Nutcracker and the mouse king

claimed Fred in a tone of contempt. “Nothing will do! I tell you what, Godfather Drosselmeier, if your fine little figures in the castle can only go on doing the same things, they are not worth much, and I don`t particularly care about them. No! I would rather have my hussars; they can manoeuvre forwards, backwards, as I like, and are not shut up in a house.”
And with this he ran to the table, and made his squadron on their silver horses trot up and down, and wheel and charge and shoot to his heart`s content.
Mary also had quietly slipped away, for she, too, soon grew tired of the strutting and capering of the puppets in the castle, but was so polite and good-natured that she would not show it so plainly as her brother Fred. Counsellor Drosselmeier spoke rather crossly to the parents.
“Such a skilful contrivance is not for senseless children. I will pack up my castle again.”
But the mother came forward, and got him to show her the construction and the wonderfully ingenious works by which the little puppets were set in motion. The Counsellor took it all to pieces and put it together again. This put him into a rather better temper, and he presented the children, furthermore, with some pretty brown men and women made of gingerbread, with gilt faces, hands, and legs, which quite delighted them.
Sister Louisa had, by her mother`s wish, put on the handsome dress which was her present, and looked very nice in it; but when Mary was to try on her new frock, she thought she would rather look at it a little longer, and they allowed her to have her own way.
CHAPTER III
THE FAVOURITE
Mary, in fact, could not tear herself away from the table of presents, since she had just discovered on it something, till now unseen. The marching off of Fred`s hussars, previously paraded close in front of the Christmas tree, left exposed to view a very remarkable little man, who stood still in the background, as if quietly awaiting his turn for notice. His figure, indeed, was not much to be proud of, for, besides that his rather long thick body by no means fitted his small thin legs, his head also seemed far too big. His nice clothes, however, which bespoke a person of taste and cultivation, went far to make up for this deformity. He wore a very fine, shiny, violet hussar jacket, with many white buttons and braidings, pantaloons of the same stuff, and the most elegant boots that ever adorned the feet of a dandy undergraduate – ay, or of an officer. They fitted his neat little legs as closely as if painted on them. Ridiculous it was indeed, that, with this costume, he had hanging behind him a short clumsy cloak or hood, which looked exactly like wood, and a queer woodsman`s cap on his head.
But Mary bethought herself that Godfather Drosselmeier also sometimes wore a very ugly lounging-jacket and a dreadful cap, yet was a dear, good godfather for all that. Also, she considered that their godfather would not be nearly so good-looking as the small figure, even if, in other respects, he were dressed out as smartly.
As Mary kept looking harder and harder at this manikin, who had quite taken her heart at first sight, she came to perceive what a kindly nature was expressed on his countenance.
His clear, green, and certainly too prominent eyes bespoke nothing but friendliness and benevolence. It suited his looks well that his chin bore a well-trimmed beard of white cotton, which set off the pleasant smile on his bright-red mouth.
“Ah, Papa!” cried Mary at length, “who is to have this dearest little man on the Christmas tree?”
“That,” said her father, “that fellow, my dear child, is to make himself useful to you all; his work is to crack hard nuts for you, and he belongs to Louisa as much as to Fred and to you.” With this her father carefully took the figure off the table, and, lifting up its wooden cloak, made the manikin`s mouth gape open to show two rows of very sharp white teeth. Then he told Mary to put in a nut, and – crack! – the man had crushed it, so that the shell fell in pieces, and Mary got the small kernel in her hand.
Now Mary and all might know that the elegant little man belonged to the race of Nutcrackers, and practised the profession of his ancestors. The little girl cried out for joy, when her father said:
“Since Friend Nutcracker pleases you so much, dear Mary, he shall be your special charge and pet; though, as I said, Louisa and Fred have as much right to use him as you.”
Mary at once took him into her arms, and made him crack nuts, yet picking out the smallest ones, in order that the manikin might not have to stretch his mouth so wide open, which was not good for him. Louisa came to look, and for her also Friend Nutcracker had to perform his service, which he seemed to do with goodwill, for he kept on smiling in the most amiable way.
Meanwhile, Fred had grown tired of all his riding and drilling, so, when he heard such a pleasant cracking of nuts, he ran to his sisters and laughed heartily at the funny little man, who, as Fred also liked to eat nuts, passed from hand to hand, and was never allowed to stop opening and shutting his mouth.
