The Child Angel by Dorothy Berry-Lound

About "The Child Angel"

by Dorothy Berry-Lound

About the artwork

This digital piece is based on The Angel, a short story by Hans Christian Anderson.

The story begins by saying that when a good child dies an angel of God sweeps down and takes the child in his arms and flies all over the places the child loved on earth. The angel tells the child that they will gather a large armful of flowers and take them to heaven together and God will take the flowers to his bosom and kiss the one he likes the best and that flower receives a voice and can join in the glorious everlasting hymn of praise.

The angel then asks the child which flowers to take with them to heaven. The child picks the broken, withering stem of an old rose bush, broken off by a careless hand and the angel kissed the child for the tender thought. They also picked some beautiful flowers and an old withered field flower that had a story of its own relating to the angel himself when he was a poor sick boy on crutches. They reached heaven and God kissed the withered field flower and it found its voice and joined the choir of angels.

The part of the story on which this image is based is this: Then the child opened his eyes wide and looked up into the angels beautiful happy face, and at that moment they found themselves in Gods Heaven where there was everlasting joy and happiness. And God pressed the child to His bosom, and he received glorious white wings like the angels, so they flew together, hand in hand.