it like green gauze and
banners. Every native of the wood, even to the brown and feathery
rushes, grew with the rest, while the birds ascended with the melody of
song. On a blade of grass that fluttered in the air like a long green
ribbon sat a grasshopper cleaning its wings with its legs. May beetles
hummed, bees murmured, birds sang--each in its own way; the air was
filled with the sounds of song and gladness.

"But where is the little blue flower that grows by the water, and the
purple bellflower, and the daisy?" asked the oak. "I want them all."

"Here we are; here we are," came the reply in words and in song.

"But the beautiful thyme of last summer, where is that? And where are
the lilies of the valley which last year covered the earth with their
bloom, and the wild apple tree with its fragrant blossoms, and all the
glory of the wood, which has flourished year after year? And where is
even what may have but just been born?"

"We are here; we are here," sounded voices high up in the air, as if
they had flown there beforehand.

"Why, this is beautiful, too beautiful to be believed," cried the oak in
a joyful tone. "I have them all here, both great and small; not one has
been forgotten. Can such happiness be imagined? It seems almost
impossible."

"In heaven with the Eternal God it can be imagined, for all things are
possible," sounded the reply through the air.

And the old tree, as it still grew upwards and onwards, felt that its
roots were loosening themselves from the earth.

"It is right so; it is best," said the tree. "No fetters hold me now. I
can fly up to the very highest point in light and glory. And all I love
are with me, both small and great. All--all are here."

Such was the dream of the old oak at the holy Christmas time. And while
it dreamed, a mighty storm came rushing over land and sea. The sea
rolled in great billows toward the shore. A cracking and crushing was
heard in the tree. Its roots were torn from the ground, just at the
moment when in its dream it was being loosened from the earth. It fell;
its three hundred and sixty-five years were ended like the single day of
the Ephemera.

On the morning of Christmas Day, when the sun rose, the storm had
ceased. From all the churches sounded the festive bells, and from every
hearth, even of the smallest hut, rose the smoke into the blue sky, like
the smoke from the festive thank-offerings on the Druids' altars. The
sea gradually became cal