profusion; there were stores of German ale in the cellars; handsome spirited horses neighed in the stables; all was superb within Borreby Castle when wealth was there.

"And children were there; three fine girls – Idé, Johanné, and Anna Dorthea. I remember their names well even now.

"They were rich people, they were people of distinction – born in grandeur, and brought up in it. Wheugh – wheugh!" whistled the wind; then it continued the tale.

"I never saw there, as in other old mansions, the high-born lady sitting in her boudoir with her maidens and spinning-wheels. She played on the lute, and sang to it, though never the old Danish ballads, but songs in foreign languages. Here were banqueting and mirth, titled guests came from far and near, music's tones were heard, goblets rang. I could not drown the noise," said the wind. "Here were arrogance, ostentation, and display; here was power, but not our Lord."

"It was one May-day evening," said the wind. "I came from the westward. I had seen ships crushed into wrecks on the west coast of Jutland. I had hurried over the dreary heaths and green woody coast, had crossed the island of Funen, and swept over the Great Belt, and I was hoarse with blowing. Then I laid myself down to rest on the coast of Zealand, near Borreby, where there stood the forest and the charming meadows. The young men from the neighbourhood assembled there, and collected brushwood and branches of trees, the largest and driest they could find. They carried them to the village, laid them in a heap, and set fire to it; then they and the village girls sang and danced round it.

"I lay still," said the wind; "but I softly stirred one branch – one which had been placed on the bonfire by the handsomest youth. His piece of wood blazed up, blazed highest. He was chosen the leader of the rustic game, became 'the wild boar,' and had the first choice among the girls for his 'pet lamb.' There were more happiness and merriment amongst them than up at the grand house at Borreby.

"And then from the great house at Borreby came, driving in a gilded coach with six horses, the noble lady and her three daughters, so fine, so young – three lovely blossoms – rose, lily, and the pale hyacinth. The mother herself was like a flaunting tulip; she did not deign to notice one of the crowd of villagers, though they stopped their game, and courtesied and bowed with profound respect.

"Rose, lily, and the pale hyacinth – yes, I saw them all three. Whose 'pet lambs' should they one day become? I thought. The 'wild boar' for each of them would assuredly be a proud knight – perhaps a prince. Wheugh – wheugh!

"Well, their equipage drove on with them, and the young peasants went on with their dancing. And the summer advanced in the village near Borreby, in Tjæreby, and all the surrounding towns.

"But one night when I arose," continued the wind, "the great lady was lying ill, never to move again. That something had come over her which comes over all mankind sooner or later: it is nothing new. Waldemar Daae stood in deep and melancholy thought for a short time. 'The proudest tree may bend, but not break,' said he to himself. The daughters wept; but at last they all dried their eyes at the great house, and the noble lady was carried away; and I also went away," said the wind.

"I returned – I returned soon, over Funen and the Belt, and set myself down by Borreby beach, near the large oak wood. There water-wagtails, wood-pigeons, blue ravens, and even black storks built their nests. It was late in the year: some had eggs, and some had young birds. How they were flying about, and how they were shrieking! The strokes of the axe were heard – stroke after stroke. The trees were to be felled. Waldemar Daae was going to build a costly ship, a man-of-war with three decks, which the king would be glad to purchase: and therefore the wood – the seamen's landmark, the birds' home – was to be sacrificed. The great red-backed shrike flew in alarm – his nest was destroyed; the ravens and all the other birds had lost their homes, and flew wildly about with cries of distress and anger. I understood them well. The crows and the jackdaws screamed high in derision, 'From the nest – from the nest! Away – away!'

"And in the midst of the wood, looking on at the crowd of labourers, stood Waldemar Daae and his three daughters, and they all laughed together at the wild cries of the birds; but his youngest daughter, Anna Dorthea, was sorry for them in her heart; and when the men were about to cut down a partially decayed tree, amidst whose naked branches the black storks had built their nests, and from which the tiny little ones peeped out their heads, she begged it might be spared. She begged – begged with tears in her eyes; and the tree was permitted to remain with the nest of black storks. It was not a great boon after all.

"The fine trees were cut down, the wood was sawn, and a large ship with three decks was built. The master shipbuilder himself was of low birth, but of noble appearance. His eyes and his forehead evinced how clever he was, and Waldemar Daae liked to listen to his conversation; so also did little Idé, his eldest daughter, who was fifteen years of age. And while he was building the ship for the father, he was also building castles in the air for himself, wherein he and Idé sat as man and wife; and that might have happened had the castles been of stone walls, with ramparts and moats, woods and gardens. But, with all his talents, the master shipbuilder was but a humble bird. What should a sparrow do in an eagle's nest?

