myriads; watching them
bud, grow, fall, and then kicking them along on the ground as if they
were worth nothing. Yet how wonderful they are--every one of them a
little different. I don't suppose you could ever find two leaves exactly
alike in form, color, and size--no more than you could find two faces
alike, or two characters exactly the same. The plan of this world is
infinite similarity and yet infinite variety.

Prince Dolor examined his leaves with the greatest curiosity--and also a
little caterpillar that he found walking over one of them. He coaxed
it to take an additional walk over his finger, which it did with the
greatest dignity and decorum, as if it, Mr. Caterpillar, were the most
important individual in existence. It amused him for a long time; and
when a sudden gust of wind blew it overboard, leaves and all, he felt
quite disconsolate.

"Still there must be many live creatures in the world besides
caterpillars. I should like to see a few of them."

The cloak gave a little dip down, as if to say "All right, my Prince,"
and bore him across the oak forest to a long fertile valley--called in
Scotland a strath and in England a weald, but what they call it in
the tongue of Nomansland I do not know. It was made up of cornfields,
pasturefields, lanes, hedges, brooks, and ponds. Also, in it were what
the prince desired to see--a quantity of living creatures, wild and
tame. Cows and horses, lambs and sheep, fed in the meadows; pigs and
fowls walked about the farm-yards; and in lonelier places hares scudded,
rabbits burrowed, and pheasants and partridges, with many other smaller
birds, inhabited the fields and woods.

Through his wonderful spectacles the Prince could see everything; but,
as I said, it was a silent picture; he was too high up to catch anything
except a faint murmur, which only aroused his anxiety to hear more.

"I have as good as two pairs of eyes," he thought. "I wonder if my
godmother would give me a second pair of ears."

Scarcely had he spoken than he found lying on his lap the most curious
little parcel, all done up in silvery paper. And it contained--what do
you think? Actually a pair of silver ears, which, when he tried them on,
fitted so exactly over his own that he hardly felt them, except for the
difference they made in his hearing.

There is something which we listen to daily and never notice. I mean
the sounds of the visible world, animate and inanimate. Winds blowing,
waters flowi