ll!"

That was the dream of the old Oak Tree; and while he dreamt thus a
mighty storm came rushing over land and sea--at the holy Christmas
tide. The sea rolled great billows towards the shore; there was a
cracking and crashing in the tree--his root was torn out of the ground
in the very moment while he was dreaming that his root freed itself
from the earth. He fell. His three hundred and sixty-five years were
now as the single day of the Ephemera.

On the morning of the Christmas festival, when the sun rose, the storm
had subsided. From all the churches sounded the festive bells, and
from every hearth, even from the smallest hut, arose the smoke in blue
clouds, like the smoke from the altars of the druids of old at the
feast of thanks offerings. The sea became gradually calm, and on board
a great ship in the offing, that had fought successfully with the
tempest, all the flags were displayed, as a token of joy suitable to
the festive day.

"The tree is down--the old Oak Tree, our landmark on the coast!" said
the sailors. "It fell in the storm of last night. Who can replace it?
No one can."

This was the funeral oration, short but well meant, that was given to
the tree, which lay stretched on the snowy covering on the sea shore;
and over its prostrate form sounded the notes of a song from the ship,
a carol of the joys of Christmas, and of the redemption of the soul of
man by His blood, and of eternal life.

"Sing, sing aloud, this blessed morn--
It is fulfilled--and He is born,
Oh, joy without compare!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!"

Thus sounded the old psalm tune, and every one on board the ship felt
lifted up in his own way, through the song and the prayer, just as the
old tree had felt lifted up in its last, its most beauteous dream in
the Christmas night.

THE BELL-DEEP.

"Ding-dong! ding-dong!" It sounds up from the "bell-deep," in the
Odense-Au. Every child in the old town of Odense, on the island of
Fuenen, knows the Au, which washes the gardens round about the town,
and flows on under the wooden bridges from the dam to the water-mill.
In the Au grow the yellow water-lilies and brown feathery reeds; the
dark velvety flag grows there, high and thick; old, decayed willows,
slanting and tottering, hang far out over the stream beside the monks'
meadow and by the bleaching-ground; but opposite there are gardens
upon gardens, each different from the rest, some with pretty flowers
and