rest road. It was a warm sunny day and, as he went
up the hill, he heard the music of the spruces so plainly that it
astonished him.

Never had spruce trees sung like that! It struck him that he ought
to find out why they were so loud-voiced just to-day. And being in
no special haste to reach home, he dropped down in the middle of
the smooth gravel road, in the shade of the singing tree. Laying
his stick on the ground, he removed his cap and mopped his brow,
then he sat motionless, with hands clasped, and listened.

The air was quite still, therefore it could hardly have been the
wind that had set all these little musical instruments into motion.
It was almost as if the spruces played for very joy at being so
young and fresh; at being let stand in peace by the abandoned
roadside, with the promise of many years of life ahead of them
before any human being would come and cut them down.

But if such was the case, it did not explain why the trees sang
with such gusto just that day; they could rejoice over those
particular blessings any pleasant summer day; they did not call for
any extra music.

Jan sat still in the middle of the road, listening with rapt
attention. It was pleasant hearing the hum of the spruce, though it
was all on one note, with no rests, so that there was neither
melody nor rhythm about it.

He found it so refreshing and delightful up here on the heights. No
wonder the trees felt happy, he mused. The wonder was they sang and
played no better than they did. He looked up at their small twigs
on which every needle was fine and well made, and in its proper
place, and drank in the piney odour that came from them. There was
no flower of the meadow, no blossom of the grove so fragrant! He
noted their half-grown cones on which the scales were compactly
massed for the protection of the seed.

These trees, which seemed to understand so well what to do for
themselves, ought to be able to sing and play so that one could
comprehend what they meant. Yet they kept harping all the while on
the same strain. He grew drowsy listening to them, and stretched
himself flat on the smooth, fine gravel to take a little nap.

But hark! What was this? The instant his head touched the ground
and his eyes closed, the trees struck up something new. Ah, now
there came rhythm and melody!

Then all that other was only a prelude, such as is played at church
before the hymn.

This was what he had felt the whole time, though he