"Wheugh – wheugh! I flew away, and he flew away, for he dared not remain longer; and little Idé got over his departure, for she was obliged to get over it.

"Splendid dark chargers neighed in the stables, worth being looked at; and they were looked at and admired. An admiral was sent by the king himself to examine the new man-of-war, and to make arrangements for its purchase. He praised the spirited horses loudly. I heard him myself," said the wind. "I followed the gentlemen through the open door, and strewed straw before their feet. Waldemar Daae wanted gold, the admiral wanted the horses – he admired them so much; but the bargain was not concluded, nor was the ship bought – the ship that was lying near the strand, with its white planks – a Noah's ark that was never to be launched upon the deep.

"Wheugh! It was a sad pity.

"In the winter time, when the fields were covered with snow, drift-ice filled the Belt, and I screwed it up to the shore," said the wind. "Then came ravens and crows, all as black as they could be, in large flocks. They perched themselves upon the deserted, dead, lonely ship, that lay high up on the beach; and they cried and lamented, with their hoarse voices, about the wood that was gone, the many precious birds' nests that were laid waste, the old ones rendered homeless, the little ones rendered homeless; and all for the sake of a great lumbering thing, a gigantic vessel, that never was to float upon the deep.

"I whirled the snow in the snow storms, and raised the snow-drifts. The snow lay like a sea high around the vessel. I let it hear my voice, and know what a tempest can say. I knew if I exerted myself it would get some of the knowledge other ships have.

"And winter passed – winter and summer; they come and go as I come and go; the snow melts, the apple blossom blooms, the leaves fall – all is change, change, and with mankind among the rest.

"But the daughters were still young – little Idé a rose, beautiful to look at, as the shipbuilder had seen her. Often did I play with her long brown hair, when, under the apple tree in the garden, she was standing lost in thought, and did not observe that I was showering down the blossoms upon her head. Then she would start, and gaze at the red sun, and the golden clouds around it, through the space among the dark foliage of the trees.

"Her sister Johanné resembled a lily – fair, slender, and erect; and, like her mother, she was stately and haughty. It was a great pleasure to her to wander up and down the grand saloon where hung the portraits of her ancestors. The high-born dames were painted in silks and velvets, with little hats looped up with pearls on their braided locks – they were beautiful ladies. Their lords were depicted in steel armour, or in costly mantles trimmed with squirrels' fur, and wearing blue ruffs; the sword was buckled round the thigh, and not round the loins. Johanné's own portrait would hang at some future day on that wall, and what would her noble husband be like? Yes, she thought of this, and she said this in low accents to herself. I heard her when I rushed through the long corridor into the saloon, and out again.

"Anna Dorthea, the pale hyacinth, who was only fourteen years of age, was quiet and thoughtful. Her large swimming blue eyes looked somewhat pensive, but a childish smile played around her mouth, and I could not blow it off; nor did I wish to do so.

"I met her in the garden, in the ravine, in the fields. She was gathering plants and flowers, those which she knew her father made use of for the drinks and drops he was fond of distilling. Waldemar Daae was arrogant and conceited, but also he had a great deal of knowledge. Everybody knew that, and everybody talked in whispers about it. Even in summer a fire burned in his private cabinet; its doors were always locked. He passed days and nights there, but he spoke little about his pursuits. The mysteries of nature are studied in silence. He expected soon to discover its greatest secret – the transmutation of other substances into gold.

"It was for this that smoke was ever issuing from the chimney of his laboratory; for this that sparks and flames were always there. And I was there too," said the wind. "'Hollo, hollo!' I sang through the chimney. There were steam, smoke, embers, ashes. 'You will burn yourself up – take care, take care!' But Waldemar Daae did not take care.

"The splendid horses in the stables, what became of them? – the silver and the gold plate, the cows in the fields, the furniture, the house itself? Yes, they could be smelted – smelted in the crucibles; and yet no gold was obtained.

"All was empty in the barns and in the pantry, in the cellars and in the loft. The fewer people, the more mice. One pane of glass was cracked, another was broken. I did not require to go in by the door," said the wind. "When the kitchen chimney is smoking, dinner is preparing; but there the smoke rolled from the chimney for that which devoured all repasts – for the yellow gold.

