The Cruise of the Little Dipper and Other Fairy Tales
9781465638311
208 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
Once upon a time there was a very poor boy, who had no cap on his head, no shoes on his feet, and never a penny in his pocket. He was so poor that he did not even have a name. His father had gone to sea many years ago in a ship called The Big Dipper, and as he had never returned, people said surely he must be dead. So the boy had gone to live in a small, dark house beside the sea, with his great-aunt, who was very old and cross and strict. She did not let him have any sugar on his cereal or butter on his bread, and every day after school she spanked him soundly for all the mistakes he had made that day, and if he had not made any she spanked him just the same for all those he would probably make to-morrow, or the next day, or the next. When he asked for a bit of soap to blow bright soap-bubbles, she cried: “Soap-bubbles, indeed! Soap is made only to wash one’s face with. You may have all you want for that, but for bubbles, no, no! Bless my boots, what will you ask for next?” When the other children played on the beach, building castles in the sand, or picking up pretty shells, this poor boy had to gather driftwood for his great-aunt’s kitchen fire. But for all his hard luck he was always whistling blithely at his work. He would whistle all the tunes in the hymn book, and all the sailor’s songs, and the nursery songs, and then some more that he made up as he ran along the beach picking up driftwood. Of course his great-aunt had forbidden his whistling about the house, but other people liked to hear him, and since he had no name, they called him “Birdling.” His great-aunt called him “You!” One day, after he had come home from school, washed his hands, eaten his dry bread and drunk his tea without sugar or cream, he went as usual to the beach to gather wood; but this day, all the boys from school were down by the sea-side making sail-boats. Their mothers and aunts and grandmas had given them odd bits of muslin from the rag-bag for sails, and their fathers and uncles and grandpas had given them little pots of paint, and the old boat-builder who lived on the beach had supplied the nails and boards and no end of good advice. They were building a splendid fleet, and when Birdling came whistling along the sands, they all hailed him and shouted: “Birdling, Birdling, come and build a boat! We have nails to spare, and surely you have some nice boards in your load of driftwood! Come, come and build a boat!” So Birdling, forgetting all about his duties and his great-aunt, sat down in the warm yellow sand, and built a boat of driftwood; and while he worked he whistled. The boys were all so glad to hear him and be able to play with him that they gave him all the paint and nails that they could spare, as well as string for his rigging and a lead sinker for his anchor. Of course he had many kinds of paint, and not enough of any one color to paint his whole boat, so her hull was black, the trimming golden-yellow, the deck bright-blue and the mast was green. She was a funny boat indeed, but Birdling liked her none the less and wanted to name her after his father’s ship, the Big Dipper.
