It was a cold winter morning in the forest. A little fox who lived with only his mother walked out of the hole that was their home.
“Ow!” the little fox cried out, holding his eyes and rolling back to his mother. “Mommy, I’ve got something in my eyes! Get it out, please!”
The mother fox was very worried and pulled his paws away carefully, but she found nothing in his eyes. Then she stepped outside and saw that the ground was all white with snow. The field was dazzling thanks to the morning light of the sun. She realized that the little fox had been blinded by the light reflecting off of the snow, which he had never seen before.
The little fox started playing in the snow. Flakes of silk cotton flew up into the air as he ran about, refracting the sunlight in rainbow colors.
Then suddenly some powdered snow fell onto the little fox’s head with a wet plop. The little fox rushed away in a panic, but when he stopped to look back, he saw no one. The snow had slipped off the branches of a fir tree. He watched some of it still sliding down, the needles shedding snow in long threads of white.
Later in the day, the little fox went home. “Mommy, my paws are cold―they’re tingling!” he said, holding out his sore wet paws to his mother. She blew on them with her warm breath and held them gently in her own paws. “They’ll get better soon. Snow won’t hurt you,” said the mother fox. But she was worried that his paws might get frostbitten, and so she decided to go to town that evening to buy woolen mittens for the little fox.
Darkness crept over the forest and the field. The snow remained dazzlingly white, even during the night. The two foxes left home. The little fox walked along beneath his mother and looked all around with curious eyes.
Soon, they saw a single light up ahead. “Look, mommy!” said the little fox. “A star has fallen down!”
“That’s not a star,” said the mother. Her legs trembled. “That light is coming from the town.” The light reminded her of the accident that she and her friend had suffered in the town. Once, they had been forced to run for their very lives because a farmer had seen her careless friend stealing a duck and had rushed to catch them.
“Come on, mommy. Let’s go!” shouted the little fox. He kept walking underneath his mother. But her legs wouldn’t carry her farther. She could only send the little fox on alone into the town.
“Give me your paw, little one,” she said. Then his paw turned into a little human hand. She grasped it lovingly.
The little fox opened his hand, closed it, and pinched it again and again. He sniffed at it for awhile. “How funny! What’s this?” asked the little fox, staring at his hand in the moonlight.
“This is a human hand,” said the mother fox. “Listen, little one. Go into the town. You’ll see many houses. Find a sign of a top hat. Then knock on the door of that house, and say, ‘Excuse me.’ A man inside will open the door a little. Put this hand, your human hand, into the crack, and say, ‘I want mittens in just my size.’ All right? And you must not hold out your paw!”
“Why not?” asked the little fox.
“Because then, the humans won’t sell us a pair of mittens. Instead, they will put you in a cage. They’re really terrifying!”
“Oh, is that true?”
“Don’t put your paw inside the door. Use your human one to buy the mittens,” reminded the mother, placing two coins on the little fox’s human palm.
The little fox set off alone toward the bright town. As he toddled through the snowy field, the single light turned into two, three, and then a dozen lights. The scene gave him the idea that the lights were made up of many different colors―red, yellow, or blue―just like the stars were. When he finally arrived in town, all the houses were closed, but warm light leaked out from all of the windowpanes.
Small street lamps lit up most of the signboards. The little fox examined each one: a bicycle, glasses, and so forth. Some were newly painted and others were worn, but all were novel and strange to him because this was the first time he had ever visited a town.
At last, he found the house, just as his mother had described it. There was a sign with a top hat shining under a blue light. The little fox knocked on the door and called out, “Excuse me!”
There was some rattling inside, and then the door slowly opened just a little bit. A ray of light shone through the crack on the snow-covered road. Its brightness was so dazzling to the little fox that he put his paw inside the door, forgetting his mother’s warning. “I want mittens in just my size,” said the little fox.
The hatter in the store looked at the fox’s paw in confusion. He suspected that the bad animal might buy mittens for fake coins made of leaves. “Please pay first,” said the hatter. The honest fox handed over the two coins. The man held them between his fingers and struck them against each other. The clicks of metal sounded credible enough, so he walked over to a shelf. He picked up a pair of woolen baby mittens and took them to the fox. The little fox thanked him, and then he ran off.
Mommy said, he thought, human beings were very terrifying, but that’s wrong because that man saw my paw and didn’t do anything. Now the little fox felt interested in humans.
Passing by a window, he heard a human voice singing a very sweet and beautiful song.
Slumber, slumber,
O my darling baby;
Gently rocked by
Mother’s gentle hand.
The little fox knew that a human mother was singing, because his own mother often gave him a hug and sang to him in the same soft way. Then he heard a child saying, “Mommy, tonight is very cold. Are the little foxes crying in the forest?” After a bit, the mother replied, “The little foxes are getting ready to sleep their holes with their mothers, who will keep them warm and sing them a lullaby. It’s time for bed, dear. Who will fall asleep first, you or the little foxes of the forest?”
Their conversation reminded the little fox of his mother’s love, and he rushed back to her. She was waiting for him at the edge of town, trembling and very anxious. When she saw the little fox, she ran to him and wrapped him tight in her joyful paws.
The little fox and his mother walked home. The rising moon shone on their velvety coats and made their footprints glow cobalt.
“Mommy, humans are not terrifying,” said the little fox.
“Why?” asked the mother.
“I failed. I held out my paw, but the man inside didn’t catch me. He gave me these nice warm mittens!” The little fox patted his gloved paws together.
“Oh, dear!” The mother sighed. And then she murmured to herself, “I wonder if humans were really good this whole time. If humans are really good…”
First published on September 10th, 1943
Translator's Note:
The lullaby is Schubert’s Weigenlied.
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