low leaves answered:

"We go to lie down
Where the spring snowdrops grow,
Their young roots to cherish
Through frost and through snow."

Then Hulda said again to the leaves:

"Yellow leaves, yellow leaves,
Faded and few,
What will the spring flowers
Matter to you?"

And the leaves said:

"We shall not see them,
When gaily they bloom,
But sure they will love us
For guarding their tomb."

Then Hulda said:

"The yellow leaves are like me: I am going away from my place for the
sake of the poor fairy, who now lies hidden in the dark Egyptian ruin;
but if I am so happy as to recover her wand by my care, she will come
back glad and white, like the snowdrops when winter is over, and she
will love my memory when I am laid asleep in my tomb."

So they set out on their journey, and every day went a little distance
toward the south, till at last, on Christmas Eve, they came to an
ancient city at the foot of a range of mountains.

"What a strange Christmas this is!" said Hulda, when she looked out the
next morning. "Let us stay here, mother, for we are far enough to the
south. Look how the red berries hang on yonder tree, and these myrtles
on the porch are fresh and green, and a few roses bloom still on the
sunny side of the window."

It was so fine and warm that the next day they carried Hulda to a green
bank where she could sit down. It was close by some public gardens, and
the people were coming and going. She fell into a doze as she sat with
her mother watching her, and in her half-dream she heard the voices of
the passers-by, and what they said about her, till suddenly a voice
which she remembered made her wake with a start, and as she opened her
frightened eyes, there, with his pack on his back, and his cunning eyes
fixed upon her, stood the pedlar.

"Stop him!" cried Hulda, starting up. "Mother, help me to run after
him!"

"After whom, my child?" asked her mother.

"After the pedlar," said Hulda. "He was here but now, but before I had
time to speak to him, he stepped behind that thorn-bush and
disappeared."

"So that is Hulda," said the pedlar to himself, as he went down the
steep path into the middle of the world. "She looks as if a few days
more would be all she has to live. I will not come here any more till
the spring, and then she will be dead, and I shall have nothing to
fear."

But Hulda did not die. See what a good thing it is to be