A Tale from the Skidway 49 



how good a resting place were my branches. 

 So their love notes mingled in the springtime 

 with the soft soughing of the wind in my 

 needles. 



" When I was about two hundred years 

 old there came such a summer as I hope will 

 never visit the earth again. Day after day 

 the sun rose into a cloudless sky and set in a 

 sea of brass. No soft white cloud cheered the 

 parched earth with promise of rain. No dew 

 fell at eventide and no rain fell for weeks and 

 months. The old mill pond in the valley 

 shrank to a mere pool, and the river that fed 

 it nearly went dry. 



" Springs that had not failed in the mem- 

 ory of man dried up, grass and shrubs were 

 burned to a crisp, and dust and a terrible 

 thirst was over all the land. The beasts of 

 the field and the fowls of the air seemed ill at 

 ease. Cattle roamed restlessly to and fro, 

 lowing and impatient. The great bald eagle 

 that had made its nest in my top for several 

 years circled about the mountain top scream- 

 ing when there was nothing to enrage it. 



