A LONG, LONG TIME AGO, a king once decided to build a tower. ‘I shall build this Tower so high,’ he said, ‘that from its topmost battlements – if you stand on tiptoe – you will be able to touch the moon.’ ‘I fear,’ said his chief architect, ‘that there will not be enough stone in the whole country to build a tower so high.’
‘Nonsense!’ said the king. ‘Get building.’
‘I am afraid,’ said his Chancellor, ‘that there won’t be enough gold in the Treasury to pay for such a building.’
‘Nonsense!’ said the king. ‘Get taxing.’
‘What is the point of being able to touch the moon?’ asked his daughter.
But the king didn’t hear her – he was far too busy organizing the laying of the foundations, the raising of the finances and the knocking-down of half his capital city to make way for the Tower.
The city itself was divided in two about the building of the Tower. Half the citizens thought it was a wonderful project. ‘It is vital,’ they said, ‘that we are able to touch the moon before any of our rivals can.’
But the other half of the city (who were losing their homes and shops to make way for the Tower) were, naturally, much less enthusiastic. But even they were not against building the Tower altogether – they were just against building it in their half of the city.
‘It will indeed be marvellous when we can touch the moon – just by standing on tiptoe,’ they said. ‘But it would make much more sense to build it on the other side of the city – the ground’s higher there for a start!’
‘But what is the point of touching the moon at all?’ asked the king’s daughter again. But she might as well have been talking to a lump of wood. As a matter of fact, she was talking to a lump of wood! You see, the princess had a secret… but I can’t tell you what it was. Not just yet.
Well, they knocked down half the city, and, in its place, they started to build the gigantic Tower. The citizens who’d lost their homes had to camp outside the city wall, and they suffered in the cold winter. But no one was allowed to rebuild their house, because all the stone was needed for the Tower.
All the stone quarries in the land were ordered to send every stone they produced to help build the Tower. And the king’s builders worked day and night – all through that winter and all through that summer, and, by the time winter came again, they’d built the first storey.
‘The work must go faster than this!’ exclaimed the king. ‘Or we’ll never be able to touch the moon – not even by standing on tiptoe!’
So the king gave orders that the work had to go twice as fast. No one was to take lunch breaks or tea breaks, and the mules pulling the carts had to walk twice as quickly.
And on they built – all through that winter. Soon the quarries ran out of stone, and they began digging new quarries in fields where animals used to graze.
And on they built, until by the end of that year, they’d finished the second storey.
‘Loafers! Do-nothings! Time-wasters! Afternoon farmers!’ exclaimed the king. ‘We’ll never be able to touch the moon at this rate!’
Then he gave orders that half of his subjects must give up their usual jobs, and work instead upon the Tower. And on the building went.
The countryside began to disappear as quarries took the place of farms. Food became scarce, and everybody in the land suffered.
‘This is CRAZY!’ shouted the king’s daughter. ‘My dad’s gone loony! He’s ruining his own kingdom, and for what? Just so some idiots can stand on tiptoe and touch the moon!’
But the lumps of wood she was talking to didn’t reply. They just lay there, the way that lumps of wood do.
‘You’ve got more sense than my dad!’ she exclaimed. ‘And you’re just two short planks!’
Meanwhile the building went on and on. The citizens suffered more and more each day, but they kept telling each other that it would be all worth it, once they could touch the moon.
Eventually they completed the third storey. But the king’s coffers were now empty, there was scarcely any food, and life was miserable.
By the time the fourth storey had been completed, most of the kingdom had been carried away in carts as stone for the building. The green fields had disappeared, the woods and forests had all been chopped down, and all that was left was the Tower.
And now even the citizens themselves began to complain. They sent some representatives to the king, who fell on their knees in front of him, and said: ‘O, King! Of course we all know the vital importance to our country of being able to touch the moon, but we have hardly anything left to eat, the kingdom has been turned into one vast quarry, and life has become intolerable. Please may we stop?’
But the king just became furious, and he ordered his army to compel every single person in the kingdom to work on the Tower.
And so they built the fifth storey.
It was at this moment that the king’s daughter, who was, by this time, a fine young girl of sixteen, said: ‘I am going to put a stop to this nonsense once and for all.’
And now the time has come when I must tell you the princess’s secret. Only you mustn’t tell anyone else because … well … she liked doing something that princesses aren’t really supposed to like doing. In fact, it was something which she only did if she was sure – absolutely sure – that nobody else, except her most trusted chambermaid, was around. I wonder if you can guess what it was? Well… I suppose I’d better tell you… The princess was very keen… very keen indeed… on carpentry!
Now, in those days, the only people who normally did carpentry were carpenters, and it was considered a pretty lowly job. But the princess loved oak and chestnut and boxwood. She loved sawing it and planing it and making things from it.
Of course, if her father had found out, he’d have probably jumped through the hole in his crown with rage, because it was such an unprincess-like thing to do. But he never did find out, until… well hang on! That’s jumping to the end of the story.
Now the princess was not only very keen on carpentry, she was also very good at it. So she built herself a flying boat, and attached six white-necked swans to it. Then she stood in the market square, disguised as a lunatic, and called out: ‘Who wants to touch the moon?’ Well, of course, she pretty soon had a crowd of people around her, all laughing and making fun of her and pretending they wanted to touch the moon. So she invited them into her flying boat, and they all piled in, still joking and smiling and thinking the princess was just some poor lunatic.
Then – to everyone’s surprise – she cracked her whip, and the swans flew up into the air, pulling the flying boat up with them. Up and up they rose, until they were as high as the moon, and everyone leaned out and touched it. Just like that.
When they returned to the earth, however, they found the king in a terrible rage, surrounded by his guards.
‘Arrest that lunatic!’ screamed the king.
But the princess flew above the king and his guards, and called down: ‘What’s the matter? I thought you wanted to touch the moon? Jump aboard and I’ll fly you there!’
But the king screamed with rage. ‘There’s only one way to touch the moon!’ he cried. ‘And that’s from the battlements of my Tower – standing on tiptoe!’
‘But we’ve already touched it,’ cried the citizens, who’d flown in the flying boat. ‘Look! You can see our fingermarks all over it!’
The king looked up, and he could indeed see their fingermarks all over the moon – like little smudges. (For you must know that up until that time the moon had been just plain white, and had no markings at all.)
‘Fly with her!’ pleaded all the citizens. ‘Touch the moon! And then we can all stop building this wretched Tower that has destroyed our kingdom!’
But the king went purple with rage. ‘No one will stop me building my Tower!’ he cried. And he ordered his archers to shoot the six white-necked swans, so the flying boat came crashing down to earth, and the king’s daughter with it.
When the citizens ran to her side, they found her disguise had fallen off, and they recognized the princess. They turned to the king and said: ‘Now see what you’ve done! You’ve killed your own daughter!’
Whereupon the king knelt down by her side, and grief swept over him like a hand wiping a slate clean. ‘I’ve been mad!’ he cried. ‘I have been obsessed – not with touching the moon – but with my own power and glory.’
And there and then he ordered his workmen to destroy the Tower, and start to rebuild his kingdom and his people’s homes.
At this moment, the princess stirred – for she had not been killed by the fall, only stunned – and she murmured: ‘Why touch the moon? It looks best as it is.’
And from that day on, no one in that land ever thought of touching the moon again.
But, you know, it still has their fingermarks all over it, and, if you look up at it on a clear night, you will see them – like a face crying out: ‘Don’t touch me!’