ARBOR DA Y MANUAL. 1 33 



been hung up on his boughs by merry wanderers; and now they hung there 

 again, ana once again they sounded in tones of marvelous sweetness. The 

 wood-pigeons cooed, as if tney were telling what the tree felt in all this, and 

 the cuckoo called out to tell him how many summer days he had yet to live. 



Then it appeared to him as if new fife were rippling down into the remotest 

 fibre of his root, and mounting up into his highest branches, to the tops of the 

 leaves. The tree felt that he was stretching and spreading himself, and through 

 his root he felt that there was life and motion even in the ground itself. He 

 felt his strength increase, he grew higher, his stem shot up unceasingly, and 

 he grew more and more, his crown became fuller, and spread out; and in pro- 

 portion as the tree grew, he felt his happiness increase, and his joyous hope 

 that he should reach even higher quite up to the warm, brilliant sun. 



Already had he grown high above the clouds, which floated past beneath his 

 crown like dark troops of passage-birds, or like great white swans. And even' 

 leaf of the tree had the gift of sight, as if it had eyes wherewith to see; the 

 stars became visible in broad daylight, great and sparkling; each of them 

 sparkled like a pair of eyes, mild and clear. They recalled to his memory well- 

 known gentle eyes, eyes of children, eyes of lovers who had met beneath his 

 boughs. 



It was a marvelous spectacle, and one full of happiness and joy! And yet 

 amid all this happiness the tree felt a longing, a yearning desire that all other 

 trees of the wood beneath him, and all the bushes, and herbs, and flowers, 

 might be able to rise with him, that they too might see this splendor, and 

 experience this joy. The great majestic oak was not quite happy in his happi- 

 ness, while he had not them all, great and little, about him ; and this feeling of 

 yearning trembled through his every twig, through his every leaf, warmly and 

 fervently as through a human heart. 



The crown of the tree waved to and fro, as if he sought something in his 

 silent longing, and he looked down. Then he felt the fragrance of thyme, and 

 soon afterward the more powerful scent of honeysuckle and violets; and he 

 fancied he heard the cuckoo answering him. 



Yes, through the clouds the green summits of the forest came peering up, 

 and under himself the oak saw the other trees, as they grew and raised them- 

 selves aloft. Bushes and herbs shot up high, and some tore themselves up 

 bodily by the roots to rise the quicker. The birch was the quickest of all. Like 

 a white streak of lightning, its slender stem shot upwards in a zigzag line, and 

 the branches spread around it like green gauze and like banners; the whole 

 woodland natives, even to the brown-plumed rushes, grew up with the rest, 

 and the birds came too, and sang ; and on the grass blade that fluttered aloft 

 like a long silken ribbon into the air, sat the grasshopper cleaning his wings 

 with his legs ; the May beetles hummed, and the bees murmured, and even- bird 

 sang in his appointed manner; all was song and sound of gladness up into the 

 high heaven. 



" But the little blue flower by the water-side, wheie is that? " said the oak; 

 "and the purple bell-flower and the daisy?" for, you see, the old oak tree 

 wanted to have them all about him. 



"We are here we are here ! " was shouted and sung in reply. 



