People should not be judged by their appearance or skin colour, but rather by their character and the purity of their hearts. In the story of the ugly duckling, we learn a valuable lesson about the importance of being careful when judging others. This is an educational story for children.
The Strange Egg
On a remote farm, there lived a duck who had six eggs. She sat on them for a while, and when it was time for the chicks to hatch, five chicks hatched, and one egg remained unhatched.
This egg was the largest among them, yet the mother duck insisted on sitting on it. Her mother came to her to check on the chicks and said to her: My daughter, leave this egg, for I have been deceived many times before, and it may be a turkey egg.
The mother duck did not heed her mother’s advice and remained sitting on the large egg. After three days, the egg hatched and a strange chick emerged.
The Ugly Duckling
The chick was grey, but the mother did not care about the colour of her little chick. When her mother asked her, she said: He stayed longer than his brothers in the egg; he will get better with time.
The mother treated all the ducklings kindly, including the ugly duckling, but the other ducklings did not accept this, so they harassed him and called him the ugly duckling.
Days passed, nothing changed. The same grumbling, the same tears on the dark duckling’s face. Despite the mother duck's attempts to defend him, the duckling did not want to bring any more trouble to his mother.
Leaving the Farm
He decided to leave the farm quietly, so he walked a very long way until he reached the house of an old woman. He decided to sleep outside. A kind hen saw him, so she brought the ugly duckling inside and let him sleep with her.
In the morning, the woman fed the hen and was surprised to find a chick that looked like a duck. The woman decided to raise it as a duck and continued to feed it along with the hen.
Several weeks passed. The ugly duckling grew a little, but it did not lay eggs, so the old woman expelled it from the farm. It saw white swans flying above and wished it were one of them.
Read also: The Story About the Tortoise and the Hare
The Cold Winter
Now winter had come, and the snow had fallen, so the duckling decided to stay near the lake until winter was over.
After winter ended, the ugly duckling saw a white swan swimming in the lake and wanted to greet it, but he was embarrassed by his ugly appearance.
Our friend gathered his strength, then went to the swan and greeted her. She asked him: Who are you? And why didn’t you migrate with us to the south during winter?
The Big Surprise
Our friend was amazed for a while, then suddenly he looked into the water and saw himself as a beautiful white swan. The swan asked him to join a flock of swans. There, he married her, and they had many beautiful swan chicks.
The Lesson
As shown in the story of the ugly duckling, beauty is not measured by outward appearance, but by what lies within the heart. Therefore, we should not judge people by their looks before truly getting to know them.