ONLY A PEBBLE. 13 



clouds above him race up the heavens and down again. 

 Thick pearly drops of cooling rain patter from on high, 

 and rise soon after, in clear, invisible vapors, back to the 

 sunny height from which they came. Untiring wings carry 

 the birds of heaven to their distant homes. Restless 

 brooks rush in eager haste from the snow-covered Alps 

 to the sunny plains ; broad streams pour majestically their 

 huge floods into the great ocean, and hasten with its gi- 

 gantic waves around our globe. The beasts of the field 

 wander from land to land; nations and empires are ever 

 seen moving with a strange, mysterious impulse, towards 

 the setting sun the very trees and grasses of the earth 

 move slowly, in man's wake, from zone to zone. 



The pebble alone lies still and lonely by the wayside, 

 and shuts his eyes not to see the merry, wandering life 

 around him. Still, he also had his time when he travelled 

 far over land and sea. High upon a lofty mountain-peak 

 was his first home, and there his life, full of strife and 

 struggle, began in fierce war with the elements. For there 

 is enmity between them and the poor pebble. Mild but 

 treacherous rains stole through cleft and crevice into every 

 pore of the rock, and oozed from vein to vein, filling the 

 core of the giant with indescribably delicate and won- 

 drously ramified little canals. Then came hard winters 

 that froze the swelling veins, and sent sharp daggers of 

 icicles into his very marrow; they blasted his limbs, and 

 rent them with insidious force into fragments. Balmy 

 springs melted again the thousand sharp wedges; but al- 

 ready the poor rock rejoices no longer in his solid, 

 massive strength; water and air have drilled and bored 



