352
ANDERSEN'S TALES,
able to find me. If I still possessed my old eye
which was broken off, I think 1 should fain weep; but
I will not— because it is not genteel to cry.”
One day a couple of boys in the street were pad-
dling in the gutter, where they turned up old nails,
pennies, and such things. It was dirty work, but they
seemed to delight in it. |
« Ta!” cried one of them, who was pricked by the
darning-needle, here’s a fellow!”
« I'm not a fellow, I’m a young lady,” said the
darning-needle ; but nobody heard her.
The wax had disappeared, and she had grown
black, but as blackness makes things appear slimmer,
she fancied she was genteeler than ever.
« There comes an egg-shell sailing along,” said the
boys, who now stuck the darning-needle through the
egg-shell.
“ White walls and a black dress are very becoming,”
said the darning-needle, “only I can’t see myself! I
hope I sha’n’t be sea-sick, for then I am afraid I should
break.”
But she was not sea-sick, and did not break.
“Tt is a good preservative against sea-sickness to
have a steel stomach, and to bear in mind that one 1s
something more than a mere human being! My feel-
ing of sea-sickness is now over. The genteeler one i,
the more one can endure.”
“Crash!” said the egg-shell, as a wagon rolled
over it.
Mercy ! what a weight!” said the darning-needle,
“ T shall be sea-sick! 1 shall break!”
But she did not break, though a heavy wagon went
over her; she lay at full length in the road,—and there
let her lie.
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