The Listening Grove · Fifty Famous Stories Retold
Chapter 40: The Kingdoms
A Charlotte Mason read-aloud lesson. Press play, with the lesson.
What is Fifty Famous Stories Retold Chapter 40, The Kingdoms, about?Parent review
Fifty Famous Stories Retold Chapter 40, The Kingdoms, is a story about a king who teaches gentle lessons through simple questions. King Frederick William of Prussia leaves the noise of the city to walk alone in the woods one June morning, gathering wildflowers as he goes. He comes upon children playing in a meadow and, delighted by them, sits down and asks them riddles: to what kingdom does an orange belong, and to what kingdom does a gold piece belong? Bright boys answer correctly, vegetable and mineral, and win the fruit and the coin as prizes. Then the king asks a harder question: to what kingdom does he himself belong? While the older children hesitate, a small blue-eyed girl answers simply, "to the kingdom of heaven." Moved to tears, the king lifts and kisses her, showing that the humblest, simplest answer can touch a great man's heart more than a clever one.
Say what you remember!
Tell what you remember from the last chapter.
What happened in Fifty Famous Stories Retold Chapter 39, Doctor Goldsmith?Have a look
In the last chapter, Doctor Goldsmith, we learned that the gentle writer Oliver Goldsmith was trained as a physician and known for giving away nearly everything he had to the poor. When a woman came to him because her husband was in distress and had no food, Goldsmith visited the family, then sent her home with a heavy paper box of medicine and instructions to open it only once she arrived. Inside, instead of medicine, she found a box full of money, with directions reading it should be taken "as often as necessity requires," showing Goldsmith had quietly given the family every bit of ready money he had.
Read the previous lesson: Doctor Goldsmith →Show what you know!
Use your printable Lesson Guide. Fill in the vocabulary you know, then click to check your work and learn some new words today.
What are the difficult or advanced vocabulary words in Fifty Famous Stories Retold Chapter 40, The Kingdoms?primrose, buttercup, meadow, glitteredHave a look
- primrose: a small flower that blooms in early spring
- buttercup: a shiny yellow wildflower
- meadow: a field covered with grass
- glittered: shone with many small flashes of light
Locate it on the map!
Use your printable Lesson Guide. Use an atlas and fill in the blank map if you can find the geographic location, then click to check your work.
What important geographic location connects with Fifty Famous Stories Retold Chapter 40, The Kingdoms?
- Find Prussia (near modern-day Berlin, Germany): Prussia is the real kingdom Baldwin names as King Frederick William's own, the setting for his walk in the woods where he meets the children gathering flowers in the meadow.
See it on the mapHave a look
This matches the map in your Lesson Guide.
The Books come Alive!
Read or listen to Chapter 40 of Fifty Famous Stories Retold, the Kindred Thicket Enhanced Edition, read by Laura Caldwell.
Read by Laura Caldwell for LibriVox (public domain), professionally adjusted and trimmed by Kindred Thicket.
What do the Teacher’s Notes tell us about Chapter 40 of Fifty Famous Stories Retold?Parent review
This is a Kindred Thicket Enhanced Edition. Baldwin’s 1896 words are read exactly as he wrote them, and we add Teacher’s Notes with historical and literary context.
- About the whole bookFifty Famous Stories Retold gathers real history together with well-loved legends and traditions. These notes tell you, story by story, which is which.
- "a king of Prussia whose name was Frederick William"Four kings of Prussia were named Frederick William, and the story does not say which one. Nothing in the record ties this scene to any of them, so it is best read as a story about a king rather than about a particular king.
- the violet, primrose and buttercupOnly the buttercup is really a June flower; it peaks in the middle of the month. Primroses are mostly finished by then and violets are long over. It is a spring bouquet, gathered a little late.
- the orange answerSorting into three kingdoms (mineral, vegetable and animal) was a scheme set out by Linnaeus in 1735. Today plants are one kingdom among living things, and minerals sit outside that system.
Memory becomes Action!
Use the Response Resource* to remember and spell tricky names. Choose one way to narrate.
*Materials in the Lesson Guide.
What is the list of names, people, characters, and places that are important in Chapter 40 of Fifty Famous Stories Retold?Frederick William, Prussia, The children, The little blue-eyed child, The orange and the gold pieceHave a look
- Frederick William: A king of Prussia.
- Prussia: Frederick William's kingdom.
- The children: Children the king meets in a meadow.
- The little blue-eyed child: The youngest of the children.
- The orange and the gold piece: The king's two prizes.
Chapter 40 Q & A
This is a Kindred Thicket Enhanced Edition. Baldwin’s stories mingle real history with beloved legend, and here is what to know about this one.
Was there a real King Frederick William of Prussia?
Yes, several. Four kings of Prussia carried the name Frederick William, and the story never says which one this is, so it's best read as a story about a king rather than a record of one specific ruler's day.
Is it true this story happens in June?
The text says it was a fine morning in June, but of the three flowers picked, only the buttercup is really in bloom that late; primroses are mostly finished and violets are long over by then, so it reads like a spring bouquet gathered a little late.
Why does the boy say the orange belongs to the "vegetable kingdom"?
That three-part way of sorting the natural world, mineral, vegetable, and animal, was a real classification scheme set out by the naturalist Linnaeus in 1735. Today plants and minerals are no longer grouped that way, but it reflects the older system this story assumes.
Did this meeting between the king and the children really happen?
There's no historical record tying this specific encounter to any of the four King Frederick Williams. It's best enjoyed as a gentle old story about humility rather than as a documented event.