"I blew through the castle gate like a warder blowing his horn; but there was no warder," said the wind. "I turned the weathercock above the tower – it sounded like a watchman snoring inside the tower; but no watchman was there – it was only kept by rats and mice. Poverty presided at the table – poverty sat in the clothes' chests and in the store-rooms. The doors fell off their hinges – there came cracks and crevices everywhere. I went in, and I went out," said the wind; "therefore I knew what was going on.

"Amidst smoke and ashes – amidst anxiety and sleepless nights – Waldemar Daae's hair had turned grey; so had his beard and the thin locks on his forehead; his skin had become wrinkled and yellow, his eyes ever straining after gold – the expected gold.

"I whisked smoke and ashes into his face and beard: debts came instead of gold. I sang through the broken windows and cracked walls – came moaning in to the daughter's cheerless room, where the old bed-gear was faded and threadbare, but had still to hold out. Such a song was not sung at the children's cradles. High life had become wretched life. I was the only one then who sang loudly in the castle," said the wind. "I snowed them in, and they said they were comfortable. They had no wood to burn – the trees had been felled from which they would have got it. It was a sharp frost. I rushed through loopholes and corridors, over roofs and walls, to keep up my activity. In their poor chamber lay the three aristocratic daughters in their bed to keep themselves warm. To be as poor as church mice – that was high life! Wheugh! Would they give it up? But Herr Daae could not.

"'After winter comes spring,' said he. 'After want come good times; but they make one wait. The castle is now mortgaged – we have arrived at the worst – we shall have gold now at Easter!'

"I heard him murmuring near a spider's web: —

"'Thou active little weaver! thou teachest me to persevere. Even if thy web be swept away thou dost commence again, and dost complete it. Again let it be torn asunder, and, unwearied, thou dost again recommence thy work over and over again. I shall follow thy example. I will go on, and I shall be rewarded.'

"It was Easter morning – the church bells were ringing. The sun was careering in the heavens. Under a burning fever the alchemist had watched all night: he had boiled and cooled – mixed and distilled. I heard him sigh like a despairing creature; I heard him pray; I perceived that he held his breath in his anxiety. The lamp had gone out – he did not seem to notice it. I blew on the red-hot cinders; they brightened up, and shone on his chalky-white face, and tinged it with a momentary brightness. The eyes had almost closed in their deep sockets; now they opened wider – wider – as if they were about to spring forth.

"Look at the alchemical glass! There is something sparkling in it! It is glowing, pure, heavy! He lifted it with a trembling hand. He cried with trembling lips, 'Gold – gold!' He staggered, and seemed quite giddy at the sight. I could have blown him away," said the wind; "but I only blew in the ruddy fire, and followed him through the door in to where his daughters were freezing. His dress was covered with ashes; they were to be seen in his beard, and in his matted hair. He raised his head proudly, stretched forth his rich treasure in the fragile glass, and 'Won – won! gold!' he cried, as he held high in the air the glass that glittered in the dazzling sunshine. But his hand shook, and the alchemical glass fell to the ground, and broke into a thousand pieces. The last bubble of his prosperity had burst. Wheugh – wheugh! And I darted away from the alchemist's castle.

"Later in the year, during the short days, when fogs come with their damp drapery, and wring out wet drops on the red berries and the leafless trees, I came in a hearty humour, sent breezes aloft to clear the air, and began to sweep down the rotten branches. That was no hard work, but it was a useful one. There was sweeping of another sort within Borreby Castle, where Waldemar Daae dwelt. His enemy, Ové Ramel, from Basnæs, was there, with the mortgage bonds upon the property and the dwelling-house, which he had purchased. I thundered against the cracked window-panes, slammed the rickety doors, whistled through the cracks and crevices, 'Wheu-gh!' Herr Ové should have no pleasure in the prospect of living there. Idé and Anna Dorthea wept bitterly. Johanné stood erect and composed; but she looked very pale, and bit her lips till they bled. Much good would that do! Ové Ramel vouchsafed his permission to Herr Daae to remain at the castle during the rest of his days; but he got no thanks for the offer. I overheard all that passed. I saw the homeless man draw himself up haughtily, and toss his head; and I sent a blast against the castle and the old linden trees, so that the thickest branch among them broke, though it was not rotten. It lay before the gate like a broom, in case something had to be swept out; and to be sure there was a clean sweep.

"It was a sad day, a cruel hour, a heavy trial to sustain; but the heart was hard – the neck was stiff.