Fred always kept shoving in the biggest and hardest nuts; but all of a sudden there was a crack, crick, then three teeth fell out of Nutcracker`s mouth, and his under-jaw went loose and wobbly.
“Oh, my poor dear Nutcracker!” cried Mary, snatching him out of Fred`s hands.
“What a silly, stupid fellow!” exclaimed Fred. “Sets up for being a nutcracker, and hasn`t a good set of grinders! He doesn`t seem to be very first-rate at his business. Hand him over, Mary! He shall go on cracking nuts for me, even though he loses all his teeth and his whole chin into the bargain, which is what such a good-for-nothing deserves.”
“No, no!” cried Mary in tears. “You are not to have him, my dear Nutcracker. Just see how sadly he looks at me and shows his sore little month! But you are a cruel boy – you beat your horse and have your soldiers shot.”
“That`s what should be; you don`t understand these things,” answered Fred. “But the Nutcracker belongs to me as much as to you; hand him over here!”
Mary began to cry bitterly, and made haste to wrap up the wounded Nutcracker in her small pocket-handkerchief. Her parents and Godfather Drosselmeier interfered. The latter, to Mary`s grief, took Fred`s part, but her father said:
“I have put Nutcracker under Mary`s protection, and since, as I see, he now needs it, she has full power over him, and nobody is to say a word against her. Besides, I am very much surprised at Fred that he should require fresh duty of a man injured on service. As a good soldier, he ought to know that wounded men are never put back in the ranks.”
Fred was much ashamed of himself, and, without troubling further about nuts or Nutcracker, slipped off to the other side of the table, where his hussars had been posted for the night, after putting out the proper pickets.
Mary picked up Nutcracker`s lost teeth. Around his hurt chin she bound a nice white ribbon, taken off her dress, and then wrapped the poor little fellow, who looked very wan and dejected, more carefully than ever in her pocket-handkerchief. Thus she held him, rocking him like a baby in her arms, while she turned over the pretty picture-books which lay among the rest of the presents. She became quite cross, as was not at all usual with her, when Godfather Drosselmeier laughed a great deal, and kept asking how she could go on so with that hideous little creature. The strange resemblance to Drosselmeier which had struck her at first setting eyes on the manikin, came again into her mind, and she spoke quite seriously:
“Who knows, Godfather, whether you, if you were to make yourself as fine as my dear Nutcracker, and had as nice shiny boots on, who knows whether you would look as pretty as he does!”
Mary did not understand why her parents laughed so loud, or why the Counsellor got so red in the face and did not join in the laugh as heartily as before. There may have been some particular reason for this.
CHAPTER IV
MARVELS
In the parlour at Dr. Stahlbaum`s, on the left-hand side as you go in at the door, stood a high glass cupboard, where the children kept all those fine things that were given them every Christmas. Louisa was quite a little girl when their father had the cupboard made by a very clever carpenter, who put in such clear panes of glass, and arranged the whole so well that the treasures inside looked almost brighter and prettier than when you had them in your hands. On the highest shelf, out of Fred and Mary`s reach, stood Godfather Drosselmeier`s works of art; right beneath was the shelf for the picture-books; the lowest compartments Mary and Fred could fill with what they pleased; but it was always the way that Mary took the bottom shelf as the dwelling of her dolls, and Fred`s troops had the one over it for their cantonments.
Such was now the arrangement; while Fred quartered his hussars above, Mary laid Missy Gertrude by in a corner below, and set out the new finely-dressed doll in that well-furnished apartment, and invited herself to take goodies with her.
Very well furnished was the apartment, I have said, and it is true; for I know not if you, my attentive reader, Mary, like the little Stahlbaum girl – her name, you know, was also Mary – I mean, whether you possess such a fine flower-chintz sofa, several dear little chairs, a small tea-table, and above all, a very neat clean little bed, for your dolls to take their repose in. All this was in one corner of the cupboard shelf, whose walls here were even papered with pretty pictures; and you can easily believe that the new doll, who, as Mary learned the same evening, was named Missy Clara, found herself very comfortable in this apartment.
It was late in the evening, getting on for midnight indeed, and Godfather Drosselmeier had long gone home, and yet the children could not tear themselves away from the glass cupboard, for all their m…