r over there one day and
hour was just like another.

"I cannot bear it!" said the pewter soldier, "I have shed pewter
tears! it is too melancholy! rather let me go to the wars and lose
arms and legs! it would at least be a change. I cannot bear it
longer!--Now, I know what it is to have a visit from one's old
thoughts, with what they may bring with them! I have had a visit from
mine, and you may be sure it is no pleasant thing in the end; I was at
last about to jump down from the drawers.

"I saw you all over there at home so distinctly, as if you really were
here; it was again that Sunday morning; all you children stood before
the table and sung your Psalms, as you do every morning. You stood
devoutly with folded hands; and father and mother were just as pious;
and then the door was opened, and little sister Mary, who is not two
years old yet, and who always dances when she hears music or singing,
of whatever kind it may be, was put into the room--though she ought
not to have been there--and then she began to dance, but could not
keep time, because the tones were so long; and then she stood, first
on the one leg, and bent her head forwards, and then on the other leg,
and bent her head forwards--but all would not do. You stood very
seriously all together, although it was difficult enough; but I
laughed to myself, and then I fell off the table, and got a bump,
which I have still--for it was not right of me to laugh. But the whole
now passes before me again in thought, and everything that I have
lived to see; and these are the old thoughts, with what they may bring
with them.

"Tell me if you still sing on Sundays? Tell me something about little
Mary! and how my comrade, the other pewter soldier, lives! Yes, he is
happy enough, that's sure! I cannot bear it any longer!"

"You are given away as a present!" said the little boy; "you must
remain. Can you not understand that?"

The old man now came with a drawer, in which there was much to be
seen, both "tin boxes" and "balsam boxes," old cards, so large and so
gilded, such as one never sees them now. And several drawers were
opened, and the piano was opened; it had landscapes on the inside of
the lid, and it was so hoarse when the old man played on it! and then
he hummed a song.

"Yes, she could sing that!" said he, and nodded to the portrait, which
he had bought at the broker's, and the old man's eyes shone so bright!

"I will go to the wars! I will go to the wars