e
properly.

They were telling each other, with a confidential interchange of ideas,
where they had been during the day. The messenger of Fortune had only
executed a few unimportant commissions, such as saving a new bonnet from
a shower of rain, etc.; but what she had yet to perform was something
quite unusual.

"I must tell you," said she, "that to-day is my birthday; and in honor
of it, a pair of walking-shoes or galoshes has been entrusted to me,
which I am to carry to mankind. These shoes possess the property of
instantly transporting him who has them on to the place or the period
in which he most wishes to be; every wish, as regards time or place, or
state of being, will be immediately fulfilled, and so at last man will
be happy, here below."

"Do you seriously believe it?" replied Care, in a severe tone of
reproach. "No; he will be very unhappy, and will assuredly bless the
moment when he feels that he has freed himself from the fatal shoes."

"Stupid nonsense!" said the other angrily. "I will put them here by
the door. Some one will make a mistake for certain and take the wrong
ones--he will be a happy man."

Such was their conversation.

II. What Happened to the Councillor

It was late; Councillor Knap, deeply occupied with the times of King
Hans, intended to go home, and malicious Fate managed matters so that
his feet, instead of finding their way to his own galoshes, slipped
into those of Fortune. Thus caparisoned the good man walked out of the
well-lighted rooms into East Street. By the magic power of the shoes he
was carried back to the times of King Hans; on which account his foot
very naturally sank in the mud and puddles of the street, there having
been in those days no pavement in Copenhagen.

"Well! This is too bad! How dirty it is here!" sighed the Councillor.
"As to a pavement, I can find no traces of one, and all the lamps, it
seems, have gone to sleep."

The moon was not yet very high; it was besides rather foggy, so that
in the darkness all objects seemed mingled in chaotic confusion. At the
next corner hung a votive lamp before a Madonna, but the light it gave
was little better than none at all; indeed, he did not observe it before
he was exactly under it, and his eyes fell upon the bright colors of the
pictures which represented the well-known group of the Virgin and the
infant Jesus.

"That is probably a wax-work show," thought he; "and the people delay
taking down their sign in