Now thou shalt hear!—Out in the country, close by the high road, there stood a pleasure-house,—thou hast, no doubt, seen it thyself. In the front is a little garden full of flowers, and this is fenced in with painted palisades. Close beside these, in a hollow, there grew, all among the loveliest green grass, a little tuft of daisies. The sun shone upon it just as warmly and as sweetly as upon the large and rich splendid flowers within the garden, and, therefore, it grew hour by hour. One morning it opened its little shining white flower-leaves, which looked just like rays of light all round the little yellow sun in the inside. It never once thought that nobody saw it down there in the grass, and that it was a poor, despised flower! No, nothing of the kind! It was The little daisy was as happy as if it had been some great holiday, and yet it was only a Monday. All the children were in school, and while they sat upon the benches learning their lessons, it also sat upon its little green stalk, and learned from the warm sun and from every thing around it, how good God is. And it seemed to it quite right that the little lark sang so intelligibly and so beautifully every thing which it felt in stillness; and it looked up with a sort of reverence to the happy bird, which could sing and fly, but it was not at all vexed because it could not do the same. "I see it and hear it," thought the daisy; "the sun shines upon me, and the winds kiss me! O, what a many gifts I enjoy!" Inside the garden paling there were such a great many stiff, grand flowers; and all the less fragrance they had the more they seemed to swell themselves out. The pionies blew themselves out that they might be bigger than the roses; but it is not size The little bird danced round about, and sang, "Nay, but the grass is in flower! and see, what a sweet little blossom, with a golden heart and a silver jerkin on!"—for the yellow middle of the daisy looked as if it were of gold, and the little leaves round about were shining and silver white. So happy as the little daisy was it is quite impossible to describe! The bird kissed it with its beak, "Ah!" sighed the little daisy, "that was very horrible; now all is over with them!" So the girl went away with the tulips. The daisy was glad that it grew in the grass, and was a little Next morning, the flower again, full of joy, spread out all its white leaves, like small arms, towards the air and the light; it recognised the bird's voice; but the song of the bird was very sorrowful. Yes, the poor little bird had good reason for being sad! it had been taken prisoner, and now sat in a cage close by the open window of the pleasure-house. It sang about flying wherever it would in freedom and bliss; it sang about the young green corn in the fields, and about the charming journeys which it used to make up in the blue air upon its hovering wings. The poor bird was heavy at heart, and was captive in a cage. The little daisy wished so sincerely that it could be of any service; but it was difficult to tell how. In sympathizing with the lark, the daisy quite forgot how beautiful was every thing around it—how warmly the sun shone, and how beautifully white were its own flower-leaves. Ah! it could think of nothing but of Just then came two little boys out of the garden; one of them had a knife in his hand, large and sharp, like that which the girl had, and with which she cut off the tulips. They went straight up to the little daisy, which could not think what they wanted. "Here we can get a beautiful grass turf for the lark," said one of the boys; and began deeply to cut out a square around the daisy-root, so that it was just in the middle of the turf. "Break off the flower!" said the other boy; and the daisy trembled for very fear of being broken off, and thus losing its life; when it would so gladly live and go with the turf into the cage of the captive lark. "Nay, let it be where it is!" said the other boy; "it makes it look so pretty!" And so it was left there, and was taken into the cage to the lark. But the poor bird made loud lamentations over its lost freedom, and struck the wires of the cage with "There is no water here," said the captive lark; "they are all gone out, and have forgotten to give me a drop to drink! my throat is dry and burning! it is fire and ice within me, and the air is so heavy! Ah! I shall die away from the warm sunshine, from the fresh green leaves, from all the glorious things which God has created!" and with that it bored its little beak down into the cool turf to refresh itself a little. At that moment it caught sight of the daisy, nodded to it, kissed it with its beak, and said, "Thou also must wither here, thou poor little flower! Thou and the little plot of grass, which they have given me for the whole world which I had out there! Every little blade of grass may be to me a green tree, every one of thy little white leaves a fragrant flower! Ah! you only tell me how much I have lost!" "Ah! who can comfort him!" thought the daisy, but could not move a leaf; and yet the fragrance which was given forth from its delicate petals was much sweeter than is usual in such flowers. The Evening came, and yet no one brought a single drop of water to the poor bird. It stretched out its beautiful wings, fluttered them convulsively, and its song was a melancholy wailing; its little head bowed down towards the flower, and its heart broke from thirst and longing. The little flower knew this not; before the evening was ended, it had folded its petals together and slept upon the earth, overcome with sickness and sorrow. Not until the next morning came the boys, and when they saw that the bird was dead they wept, wept many tears, and dug for it a handsome grave, which they adorned with leaves of flowers. The corpse of the bird was laid in a beautiful red box. It was to be buried royally, the poor bird! which, when full of life and singing its glorious song, they forgot, and let it pine in a cage, and suffer thirst—and now they did him honor, and shed many tears over him! But the sod of grass with the daisy, that they |