But the summer passed into autumn, and drenching rains succeeded the
sunny days; the poor goldfinch had to perch of nights in rain-soaked
trees, where he had to sit cold and shivering, feeling his feathers
getting wet and draggled one by one. Furious winds tore away the leaves,
and lo! one morning when he opened his eyes, he saw a new and strange
world—the ground was covered with snow, and far as sight could reach
were only white roofs, white hedges, and white trees. Winter was come!
Then oh! how bitterly he regretted his mother’s warm breast! How gladly
would he have given the joys of the past summer to find himself once
more pressed close to her side and feel her heart beating against his in
the cosy nest! But all summer the wind had been busy confusing the
pathways of the air, so that it was now impossible to discover the one
that should have led him back to the nest; nay, a more blighting wind
than all the rest blew out of the skies; the wind of forgetfulness had
breathed upon his spirit, carrying away the memory of that happy
road—the first that young folks forget. And now winter grew fierce and
fell, devastating the orchards, bombarding the cottages with hailstones,
driving hope from all breasts and killing the little birds in the
nests—the young birds that are the hope of the verdant springtide and
happy days to come.
The little goldfinch was quite sure this horror would never end, that
the trees would never grow green again, that never more would the
harvest clothe the fields in green, that gaiety, sunshine, and youth
were vanished away for good and all.
Cowering in the hollow of an old branch, he watched the days go by like
a procession of white phantoms, each uglier than the other, and his
little feet all stiff with cold, his feathers frozen together with
hoar-frost, sad and shivering, he thought many and many a time his last
hour was come.
In vain the old birds told him of a re-birth; he could not believe in
the resurrection of things when this dreary time of mourning should be
over.