“I never shall lose the memory of that!” said the Teapot, when it afterward talked to itself of the course of its life.  “I was called an invalid, and placed in a corner, and the day after was given away to a woman who begged victuals.  I fell into poverty, and stood dumb both outside and in; but there, as I stood, began my better life.  One is one thing and becomes quite another.  Earth was placed in me:  for a Teapot that is the same as being buried, but in the earth was placed a flower bulb.  Who placed it there, who gave it, I know not; given it was, and it took the place of the Chinese leaves and the boiling water, the broken handle and spout.  And the bulb lay in the earth, the bulb lay in me, it became my heart, my living heart, such as I never before had.  There was life in me, power and might.  My pulses beat, the bulb put forth sprouts, it was the springing up of thoughts and feelings; they burst forth in flower.  I saw it, I bore it, I forgot myself in its delight.  Blessed is it to forget one’s self in another.  The bulb gave me no thanks, it did not think of me—­it was admired and praised.  I was so glad at that:  how happy must it have been!  One day I heard it said that it ought to have a better pot.  I was thumped on my back—­that was rather hard to bear; but the flower was put in a better pot—­and I was thrown away in the yard, where I lie as an old crock.  But I have the memory:  that I can never lose.”

THE UGLY DUCKLING

From ‘Riverside Literature Series’:  1891, by Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

I—­THE DUCKLING IS BORN

It was glorious in the country.  It was summer; the cornfields were yellow, the oats were green, the hay had been put up in stacks in the green meadows; and the stork went about on his long red legs, and chattered Egyptian, for this was the language he had learned from his mother.  All around the fields and meadows were great woods, and in the midst of these woods deep lakes.  Yes, it was right glorious in the country.

In the midst of the sunshine there lay an old farm, with deep canals about it; and from the wall down to the water grew great burdocks, so high that little children could stand upright under the tallest of them.  It was just as wild there as in the deepest wood, and here sat a Duck upon her nest.  She had to hatch her ducklings, but she was almost tired out before the little ones came; and she seldom had visitors.  The other ducks liked better to swim about in the canals than to run up to sit under a burdock and gabble with her.

At last one egg-shell after another burst open.  “Pip! pip!” each cried, and in all the eggs there were little things that stuck out their heads.

“Quack! quack!” said the Duck, and they all came quacking out as fast as they could, looking all around them under the green leaves; and the mother let them look as much as they liked, for green is good for the eye.