they going?”
“We know, we know,” sang the sparrows; “we have looked in at the
windows of the houses in the town, and we know what is done with them.
They are dressed up in the most splendid manner. We have seen them
standing in the middle of a warm room, and adorned with all sorts of
beautiful things,-honey cakes, gilded apples, playthings, and many hundreds
of wax tapers.”
“And then,” asked the fir-tree, trembling through all its branches, “and
then what happens?”
“We did not see any more,” said the sparrows; “but this was enough for
us.”
“I wonder whether anything so brilliant will ever happen to me,” thought
the fir-tree. “It would be much better than crossing the sea. I long for it
almost with pain. Oh! when will Christmas be here? I am now as tall and
well grown as those which were taken away last year. Oh! that I were now
laid on the wagon, or standing in the warm room, with all that brightness
and splendor around me! Something better and more beautiful is to come
after, or the trees would not be so decked out. Yes, what follows will be
grander and more splendid. What can it be? I am weary with longing. I
scarcely know how I feel.”
“Rejoice with us,” said the air and the sunlight. “Enjoy thine own bright
life in the fresh air.”
But the tree would not rejoice, though it grew taller every day; and,
winter and summer, its dark-green foliage might be seen in the forest, while
passers by would say, “What a beautiful tree!”
A short time before Christmas, the discontented fir-tree was the first to
fall. As the axe cut through the stem, and divided the pith, the tree fell with
a groan to the earth, conscious of pain and faintness, and forgetting all its
anticipations of happiness, in sorrow at leaving its home in the forest. It
knew that it should never again see its dear old companions, the trees, nor
the little bushes and many-colored flowers that had grown by its side;
