lo, nowadays the earth is white or green, according as winter rules or spring. the thrush sings in the grove and the canary in his cage, the smoke rises from the house-top and the church-bell tolls for evensong. the monk walks in the meadow and the poet writes verse.

but once things were different.

once things were so that, had somebody taken a walk on the earth, nowhere would a dog have run out of a house and barked at him. for there was not upon all the earth a single dog to run out of a house nor a single house for a dog to run out of.

he would not have come upon a tree nor a flower nor a blade of grass. nor could he have found a drop of water to quench his thirst with.

for there was nobody on the earth—nobody and nothing.

had there been anybody who wanted to take a walk, he simply could not have done so. for the earth was mere vapour and mist, so that he would have fallen plump through her and plunged straight into space, where the stars float.

and he would not have had much satisfaction from this. for, unless he had been quite round and nice and bright, he would have cut a foolish figure among the stars.

such was the state of things.

but the earth quite understood that she could not go on like this for ever. she could not have been intended to be never more than smoke. so she pulled herself together and did her best. but she had to go through a terrible amount and it was a hard time for her, which she never forgot and which she bears the marks of to this day.

she had to go through fire and through water too.

for thousands of years, she flew through space like a ball of fire and, when at length she had a stone crust about her, the rain poured down upon her nor stopped until she sailed away like an enormous drop of water.

meanwhile, the fire in the earth’s interior broke out each moment through the crust, burst it and split it criss-crosswise and flung the pieces higgledy-piggledy to every side.

“my poor, dear little earth!” said the sun and looked at her kindly.

“why do you bother about that clot?” asked one of the big stars. “shine on us, who are worth shining on.”

“the earth is no clot to me,” replied the sun. “she is my child, like yourself and the others. and she is the youngest and therefore nearest to my heart. it is not so very many thousand years ago since she broke loose from me and sallied forth into the universe to tempt fortune single-handed. if only she behaves pluckily and does not lose heart, i shall have pleasure enough in her.”

the earth heard this and held out.

year by year, the stone crust grew thicker, the water sank gradually into the ground and the land rose to the surface. but, even when the crust became so thick that the fire could not break through it just when[xvi] and where it pleased, but had to make a regular effort when it wished to create a sensation, even then the earth’s trials were not over.

there was no order about her at all.

for instance, it was just as warm in greenland as in italy. plenty of plants grew on the earth, but they were queer ones: ferns and horse-tails as tall as the tallest trees in the forest nowadays. there were animals too, but they were strange and uncanny creatures which we never meet with now except in the old fairy-tales. there were quadrupeds that were thirty yards long and swam in the water; and there were dragons that flew in the air and looked horrid.

and so it happened that it became ridiculously cold on the greatest part of the earth. wherever one looked lay ice and snow; and the animals and plants died.

but then the fire broke out again, more violently than ever, and overturned hills and dales. great new lands rose up out of the sea; and the sea swept its broad waves ruthlessly over the old lands.

no one could conceive what the end would be.

“my poor, dear little earth!” said the sun.

but how all these things were put in order at last—this you shall read in the fairy-tale of the four seasons.