she was a courteous tree, when no one offended her.

"Thank you," said the blackbird and went on rubbing his beak.

"You're working awfully hard to-day," said the tree.

"There's a stone on the side of my beak," said the blackbird. "It's
there as if it were glued fast; and I can't get it off, however much I
rub."

"What have you had to eat?"

[Illustration]

"I had some beautiful white berries," said the blackbird. "I never
tasted anything so good; and I am a judge of berries, as you know. It
was somewhere ever so far away; and now I've been flying for a day and a
half with this silly stone. Every moment, I've been trying to get it
off.... Ah, there it goes, thank goodness! Now it's on you, you old
Crab-Apple-Tree. You'll see, you will never get rid of it."

"Just let it be," said the apple-tree, gaily, "and don't bother about
me. It'll take to its legs, right enough, when it begins to rain and
blow."

The blackbird flew away and the crab-apple-tree stood sunk in her own
old thoughts, with the stone on her branch. In the evening, it came on
to rain violently and the stone slipped slowly down the wet branch,
until it reached the underside.

"Now it will drop," thought the apple-tree.

But the stone did not drop. At night, a terrible storm broke loose and
all the trees creaked and swayed to and fro. Inside the keeper's garden,
the orange-pippins and the russets fell to the ground by the bushel. But
the stone stuck where it was.

"Well, that's odd!" thought the crab-apple-tree.

And, when the dog came jogging along in the morning, the tree told him
of the queer thing:

"What sort of a chap can it be?" she asked.

"I expect it's a flea," said the dog and rubbed himself. "One can never
get rid of them. Does it hop all over you? And bite you?"

"Certainly not," replied the apple-tree. "Last night, it slipped down
quite gently to the underside of the branch; and, for that matter, it
does me no harm."

"Then it's not a flea," said the dog.

3

Autumn came and all the good apples in the garden were gathered and
stored in the loft. There was no one who cared about the
crab-apple-tree. Her apples remained on the branches till they fell to
the ground, where they lay and rotted. But the tree was well-pleased
with the state of things. She knew that little crab-apple-trees would
sprout from them and that was why she had put them forth.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: THE OLD DOG STOOD ON HIS HIND-LEGS AND