"They possessed nothing but the clothes they had on. Yes, they had a newly-bought alchemist's glass, which was filled with what had been wasted on the floor: it had been scraped up, the treasure promised, but not yielded. Waldemar Daae concealed this near his breast, took his stick in his hand, and the once wealthy man went, with his three daughters, away from Borreby Castle. I blew coldly on his wan cheeks, and ruffled his grey beard and his long white hair. I sang around them, 'Wheu-gh – wheu-gh!'

"There was an end to all their grandeur!

"Idé and Anna Dorthea walked on each side of their father; Johanné turned round at the gate. Why did she do so? Fortune would not turn. She gazed at the red stones of the wall, the stones from Marshal Stig's castle, and she thought of his daughters: —

 
'The eldest took the younger's hand,
And out in the wide world they went.'
 

She thought upon that song. Here there were three, and their father was with them. They passed as beggars over the same road where they had so often driven in their splendid carriage to Smidstrup Mark, to a house with mud floors that was let for ten marks a year – their new manor-house, with bare walls and empty closets. The crows and the jackdaws flew after them, and cried, as if in derision, 'From the nest – from the nest! away – away!' as the birds had screeched at Borreby Wood when the trees were cut down.

"And thus they entered the humble house at Smidstrup Mark, and I wandered away over moors and meadows, through naked hedges and leafless woods, to the open sea – to other lands. Wheugh – wheugh! On – on – on!"

What became of Waldemar Daae? What became of his daughters? The wind will tell.

"The last of them I saw was Anna Dorthea, the pale hyacinth. She had become old and decrepit: that was about fifty years after she had left the castle. She lived the longest – she saw them all out."

"Yonder, on the heath, near the town of Viborg, stood the dean's handsome house, built of red granite. The smoke rolled plentifully from its chimneys. The gentle lady and her beautiful daughters sat on the balcony, and looked over their pretty garden on the brown heath. At what were they gazing? They were looking at the storks' nests, on a castle that was almost in ruins. The roof, where there was any roof, was covered with moss and houseleeks; but the best part of it sustained the storks' nests – that was the only portion which was in tolerable repair.

"It was a place to look at, not to dwell in. I had to be cautious with it," said the wind. "For the sake of the storks the house was allowed to stand, else it was really a disgrace to the heath. The dean would not have the storks driven away; so the dilapidated building was permitted to remain, and a poor woman was permitted to live in it. She had to thank the Egyptian birds for that – or was it a reward for having formerly begged that the nests of their wild black kindred might be spared in Borreby Wood? Then the wretched pauper was a young girl – a lovely pale hyacinth in the noble flower parterre. She remembered it well – poor Anna Dorthea!

"'Oh! oh! Yes, mankind can sigh as the wind does amidst the sedges and the rushes – Oh! No church bell tolled at thy death, Waldemar Daae! No charity-school children sang over his grave when the former lord of Borreby was laid in the cold earth! Oh, all shall come to an end, even misery! Sister Idé became a peasant's wife. That was the hardest trial to her poor father. His daughter's husband a lowly serf, who could be obliged by his master to perform the meanest tasks! He, too, is now under the sod, and thou art there with him, unhappy Idé! O yes – O yes! it was not all over, even then; for I am left a poor, old, helpless creature. Blessed Christ! take me hence!'

"Such was Anna Dorthea's prayer in the ruined castle, where she was permitted to live – thanks to the storks.

"The boldest of the sisters I disposed of," said the wind. "She dressed herself in men's clothes, went on board a ship as a poor boy, and hired herself as a sailor. She spoke very little, and looked very cross, but was willing to work. She was a bad hand at climbing, however; so I blew her overboard before any one had found out that she was a female; and I think that was very well done on my part," said the wind.

"It was one Easter morning, the anniversary of the very day on which Waldemar Daae had fancied that he had found out the secret of making gold, that I heard under the storks' nests, from amidst the crumbling walls, a psalm tune – it was Anna Dorthea's last song.

"There was no window. There was only a hole in the wall. The sun came like a mass of gold, and placed itself there. It shone in brightly. Her eyes closed – her heart broke! They would have done so all the same, had the sun not that morning blazed in upon her.

"The storks had provided a roof over her head until her death.

"I sang over her grave," said the wind; "I had also sung over her father's grave, for I knew where it was, and none else did.

"New times came – new generations. The old highway had disappeared in inclosed fields. Even the tombs, that were fenced around, have been converted into a new road; and the railway's steaming engine, with its lines of carriages, dashes over the graves, which are as much forgotten as the names of those who moulder into dust in them! Wheugh – wheugh!

"This is the history of Waldemar Daae and his daughters. Let any one relate it better who can," said the wind, turning round.

And he was gone!