Once upon a time, two poor woodcutters were making their way home through a great pine forest. It was winter, and a night of bitter cold. The snow lay thick upon the ground and the branches. The frost snapped the little twigs as they passed, and the mountain torrent hung motionless, frozen by the Ice-King.
So cold was it that the animals and birds were bewildered.
'Ugh!' snarled the Wolf, limping with his tail between his legs. 'This is monstrous weather. Why doesn't the Government look to it?'
'Weet! weet! weet!' twittered the green Linnets. 'The old Earth is dead and laid out in her white shroud.'
'The Earth is going to be married, and this is her bridal dress,' whispered the Turtle-doves, their pink feet frost-bitten, yet feeling duty-bound to be romantic.
'Nonsense!' growled the Wolf. 'It's all the Government's fault, and if you don't believe me, I shall eat you.' The Wolf had a thoroughly practical mind.
'Well,' said the Woodpecker, a born philosopher, 'I don't care for explanations. If a thing is so, it is so, and at present it is terribly cold.'
Terribly cold it certainly was. The little Squirrels rubbed each other's noses for warmth. The Rabbits curled up in their holes. Only the great horned Owls seemed to enjoy it, their feathers stiff with rime, rolling their large yellow eyes and calling, 'Tu-whit! Tu-whoo! What delightful weather!'
The two Woodcutters pressed on, blowing on their fingers and stamping their iron-shod boots. They sank into a snowdrift and emerged white as millers; they slipped on frozen marsh-ice, their faggots scattering; once, fearing they were lost—knowing snow is cruel to those who sleep in her arms—they trusted in Saint Martin, retraced their steps warily, and finally reached the forest's outskirts. Far below, they saw the lights of their village.
Overjoyed, they laughed aloud. The Earth seemed a flower of silver, the Moon a flower of gold.
Yet their laughter turned to sadness as they remembered their poverty. 'Why make merry,' said one, 'when life is for the rich? Better we had died in the forest.'
'Truly,' answered his companion, 'much is given to some, little to others. Injustice has parcelled out the world; only sorrow is divided equally.'
As they bewailed their misery, a strange thing happened. A very bright and beautiful star fell from heaven. It slipped down the sky, passing other stars, and seemed to sink behind a clump of willow trees near a sheepfold.
'Why! A crock of gold for whoever finds it!' they cried, and ran eagerly.
One outran the other, forced his way through the willows, and lo! There on the white snow lay a golden thing. He hastened to it, stooped, and placed his hands upon it. It was a cloak of golden tissue, curiously wrought with stars and wrapped in many folds. He cried to his comrade of the treasure fallen from the sky.
They sat in the snow and loosened the folds to divide the gold. But, alas! No gold, nor silver, nor any treasure was within—only a little child, asleep.
One said to the other: 'This is a bitter ending to our hope. What profit is a child to a man? Let us leave it here. We are poor and have children of our own to feed.'