THUMBELINA. a7

glimmered like fire in the dark; then he went first and lighted
them through the long dark passage. When they came where
the dead bird lay, the Mole thrust up his broad nose against the
ceiling, so that a great hole was made, through which the day-
light could shine down. In the middle of the floor lay a dead
Swallow, his beautiful wings pressed close against his sides,
and his head and feet drawn back under his feathers : the poor
bird had certainly died of cold. Thumbeliaa was very sorry for
this : she was very fond of all the little birds, who had sung and
twittered so prettily before her through the summer; but the
Mole gave him a push with his crooked legs, and said, “ Now he
doesn’t pipe any more. It must be miserable to be born a little
bird. I’m thankful that none of my children can be that: such
a bird has nothing but his ‘tweet-tweet,’ and has to starve in the
winter !”

“Yes, you may well say that, as a clever man,” observed the
Field Mouse. “Of what use is all this ‘tweet-tweet’ to a bird
when the winter comes? He must starve and freeze. But they
say that’s very aristocratic.”

Thumbelina said nothing; but when the two others turned
their backs on the bird, she bent down, put the feathers aside
which covered his head, and kissed him upon his closed eyes.

“Perhaps it was he who sang so prettily before mein the sum-
mer,” she thought. “ How much pleasure he gave me, the dear
beautiful bird !”

The Mole now closed up the hole through which the daylight
shone in, and accompanied the ladies home. But at night Thum-
belina could not sleep at all; so she got up out of her bed, and
wovea large beautiful carpet of hay, and carried it and spread it
over the dead bird, and laid the thin stamens of flowers, soft as
cotton, and which she had found in the Field Mouse’s room, at
the bird's sides, so that he might lie soft in the ground.

“Farewell, you pretty little bird!” said she. “Farewell! and
thanks to you for your beautiful song in the summer, when all
the trees were green, and the sun shone down warmly upon us.”
And then she laid the bird’s head upon her heart. But the bird
was not dead; he was only lying there torpid with cold ; andnow
he had been warmed, and came to life again. : :

In autumn all the swallows fly away to warm countries ; but if
one happens to be belated, it becomes so cold that it falls down
as if dead, and lies where it fell, and then the cold snow covers it.

Thumbelina fairly trembled, she was so startled; for the bird
was large, very large, compared with her, who was only aninch .
in height. But she took courage, laid the cotton closer round the
poor bird, and brought a leaf that she had used as her own
coverlet, and laid it over the bird’s head.

‘The next night she crept out to him again—and now he was
alive, but quite weak; he could only open his eyes fora moment}