The Ugly Duckling

The Ugly Duckling
By Hans Christian Andersen
One summer afternoon, a mother duck sat quietly on her nest. In the nest were five beautiful eggs. She sat patiently, waiting for five eggs to hatchand produce five little ducklings.
The father duck was also waiting. He marched up and down beside the nest wondering why it took so long for eggs to hatch. At last the mother duck quacked for joy:the eggs were rocking backwards and forwards. She jumped from the nest and stood waiting there with the father duck.
They watched anxiously as one by one the eggs cracked open and out tumbled fourtiny yellow ducklings. They had bright little eyes and pretty little beaks and tried to stand on their wobbly little legs.
The mother and father kept watching the nest, for the fifth and largest egg hadnot yet hatched. But soon two little feet broke through the shell and then a head popped out of the top.
It was a big white, fuzzy head instead of a small yellow, downy one. The duckling wiggled outof the shell and said, "Honk, Honk, Honk!"
"That certainly is a funny looking duckling, "said the father duck. "And why does he say honk, honk, honk when the others say quack, quack, quack?"
Thefour little yellow ducklings gathered around the big white one and quacked. "He's not like us, he's ugly!" Then they went with their mother down to the pond and left him all alone.
The poor uglyduckling couldn't understand why nobody liked him. He also went down to the pod and sat there all by himself. Tears filled his eyes, rolled down his beak, and slashed into the water.
As he looked into thewater a strange and ugly face looked back at him. He didn't understand that his tears had caused ripples on the water, making his reflection look very odd. "No wonder they don't like me," he thoughtsadly, "if that's the way I look."
He went deep into the woods to hide. Then through the gloom, he heard some cheerful, chirping sounds. He had found a nest of baby marsh birds.
He hopped into the...