and it was tied round crosswise with red wool. I thought at once of Christmas, and a Christmas-tree. My father took off the wool, and found tied under it a little red heart, cut from a playing-card. It had no doubt been the amusement of some child. My father planted the walnut on the spot where it had fallen. He sheltered it carefully from the cold, and watered it, and did all that a skilful gardener could do; and soon a little plant appeared, which grew up very fast during the first year, but then went on very slowly. Cold years, which did not please the little delicate tree that belonged to a warmer country, kept it back; yet it grew on, and the pruning-knife, which a nut-tree cannot bear, was never laid upon it. In ten or twelve years it bore the first fruit. The tree had become very dear to us all. As it grew and spread with years, its shade became the place of meeting with our family acquaintances, or my little companions. My father had many friends and acquaintances, to whom he had related the history of our walnut-tree, and they had spread the story farther. One summer-time, when there was a fair in the town, a large party had assembled from far and near at my father's house, and were sitting about our tree and under its shade, with my parents, when a gentleman, whom he did not know, came into the garden, leading a young lady. After bowing politely to my parents and the company, he began to speak in a pleasant, lively manner, saying, that it rejoiced him much to see so fair an assemblage of ladies and gentlemen, and to have the honour of making their acquaintance, and that it grieved him the more that he must disturb so good a company; for he feared that from henceforth meetings on this spot would be at an end, since his daughter, in whose name he spoke, believed, and hoped to prove, that the tree under which they were so pleasantly refreshing themselves, belonged to her. The nut was hers, from which the tree had grown, and it had been in an inexplicable manner taken away from her. Yet if those who had hitherto eaten its nuts, would now agree to send her every year (for he believed it undeniable that every year it did produce a few) the half of its fruits, he, her father, would accept this in her name; but if this bargain was not agreed to, why then- but here the company laughed so much, that the speech came to an end. Those were simple, happy times, and hearts that were at ease expressed themselves in sunny looks and mirthful words, and no one was too stiff or too proud to take a share in them. My father, there are few now who remember him, was a very modest, and retiring man, and truly polite in manner, yet he was ready to enter into a sport like this, and in the same pleasant tone, asked some questions of the gentleman who spoke, and found that he lived about six miles distant, and that he was one of a family with whom my father was acquainted. The young lady, the claimant of the walnut-tree, entered into conversation with a very bright and lively manner, and a contest went on for some time, not too warm, but merry and good-natured; not too sharp, but yet with much sparkling wit. At last my father, entering fully into the pretended earnestness of the sport, proposed that an old friend of his, a learned lawyer who was present, should hear the cause, and be the judge. The proposal was agreed to. My father chose his neighbour, an old physician, as his advocate, but the young lady kept to her father as hers. The old lawyer sat down at a table, caused the disputants to stand on each side, and heard the particulars of the story, and found from the young lady, that she had fastened the heart to the walnut, as a plaything for her little brother; while he caused us to relate again the way in which it came into our possession. Then he began to pronounce his judgment: "If the complainant can produce the card from which the heart was cut-" "Here it is," said the young lady, handing one to the judge, who went on "And a piece of the red wool ” "Which is here," interrupted the young lady again. "Well!" said the judge, "since the hole in the card, and the red wool have been produced, and seem to match the heart and the wool found on the walnut, I pronounce that half the walnuts shall every year be sent to the complainant, provided she have also prepared the crow to appear, who must confess himself the thief who stole the walnut in question." And so, amidst much mirth, the sport came to an end. Yet the story does not quite end there. The young lady did not only find the heart she had cut so long ago from the card. A young physician, who was of the party, was so much struck by the bright and innocent sweetness of her countenance, and manner, and the child-like affection with which she clung to her father, that he soon sought her as his wife, and happy indeed his choice proved to him. The tree still grew on, and reached as high as the highest rooms in our house, so that I remember having gathered many walnuts from the window of my little room. It lived till long after I was grown up, and then, when we were no longer the inhabitants of the house, a cold winter killed our walnut-tree, and many things were made from its wood. How much came to pass therefore, from the flight of a crow! Thus, the smallest things may lead to the greatest, and the whole course of life may take its form from the falling of a nut. For God causes all things to serve Him in bringing to pass His will, and the least things are in His Hands, who orders even the course of a bird's flight.-From the German. 251 66 Poetry. LABOUR. "Labour, labour !" sounds the anvil, "Labour, labour !" in the harvest, Saith the whetting of the scythe, And the mill-wheel tells of labour, Under waters falling blithe; "Labour, labour !" groan the mill-stones, To the bands that whirl and writhe. And the woodman tells of labour, 'Tis the dearest word he knows. "Labour, labour !" saith the spirit, And with labour comes repose. "Labour!" saith the loaded waggon, Beating like that iron engine, "Labour, labour !" cries the heart. |