Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1879-05-03
What a Seed Did.

"A lIJjl6 TOuHU S00u one Gay Iell lQUO q emma
jar In the Kings palace. No one heard 1t drop,
but as 1t fell it cried out, ALAS! now my work
In the world Is done. / shall never get out of
this prison. shall never get out And after
long time passed away, and the little seed was
still In the china jar, with the same lamenta-
ton, and even though it could see light very
OFTEN, and heard the people around It, it was
was passing through the room, when his sword
struck the china jar, SO that it was thrown
down to the ground and broken to pieces.
Then the prince said to his servants: go;
throw away the fragments that lie there; and
as they threw them away the seed dropped out
and fell into the earth and was covered by it.
And when it found that the earth hid it from
than at first, and said. There is an end now to
me; shall see the light no more; nor ever es-
cape from my prison.
1t was burst asunder, so that 1t looked for
death. But instead of that, it felt itself push
Ing away the earth; and one day 1t thrust its
bright sunshine. And the Seed was gone, but
there remained instead a plant with leaves;
snd soon the plant bore one beautiful white
flower.
"Now, it CHANGED one day that the Kings
son passed, and saw the beautiful flower, SO ne
stopped and piucked it, saying-'This I will
give to Zorella.' And when the flower was
pulled from the stem it felt a pain and gave a
sigh; but it was grown wiser than when it was
seed, and so did not feel afraid of what was
to come. Then the Kings son carried the
called it beautiful; whereat the flower was
tinged with red. And the princess Zorella laid
Tie flower In her bosom. and when the prince
mad left her took it out again and called 1t beau
tiful once more and kissed it; but it was the
Kings son who had given it to her.
So she put the flower In a book, and would
often look at it and kiss it, because it was beau
tiful: And the flower was happy. But one
day they brought more flowers to tha room. all
Of white, and dressed the princess with them,
so that the flower was afraid Of being forgotten.
hON HnNC nt6
the flower, say ing, You were his first gift and
then the flower was happy once more; SO happy
that it looked back upon the time when it lay
prisoner In the china jar and In the earth,
land long after this the flower was kept In
the book, which the princess read every day,
until day came when she could not open 1t,
and lay In her room still; oh, 80 very still! And
as she lay there the Kings son entered the
room, and taking up the book which lay on the
table opened it at venture: but ne happened
looked the flower spoke to him, though he
heard 1t not, and told him of the time when he
had piucked 1t, and how he had given it to the
felt drops fall upon 1t like to the rain in the
time gone by; and when it looked up the Kings
son was weeping at the story it had told.
room, and would have laid them On the bosom
of the princess; and the Old flower spoke TO
them, saving, that it only ought to be placed
there's but the servants did not understand the
ertheess, they did not crush it, because It lay
on the open book which had been the princess
"Then the Kings son came in and lifted the
flower up from the book and kissed It, The
flower was happy because of it, and tried to tell
him how the princess had kissed it also but it
could not for the Kings son was weeping. SO
he took the flowers from on the bosom OF the
princess, and placed thereon instead the old
flower which he had given to her 80 long ago.
And the flower lay there, and they put the
princess in the earth; but the flower was not
afraid, for its task was finished; and although
1t cTumbled into dust the flower was not afraid,
for it sa1d-"We shall soon see the light again,
even as before sprang up from the earth, a
living f1OWer."-[ From Fdiryland.