“We are afraid that the gardener will come to think too much of himself,”
said they; but he looked on it in another way: what he wished was to get the
reputation of being one of the best gardeners in the country, and to produce
every year something exquisite out of all sorts of garden stuff, and that he
did. But he often had to hear that the fruits which he first brought, the
apples and pears, were after all the best. All other kinds of fruits were
inferior to these. The melons, too, were very good, but they belonged to
quite another species. His strawberries were very excellent, but by no
means better than many others; and when it happened one year that his
radishes did not succeed, they only spoke of them, and not of other good
things he had made succeed.
It really seemed as if the family felt some relief in saying “It won’t turn
out well this year, little Larsen!” They seemed quite glad when they could
say “It won’t turn out well!”
The gardener used always twice a week to bring them fresh flowers,
tastefully arranged, and the colors by his arrangements were brought out in
stronger light.
“You have good taste, Larsen,” said the owner, “but that is a gift from our
Lord, not from yourself.”
One day the gardener brought a great crystal vase with a floating leaf of a
white water-lily, upon which was laid, with its long thick stalk descending
into the water, a sparkling blue flower as large as a sunflower.
“The sacred lotos of Hindostan!” exclaimed the family. They had never
seen such a flower; it was placed every day in the sunshine, and in the
evening under artificial light. Every one who saw it found it wonderfully
beautiful and rare; and that said the most noble young lady in the country,
the wise and kind-hearted princess. The lord of the manor deemed it an
honor to present her with the flower, and the princess took it with her to the
castle. Now the master of the house went down to the garden to pluck
another flower of the same sort, but he could not find any. So he sent for the
gardener, and asked him where he kept the blue lotos. “I have been looking
