"Pray, what are the winds saying now?" or "What song is that I hear?" the
ivy would ask; and then the oak-tree would repeat the story or the song,
and the ivy would listen in great wonderment.

Whenever the storms came, the oak-tree cried to the little ivy: "Cling
close to me, and no harm shall befall you! See how strong I am; the
tempest does not so much as stir me--I mock its fury!"

Then, seeing how strong and brave he was, the ivy hugged him closely; his
brown, rugged breast protected her from every harm, and she was secure.

The years went by; how quickly they flew,--spring, summer, winter, and
then again spring, summer, winter,--ah, life is short in the greenwood as
elsewhere! And now the ivy was no longer a weakly little vine to excite
the pity of the passer-by. Her thousand beautiful arms had twined hither
and thither about the oak-tree, covering his brown and knotted trunk,
shooting forth a bright, delicious foliage and stretching far up among his
lower branches. Then the oak-tree's pity grew into a love for the ivy, and
the ivy was filled with a great joy. And the oak-tree and the ivy were wed
one June night, and there was a wonderful celebration in the greenwood;
and there was most beautiful music, in which the pine-trees, the crickets,
the katydids, the frogs, and the nightingales joined with pleasing
harmony.

The oak-tree was always good and gentle to the ivy. "There is a storm
coming over the hills," he would say. "The east wind tells me so; the
swallows fly low in the air, and the sky is dark. Cling close to me, my
beloved, and no harm shall befall you."