Sunday afternoons they would bring out some books,
generally a book of travels which they were very fond of. The old
man would read aloud about Africa, with its great forests and the wild
elephants, while his wife would listen attentively, stealing a
glance now and then at the clay elephants, which served as
flower-pots.

"I can almost imagine I am seeing it all," she said; and then
how the lamp wished for a wax taper to be lighted in him, for then the
old woman would have seen the smallest detail as clearly as he did
himself. The lofty trees, with their thickly entwined branches, the
naked negroes on horseback, and whole herds of elephants treading down
bamboo thickets with their broad, heavy feet.

"What is the use of all my capabilities," sighed the old lamp,
"when I cannot obtain any wax lights; they have only oil and tallow
here, and these will not do." One day a great heap of wax-candle
ends found their way into the cellar. The larger pieces were burnt,
and the smaller ones the old woman kept for waxing her thread. So
there were now candles enough, but it never occurred to any one to put
a little piece in the lamp.

"Here I am now with my rare powers," thought the lamp, "I have
faculties within me, but I cannot share them; they do not know that
I could cover these white walls with beautiful tapestry, or change
them into noble forests, or, indeed, to anything else they might
wish for." The lamp, however, was always kept clean and shining in a
corner where it attracted all eyes. Strangers looked upon it as
lumber, but the old people did not care for that; they loved the lamp.
One day--it was the watchman's birthday--the old woman approached
the lamp, smiling to herself, and said, "I will have an illumination
to-day in honor of my old man." And the lamp rattled in his metal
frame, for he thought, "Now at last I shall have a light within me,"
but after all no wax light was placed in the lamp, but oil as usual.
The lamp burned through the whole evening, and began to perceive too
clearly that the gift of the stars would remain a hidden treasure
all his life. Then he had a dream; for, to one with his faculties,
dreaming was no difficulty. It appeared to him that the old people
were dead, and that he had been taken to the iron foundry to be melted
down. It caused him quite as much anxiety as on the day when he had
been called upon to appear before the mayor and the council at the
town-hall. But though he had been endo