ehoods, I should not feel quite sure that it might not be found
again some fine day.

_Anders' New Cap_[14]

ANNA WOHLENBERG

Once upon a time there was a little boy, called Anders, who had a new
cap. And a prettier cap you never could see, for mother herself had
knitted it, and nobody could make anything quite as nice as mother
could. And it was altogether red, except a small part in the middle
which was green, for the red yarn had given out; and the tassel was
blue.

[Footnote 14: _A Swedish Fairy Tale._]

His brothers and sisters walked about squinting at him, and their
faces grew long with envy. But Anders cared nothing about that. He put
his hands in his trousers pockets and went out for a walk, for he did
not begrudge anybody's seeing how fine he was.

The first person he met was a farm labourer walking alongside a load
of peat and smacking at his horse. He made a bow so deep that his back
came near breaking, and he was dumbfounded, I can tell you, when he
saw it was nobody but Anders.

"Dear me," he said, "if I did not think it was the gracious little
count himself." And then he invited Anders to ride on the peat load.

But when one has a fine red cap with a blue tassel, one is too fine to
ride on peat loads, and Anders trotted proudly by.

At the turn of the road he ran up against the tanner's boy, Lars. He
was such a big boy that he wore high boots and carried a jack-knife.
He gazed and gazed at the cap, and could not keep from fingering the
blue tassel.

"Let's swap caps," he said, "and I will give you my jack-knife to
boot."

Now this knife was a splendid one, though half the blade was gone, and
the handle was a little cracked; and Anders knew that one is almost a
man as soon as one has a jack-knife. But still it did not come up to
the new cap which mother had made.

"Oh no, I am not as stupid as all that!"

And then he said good-bye to Lars with a nod; but Lars only made faces
at him, for he was very much put out because he could not cheat Anders
out of his cap which his mother had made.

Soon after this, Anders met a very old, old woman who curtsied till
her skirts looked like a balloon. She called him a little gentleman
and said that he was so fine that he might go to the royal court ball.

"Yes, why not?" thought Anders. "Seeing that I am so fine, I may as
well go and visit the King."

And so he did. In the palace yard stood two soldiers with shining
helmets, and with muskets