On my anvil gently will I beat you;
With my tongs, then, deftly will I hold you; 5
With my hammer I will shape and mold you
Into forms so fair that all will prize you,
Forms so rare that none will e'er despise you:
Axes, knives (so men will wish to use you),
Needles, pins (so women, too, will choose you). 10
Come with me, your brother will not harm you,
Come with me, my smithy sure will charm you."

Hearing this, Iron came out of his lurking places and
without more ado bashfully followed the cunning Smith.
But no sooner was he in the smithy than he felt himself 15
a prisoner. The tongs of bronze gripped him and thrust
him into the forge. The bellows roared, the Smith shouted,
and Fire leaped joyfully out of the ashes and threw his
arms around his helpless younger brother. And bashful,
bashful Iron turned first red and then white and finally 20
became as soft as dough and as radiant as the sun.

Then the tongs of bronze drew him forth from the flames,
and twirled him in the air, and threw him upon the anvil;
and the hammer of stone beat him fiercely again and again
until he shrieked with pain. 25

"Oh, spare me! spare me!" he cried. "Do not deal so
roughly with me. Let me go back to my lonely hiding
places and lie there in peace as in the days of old."

But the tongs pinched him worse than before, and the
hammer beat him still harder, and the Smith answered: 30

"Not so, not so! Be not so cowardly. We do not hurt
you; you are only frightened. Be brave and I will shape
you into things of great use to men. Be brave and you
shall rule the world."

Then in spite of Iron's piteous cries, he kept on pounding
and twisting and turning and shaping the helpless metal 5
until at length it was changed into many forms of use and
beauty--rings, chains, axes, knives, cups, and curious
tools. But it was so soft, after being thus heated and
beaten, that the edges of the tools were quickly dulled.
Try as he might, the Smith did not know how to give the 10
metal a harder temper.

One day a honeybee strolled that way. It buzzed
around the smithy and then lit on a clover blossom by the
door.

"O bee," cried the busy Smith, "you are a cunning 15
little bird, and you