Household Tales · Chapter
The Old Beggar-Woman explained
An old beggar-woman is invited by a boy to warm herself by the fire, but her rags catch fire and the boy fails to put out the flames, either with water or with his tears.
What happens
An old beggar-woman is invited by a boy to warm herself by the fire, but her rags catch fire and the boy fails to put out the flames, either with water or with his tears.
Free preview opens on this chapter — companions, themes, and character notes appear beside the text.
Narrative arc
Story tension across the book — this chapter sits in Falling action.
- Setup
- Escalation
- Breaking point
- Aftermath
- Closing
The emotional and psychological peak occurs when the sisters, driven by envy of the Queen’s beauty and their o…
Full beat labels and climax notes unlock in the reader.
Follow the arc while readingThemes in this chapter
- Virtue Rewarded and Vice Punished
The boy's failure to help the beggar-woman after initially showing kindness implies a moral lesson about the consequences of neglecting one's duty to assist those in need.
Characters to notice
Key passages
“The boy said kindly to the poor old woman as she was standing shivering thus by the door, “Come, old mother, and warm yourself.””
The boy invited the shivering old woman to come inside and warm herself by the fire.
The boy's initial kindness is highlighted, setting up the moral dilemma.
“The boy stood and saw that, but he ought to have put the flames out. Is it not true that he ought to have put them out? And if he had not any water, then should he have wept all the water in his body out of his eyes, and that would have supplied two pretty streams with which to extinguish them.”
The boy saw the flames but did nothing; the narrator insists he should have put out the fire, even if it meant crying enough tears to douse it.
The narrator's rhetorical question emphasizes the boy's moral failure and the absurdity of his inaction.
