s after the other of the new ones which they
had pretended to make. They pretended to fasten something round his
waist and to tie on something; this was the train, and the Emperor
turned round and round in front of the mirror.

'How well his majesty looks in the new clothes! How becoming they are!'
cried all the people round. 'What a design, and what colours! They are
most gorgeous robes!'

'The canopy is waiting outside which is to be carried over your majesty
in the procession,' said the master of the ceremonies.

'Well, I am quite ready,' said the Emperor. 'Don't the clothes fit
well?' and then he turned round again in front of the mirror, so that he
should seem to be looking at his grand things.

The chamberlains who were to carry the train stooped and pretended to
lift it from the ground with both hands, and they walked along with
their hands in the air. They dared not let it appear that they could not
see anything.

Then the Emperor walked along in the procession under the gorgeous
canopy, and everybody in the streets and at the windows exclaimed, 'How
beautiful the Emperor's new clothes are! What a splendid train! And they
fit to perfection!' Nobody would let it appear that he could see
nothing, for then he would not be fit for his post, or else he was a
fool.

None of the Emperor's clothes had been so successful before.

'But he has got nothing on,' said a little child.

'Oh, listen to the innocent,' said its father; and one person whispered
to the other what the child had said. 'He has nothing on; a child says
he has nothing on!'

'But he has nothing on!' at last cried all the people.

The Emperor writhed, for he knew it was true, but he thought 'the
procession must go on now,' so held himself stiffer than ever, and the
chamberlains held up the invisible train.

THE WIND'S TALE

ABOUT WALDEMAR DAA AND HIS DAUGHTERS

When the wind sweeps across a field of grass it makes little ripples in
it like a lake; in a field of corn it makes great waves like the sea
itself: this is the wind's frolic. Then listen to the stories it tells;
it sings them aloud, one kind of song among the trees of the forest, and
a very different one when it is pent up within walls with all their
cracks and crannies. Do you see how the wind chases the white fleecy
clouds as if they were a flock of sheep? Do you hear the wind down
there, howling in the open doorway like a watchman winding his horn?
Then, too, how he whis