It is unbelievable all that children know nowadays; one can scarcely say what they don't know. They no longer believe the old story that the stork brought them to father and mother out of the well or the millpond when they were little, and yet it is really true.

The days of the week once wanted to be free to get together and have a party.

"Such lovely roses!" said the Sunshine. "And each bud will soon burst in bloom and be equally beautiful. These are my children. It is I who have kissed them to life."

Outside the paper mill, masses of rags lay piled in high stacks; they had been gathered from far and wide. Every rag had a tale to tell, and told it, too; but we can't listen to all of them.

"How did it go with that wandering bird, King Christian? The birds have sung about it, and they fly far over distant lands and seas."

Godfather could tell stories, so many of them and such long ones, and he could cut out paper figures and draw pictures. When it was nearly Christmas he would bring out a scrapbook with clean white pages, and on these he pasted pictures cut out of books and newspapers; and if there weren't enough for the story he was going to tell, he drew them himself.

The houses were so high and close. The sun shone only upon one wall; that was covered with posters and placards, and people crowded and thronged around it. Carriages rushed by, light ones and heavy ones. Busses, filled to overflowing, rattled by like moving houses. Carts and carriages squabbled over the right of way.

We're going to Paris to see the exposition!

Now we're there! It was a speedy journey, done completely without witchcraft -- we went by steam, in a ship and on a railroad. Our time is indeed a time of fairy tales.

You know the Goblin, but do you know the Woman -- the Gardener's wife? She was very well read and knew poems by heart; and she could write them, too, easily, except that the rhymes -- "clinchings," as she called them -- gave her a little trouble.

Near the coast of Zealand, off Holsteinborg castle, there once lay two wooded islands, Vano and Glano, on which were villages, churches, and farms.