come to her and she said in her heart:--"I will cause him to forget that
we are unlike our companions; I will sing to him my softest songs and
gradually her dress of sombre green assumed a brighter hue, young buds
sprang forth, her branches waved softly in the breeze and she wooed the
birds by gentle voice to build their nests in her arms, and,

"In foul weather and in fair,
Day by day in vaster numbers,
Flocked the poets of the air."

At eventide she folded them in her bosom, that their songs might not
disturb the sleep of her companion, and while all the forest slept, she
alone was awake and, in the silence of the night, she murmured softly,
"Ich liebe Dich," and when the sun arose the birds from her arms flew
through the forest, singing, "Ich liebe Dich," and all the trees took up
the song; the birds, the trees and the brooks caught up the refrain and
all the great forest sang, "Ich liebe Dich, Ich liebe Dich."

So the summer passed and her heart grew sad, for she saw the discontent
of her companion, but she said to herself, "When the winter comes I will
shelter him from the blasts," but he said complainingly, "I would I were
like the other trees; I would like my garments to be as those I see
around me. I would my limbs were as those of my companions all through
the forest." And she heard, and said to herself, "I will make his
garments of brilliant green." So she sent from her own roots and
branches the sap--her life blood--to enrich the roots and beautify the
dress of her companion. When the cold blast of winter swept through the
forest she sheltered him with her long limbs, when the snow fell she
covered his head with her branches and caught the weight of snow in her
own arms; so all through the long winter she sheltered him from the