124 BEAUTIFUL: BIRDS 
assured that you have life, as much as anything that 
lives and grows upon the earth, though, to be sure, 
it is of another kind. Be satisfied, therefore, and re- 
joice in your loveliness.” This answer of the sun’s 
satisfied most of the sunbeams, but there were some 
who were foolish and whom it did not satisfy. 
““Give us such. life as the ‘children of the eansm 
enjoy!” cried these; “the life that breathes and 
grows, that has a shape, that is born and dies. 
That is the life that we would have. Be good to 
us, and give us that.” Then the sun said to the 
foolish sunbeams: ‘“‘I can give you such life as 
you ask for, and, if you persist in asking it, I must ; 
for you are my children and I cannot bear to see 
you unhappy. But remember, if I once grant you 
this wish, and give you the life that earth’s children 
enjoy, you can nevermore be as you now are, or 
enter into my palace—my golden palace—again. 
Now you fly from me to the earth and from the 
earth back to me, but when once you have earth’s 
life, on earth you must remain and on earth you 
must die. You are immortal now: when you 
become children of the earth you will be mortal as 
they are.” 
But the foolish sunbeams, who could not under- 
stand what death should be, persisted, and the sun, 
who loved them because they were his children, had 
