The Ugly Duckling

He wants to stay and watch them. He knows they are swans. Oh, how he wants to be beautiful like them. Now it is winter.

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Everything is white with snow. The river is covered with ice. The ugly duckling is very cold and unhappy. One morning the ugly duckling sees the beautiful swans again. He wants so much to swim with them in the river. But he is afraid of them. He wants to die. So he runs into the river.

He looks into the water. There in the water he sees a beautiful swan.

The Hans Christian Andersen Centre

He is no more an ugly duckling. He cannot be one of us! Your brother hatched from the very same nest as you did. We will go to the lake for your very first swim. He took the last spot in the line. Each yellow duck jumped in the river and swam behind Mama Duck. When it was his turn, the Ugly Duckling jumped in and started to paddle, too. When they left the water and started to play, the Ugly Duckling tried to play with his brothers and sisters, too.

We will not play with you! And you walk weird, too!

When Mama Duck was close by, she would not let them talk in this way. But she was not always close by. You would do us a big favor if you just went away from here! He hung his head down low. That night, the Ugly Duckling flew over the farmyard fence. He flew till he landed on the other side of the lake.

There he met two grown-up ducks.

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They quickly flew up in the air, and their feathers fell down on the ground. The poor Ugly Duckling froze in fear. The dog sniffed and sniffed at the Ugly Duckling, then turned away. The sky turned dark. A bolt of lightning. Then came a big storm, with heavy rains pouring down from the sky. In just moments, the Ugly Duckling was soaked through and through.

Then a cold wind started to blow. Suddenly a big hungry dog came tearing by, chasing the two ducks. All at once, a tiny light blinked far off in the woods. He flew to the door. The door of the hut creaked open. And again the duckling had to admit that he could do nothing but swim, which did not seem of much use to anybody. What had we better do with it? Anyway, we will let it stay here for a bit, and see what happens. So the duckling remained for three weeks, and shared the food of the cat and the hen; but nothing in the way of eggs happened at all. Then the sun came out, and the air grew soft, and the duckling grew tired of being in a hut, and wanted with all his might to have a swim.

And one morning he got so restless that even his friends noticed it. You can't think how delicious it is to put your head under the water and dive straight to the bottom. And the cat and the hen, who felt hurt and offended, answered shortly:. The duckling would have liked to say good- bye, and thank them for their kindness, as he was polite by nature; but they had both turned their backs on him, so he went out of the rickety door feeling rather sad.

But, in spite of himself, he could not help a thrill of joy when he was out in the air and water once more, and cared little for the rude glances of the creatures he met. For a while he was quite happy and content; but soon the winter came on, and snow began to fall, and everything to grow very wet and uncomfortable. And the duckling soon found that it is one thing to enjoy being in the water, and quite another to like being damp on land. The sun was setting one day, like a great scarlet globe, and the river, to the duckling's vast bewilderment, was getting hard and slippery, when he heard a sound of whirring wings, and high up in the air a flock of swans were flying.

They were as white as snow which had fallen during the night, and their long necks with yellow bills were stretched to a land where the sun shone all day.

The Ugly Duckling

Oh, if he only could have gone with them! But that was not possible, of course; and besides, what sort of companion could an ugly thing like him be to those beautiful beings? So he walked sadly down to a sheltered pool and dived to the very bottom, and tried to think it was the greatest happiness he could dream of. But, all the same, he knew it wasn't! And every morning it grew colder and colder, and the duckling had hard work to keep himself warm. Indeed, it would be truer to say that he never was warm at all; and at last, after one bitter night, his legs moved so slowly that the ice crept closer and closer, and when the morning light broke he was caught fast, as in a trap; and soon his senses went from him.

A few hours more and the poor duckling's life had been ended. But, by good fortune, a man was crossing the river on his way to his work, and saw in a moment what had happened. He had on thick wooden shoes, and he went and stamped so hard on the ice that it broke, and then he picked up the duckling and tucked him under his sheepskin coat, where his frozen bones began to thaw a little. Instead of going on his work, the man turned back and took the bird to his children, who gave him a warm mess to eat and put him in a box by the fire, and when they came back from school he was much more comfortable than he had been since he had left the old woman's cottage.

They were kind little children, and wanted to play with him; but, alas! He never could tell afterwards exactly how he had spent the rest of the winter. He only knew that he was very miserable and that he never had enough to eat. But by-and-by things grew better. The earth became softer, the sun hotter, the birds sang, and the flowers once more appeared in the grass. When he stood up, he felt different, somehow, from what he had done before he fell asleep among the reeds to which he had wandered after he had escaped from the peasant's hut. His body seemed larger, and his wings stronger.

Something pink looked at him from the side of a hill. He thought he would fly towards it and see what it was. Oh, how glorious it felt to be rushing through the air, wheeling first one way and then the other!

The Ugly Duckling - Wikipedia

He had never thought that flying could be like that! The duckling was almost sorry when he drew near the pink cloud and found it was made up of apple blossoms growing beside a cottage whose garden ran down to the banks of the canal.



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He fluttered slowly to the ground and paused for a few minutes under a thicket of syringas, and while he was gazing about him, there walked slowly past a flock of the same beautiful birds he had seen so many months ago. Fascinated, he watched them one by one step into the canal, and float quietly upon the waters as if they were part of them.

It did not take him long to reach them, for they had stopped to rest in a green pool shaded by a tree whose branches swept the water. And directly they saw him coming some of the younger ones swam out to meet him with cries of welcome, which again the duckling hardly understood. He approached them glad, yet trembling, and turning to one of the older birds, who by this time had left the shade of the tree, he said:. I don't know why I was ever hatched, for I am too ugly to live. Reflected in the still pool he saw many white shapes, with long necks and golden bills, and, without thinking, he looked for the dull grey body and the awkward skinny neck.

But no such thing was there. Instead, he beheld beneath him a beautiful white swan! I loved the audio and I have always love this story ever since I was a kid. My Best Friend Randi has never heard this story until now and I think that she is hooked. But I think those animals were really rude and mean. Everyone is different it there own way. If everyone was the same the world would be so boring. I know someone who has been picked on and called fat by a bunch of bigger kids, but my friend has muskulor distriffe. It is an illness that makes you gain weight.

My name is zhang Xinqian. I am 14 years old. I live in Jiangsu Jiangdu. I like this story very much.



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We seem to be getting a quite a few visitors from China. A big hello to you all from Bertie and Natasha. Thanks for listening to Storynory. Bertie — March 25, Thanks very much for this good shory,and for all your works. I am from china,and I am looking something for my little son,then I find this. I have listened to a lot of adiuos with lessons but this one is a new one for me. If I was of the yellow ducklings I would have stood up for the ugly duckling. I liked it because it had an ugly duckling who was afraid of all the cruel and fowl ha language who ended up searching the pretty much the whole world for happiness and finally found it.

My mom liked it because she could listen to someone else telling the story. Can people who used inappropriate language stop doing things like that? This website is supposed to be an international one, which means we should expect readers of other languages.

But I appreciate the efforts of the website creator. Bertie — April 14, I disagree with commenting on this page in Chinese! Your help is much appreciated. Bertie — April 17, I think this story is very insteresting. That was very lovely!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I loved your story, you do a very good job with your voices. This has always been one of my favorite stories. Keep up the good work. Is it possible for every tribe to set up its own country?