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Updated: October 29, 2026
He saw the same children, and the same toys on the table; and there was the same grand castle with the pretty little Dancer. She was still standing on one leg with the other high in the air; she too was steadfast. That touched the Tin-soldier, he was nearly going to shed tin-tears; but that would not have been fitting for a soldier. He looked at her, but she said nothing.
So they made a little boat out of newspaper, put the Tin-soldier in it, and made him sail up and down the gutter; both the boys ran along beside him, clapping their hands. What great waves there were in the gutter, and what a swift current!
If the Tin-soldier had only called out 'Here I am! they must have found him; but he did not think it fitting for him to cry out, because he had on his uniform. Soon it began to drizzle; then the drops came faster, and there was a regular down-pour. When it was over, two little street boys came along. 'Just look! cried one. 'Here is a Tin-soldier! He shall sail up and down in a boat!
Ugh! how he showed his teeth, as he cried to the chips of wood and straw: 'Hold him, hold him! he has not paid the toll! He has not shown his passport! But the current became swifter and stronger. The Tin-soldier could already see daylight where the tunnel ended; but in his ears there sounded a roaring enough to frighten any brave man.
But the Tin-soldier took no notice, and seemed not to hear. 'Very well, wait till to-morrow! said the imp. When it was morning, and the children had got up, the Tin-soldier was put in the window; and whether it was the wind or the little black imp, I don't know, but all at once the window flew open and out fell the little Tin-soldier, head over heels, from the third-storey window!
The paper-boat tossed up and down, and in the middle of the stream it went so quick that the Tin-soldier trembled; but he remained steadfast, showed no emotion, looked straight in front of him, shouldering his gun. All at once the boat passed under a long tunnel that was as dark as his box had been. 'Where can I be coming now? he wondered. 'Oh, dear! This is the black imp's fault!
The tin-soldiers rattled in their box, for they wanted to be out too, but they could not raise the lid. The nut-crackers played at leap-frog, and the slate-pencil ran about the slate; there was such a noise that the canary woke up and began to talk to them, in poetry too! The only two who did not stir from their places were the Tin-soldier and the little Dancer.
The boat whirled three, four times round, and became filled to the brim with water: it began to sink! The Tin-soldier was standing up to his neck in water, and deeper and deeper sank the boat, and softer and softer grew the paper; now the water was over his head.
The little lady was stretching out both her arms, for she was a Dancer, and was lifting up one leg so high in the air that the Tin-soldier couldn't find it anywhere, and thought that she, too, had only one leg. 'That's the wife for me! he thought; 'but she is so grand, and lives in a castle, whilst I have only a box with four-and-twenty others. This is no place for her!
All the laughter was gone from the voice and the hard gray eyes. "Yesterday we humored you tin-soldier fashion, but to-day let's put away childish things. I like that magistrate, plainly, a damned deal better than I like you. When you or I show one half his ability, we're free to mock him in my house." For the first time within the memory of any man present, the mimic wilted.