Description
Snowdrop and Other Tales
Snowdrop
It was the middle of winter, and the snowflakes were falling from the
sky like feathers. Now, a Queen sat sewing at a window framed in black
ebony, and as she sewed she looked out upon the snow. Suddenly she
pricked her finger and three drops of blood fell on to the snow. And
the red looked so lovely on the white that she thought to herself: ‘If
only I had a child as white as snow and as red as blood, and as black
as the wood of the window frame!’ Soon after, she had a daughter,
whose hair was black as ebony, while her cheeks were red as blood, and
her skin as white as snow; so she was called Snowdrop. But when the
child was born the Queen died. A year after the King took another
wife. She was a handsome woman, but proud and overbearing, and could
not endure that any one should surpass her in beauty. She had a magic
looking-glass, and when she stood before it and looked at herself she
used to say:
‘Mirror, Mirror on the wall,
Who is fairest of us all?’
then the Glass answered,
‘Queen, thou’rt fairest of them all.’
Then she was content, for she knew that the Looking-glass spoke the
truth.
But Snowdrop grew up and became more and more beautiful, so that when
she was seven years old she was as beautiful as the day, and far
surpassed the Queen. Once, when she asked her Glass,
‘Mirror, Mirror on the wall,
Who is fairest of us all?’
it answered–
‘Queen, thou art fairest here, I hold,
But Snowdrop is fairer a thousandfold.’
Then the Queen was horror-struck, and turned green and yellow with
jealousy. From the hour that she saw Snowdrop her heart sank, and she
hated the little girl.
Product ID: 9781776780600
Sku: 9781776780600
