om the window, she
watched from the doorstep, but her daughter came not. The hours passed
slowly, but Helen did not return.

"Can it be that the apples have charmed her from her home?" thought the
mother. Then she clad herself in hood and pelisse, and went in search of
her daughter. Snow fell in huge masses. It covered all things. For long
she wandered hither and thither, the icy northeast wind whistled in the
mountain, but no voice answered her cries.

Day after day Marouckla worked, and prayed, and waited, but neither
stepmother nor sister returned. They had been frozen to death on the
mountain.

The inheritance of a small house, a field, and a cow fell to Marouckla.
In course of time an honest farmer came to share them with her, and
their lives were happy and peaceful.

THE MAIL-COACH PASSENGERS

BY HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN (ADAPTED)

It was bitterly cold. The sky glittered with stars, and not a breeze
stirred. "Bump,"--an old pot was thrown at a neighbor's door; and,
"Bang! Bang!" went the guns, for they were greeting the New Year.

It was New Year's Eve, and the church clock was striking twelve.
"Tan-ta-ra-ra, tan-ta-ra-ra!" sounded the horn, and the mail-coach came
lumbering up. The clumsy vehicle stopped at the gate of the town; all
the places had been taken, for there were twelve passengers in the
coach.

"Hurrah! Hurrah!" cried the people in the town; for in every house the
New Year was being welcomed; and, as the clock struck, they stood up,
the full glasses in their hands, to drink success to the newcomer. "A
happy New Year," was the cry; "a pretty wife, plenty of money, and no
sorrow or care!"

The wish passed round, and the glasses clashed together till they rang
again; while before the town-gate the mail-coach stopped with the twelve
strange passengers. And who were these strangers? Each of them had his
passport and his luggage with him; they even brought presents for me,
and for you, and for all the people in the town. Who were they? What did
they want? And what did they bring with them?

"Good-morning!" they cried to the sentry at the town-gate.

"Good-morning," replied the sentry, for the clock had struck twelve.

"Your name and profession?" asked the sentry of the one who alighted
first from the carriage.

"See for yourself in the passport," he replied.

"I am myself!"--and a famous fellow he looked, arrayed in bearskin
and fur boots. "Come to me to-morrow, and I will give you a