t think sadly of her little green apples, that
seemed to show no signs of ripening.

Many long summer days passed. The early harvest apples in their full
prime were picked and barreled.

Each day the golden pippins grew more juicy and golden; the big jolly
Ben Davis, wine-saps, northern spies, bellflowers and many others
ripening in their turn, filled the orchard with a delightful odor and
glow of color; but the fruit on the one tree seemed as hard and backward
as ever.

The trees with the beautiful fruit laughed and whispered among
themselves, and the little tree was very unhappy, for she thought they
were laughing at her.

"Surely my fruit _must_ begin to ripen soon," she thought.

But at night when the rest of the orchard was asleep, she wept silently
to herself, for she wondered if it could be possible that her apples
would not ripen at all.

At last summer seemed to hold her breath. Day after day the warm
sunshine beat down upon the orchard, drowsy with the richness and
fulness of its almost completed labor. The trees now and then stirred
their heavy branches, as if suggesting that it was time to be relieved
of their burden.

One day a flock of merry children came to the orchard to play. The day
was cool, a gentle breeze stirred,--early fall had blown its first faint
breath.

The children frolicked all day, ate their luncheon on the grass, shook
down ripe apples, and with the lengthening evening shadows, began to
gather up their baskets, happy and contented and ready to go home.

A cool evening breeze sprang up with sudden briskness.

"Look at that black cloud!" cried a little urchin.

Suddenly the rain began to come down with a brisk patter; the children
scampered quickly under the nearest tree; the dark cloud overspread the
whole sky, rain pelted down, a great wind roared through the orchard,
bending the trees, and causing their branches to wave wildly and a
shower of apples to fall.

"Oh, where shall we go?" cried the children. "The apples are pelting us,
and the rain drives in upon us."

"Yonder under the little tree with green apples," cried one. "See how
thickly leaved it is, and how low the boughs bend; we shall be well
sheltered there."

[Illustration: THE WARM SUNSHINE BEAT DOWN UPON THE DROWSY ORCHARD]

Quickly they rushed to the tree, and how gladly she gathered them in,
and kept them dry under her loving arms; and not one of her apples fell
off.

Soon the shower was over, and the c