did say
'tweet' rather loudly. The thick-headed roses really ought to know, but
they are very ignorant; they only look at one another and smell. I am
heartily tired of such neighbors."

"Listen to the sweet little birds above us," said the roses; "they are
trying to sing. They cannot manage it yet, but it will be done in time.
What a pleasure it will be, and how nice to have such lively neighbors!"

Suddenly two horses came prancing along to drink at the water. A peasant
boy rode on one of them; he had a broad-brimmed black hat on, but had
taken off the most of his clothes, that he might ride into the deepest
part of the pond; he whistled like a bird, and while passing the
rosebush he plucked a rose and placed it in his hat and then rode on
thinking himself very fine. The other roses looked at their sister and
asked each other where she could be going, but they did not know.

"I should like for once to go out into the world," said one, "although
it is very lovely here in our home of green leaves. The sun shines
warmly by day, and in the night we can see that heaven is more beautiful
still, as it sparkles through the holes in the sky."

She meant the stars, for she knew no better.

"We make the house very lively," said the mother sparrow, "and people
say that a swallow's nest brings luck, therefore they are pleased to
see us; but as to our neighbors, a rosebush on the wall produces damp.
It will most likely be removed, and perhaps corn will grow here instead
of it. Roses are good for nothing but to be looked at and smelt, or
perhaps one may chance to be stuck in a hat. I have heard from my mother
that they fall off every year. The farmer's wife preserves them by
laying them in salt, and then they receive a French name which I neither
can nor will pronounce; then they are sprinkled on the fire to produce a
pleasant smell. Such you see is their life. They are only formed to
please the eye and the nose. Now you know all about them."

As the evening approached, the gnats played about in the warm air
beneath the rosy clouds, and the nightingale came and sang to the roses
that _the beautiful_ was like sunshine to the world, and that _the
beautiful_ lives forever. The roses thought that the nightingale was
singing of herself, which any one indeed could easily suppose; they
never imagined that her song could refer to them. But it was a joy to
them, and they wondered to themselves whether all the little sparrows in
the nes