When you read that the Danish Arms consist of “three lions and nine hearts,” what do you see?  Has the United States any arms?  What are they?

Do you know a legend about King Canute and the waves of the sea?  Can you find out anything more about Waldemar and Margaret?

Do you think the man whose face was carved into a figurehead was really Holger Danske?  Do you think it possible that the grandfather could mean that every brave man who fights for his country is a Holger Danske?  Can you imagine the great figure of Holger Danske throwing its shadow on the wall and seeming to move about in the candle light?  Does the grandfather believe that such heroes can do other things than fight?

What do you know about Thorwaldsen?  Did you ever see a picture of his beautiful statue of Christ?  Did the little boy see any other Holger Danske than the one whose beard was grown into the marble table?

Has a Holger ever come to save this United States from great danger?  Would you call Washington and Longfellow and Hawthorne, Holgers?  Why?  Can you name a few men whom the grandfather, had he been an American, might have said were Holgers?  Do you not believe that if the people of the United States need a great man he will be forthcoming if we have faith that he will come?

Do you not think that the little Danish boy, by his dreaming about Holger Danske, might have come to be the very one to aid his country most?  Is it worth while for each of us to try to be a Holger?

WHAT THE OLD MAN DOES IS ALWAYS RIGHT

By Hans Christian Andersen

I will tell you the story which was told to me when I was a little boy.  Every time I thought of the story it seemed to me to become more and more charming; for it is with stories as it is with many people—­they become better as they grow older.

I take it for granted that you have been in the country, and have seen a very old farmhouse with a thatched roof, and mosses and small plants growing wild upon the thatch.  There is a stork’s nest on the summit of the gable; for we can’t do without the stork.  The walls of the house are sloping, and the windows are low, and only one of the latter is made so that it will open.  The baking-oven sticks out of the wall like a little fat body.  The elder tree hangs over the paling, and beneath its branches, at the foot of the paling, is a pool of water in which a few ducks are disporting themselves.  There is a yard dog, too, who barks at all comers.

Just such a farmhouse stood out in the country; and in this house dwelt an old couple—­a peasant and his wife.  Small as was their property, there was one article among it that they could do without—­a horse, that lived on the grass it found by the side of the highroad.  The old peasant rode into the town on this horse; and often his neighbors borrowed it of him, and rendered the old couple some service in return for the loan of it.  But they thought it would be best if they sold the horse, or exchanged it for something that might be more useful to them.  But what might this something be?