A Norwegian story-teller wrote a story “How the Mountain Was Clothed.”
This is his story:
Through a deep cut between two mountains, a river hurried down over the
rocks. The mountain walls on either side were high and steep. But one
side of the mountain was bare. But at the foot even of this side, and so
near the river that it was bathed in its spray, stood a cluster of
trees. They gazed upward and outward, but they could not move one way or
another.
“Suppose we clothe the mountain,” said the juniper to the fir.
The fir looked up at the naked mountainside and replied, “If any body is
to do it, I suppose it will have to be we.”
The fir looked over toward the birch and asked, “What do you think,
Birch?”
The birch glanced up the bare mountainside. The wall leaned over so that
it seemed to the birch as if it could scarcely breathe. “Yes, indeed,
let us clothe it,” he said.
So the three took upon themselves the task to clothe the bare mountain.
That was their goal, and they soon set out to see whether they could
reach that goal. The juniper went first.
When they had gone but a little way, they met the heather. The juniper
seemed to want to pass it by. “No, take it along,” said the fir. So the
heather joined them.
Before long the juniper began to slip, “Take hold of me,” said the
heather. The juniper did so, and whenever the smallest crack could be
seen, the heather put its finger into it. Wherever the heather had first
pried in a finger, the juniper put a whole hand. They crawled and crept,
the fir working hard, the birch always behind the rest.
“This is a noble work,” said the birch.
The mountain began to wonder what kind of creatures these might be that
came clambering up its side. And after it had thought the matter over
for a hundred years or two it sent a little brooklet down to find out.
As it happened, the brook went at the time of the spring floods. It
crept down till it met the heather. “Dear, dear heather,” said the
brook, “won’t you let me pass? I am so tiny.” The heather was very busy,
so merely raised itself a bit, and worked on. The brooklet slipped in
underneath and away.
“Dear, dear juniper, won’t you let me pass? I am so very little.” The
juniper eyed it severely, but since the heather had let the brook slip
by, the juniper might do that too.
The brook raced on down the hill, and came to where the fir stood
puffing, out of breath, on the hillside. “Dear, dear fir, won’t you let
me by?” begged the brook, “I am so very small,” and kissed the fir on
the foot, and smiled. The fir let it by.
And the birch made way for the brook, even before it was asked.
“Hi, hi, hi!” said the brook and grew. “Ha, ha, ha!” said the brook and
grew larger. “Ho, ho, ho!” said the brook, and tore up the heather, the
juniper, the fir, and the birch by their roots and flung them pell mell,
head o’er heels, down the steep slope of the mountain.
The mountain sat for several hundred years after that and smiled at the
memory of that day. It was plain to be seen: _The mountain did not want
to be clothed._
The heather fretted and worried until it grew green again, and then it
set forth once more. “Courage!” said the heather.
The juniper half raised itself to get a good look at the heather. So
long did it sit half raised that at last it sat upright. It scratched
its head, set forth again, and dug in so hard for a foothold that it
seemed surely the mountain must feel it. “If you won’t have me, then I
will have you.”
The fir stretched its toes a bit to see if they were all right, raised
first one foot and then the other, and finally both feet at once. It
first looked to see where it had climbed, next where it had been lying,
and finally where it was to go. It then went on its way, pretending it
had never fallen.
The birch, which had soiled itself badly, got up and brushed itself off.
Away they went, faster than ever, to the sides and straight up, in
sunshine and in rain.
“What can all this mean?” asked the mountain, one fair day, all
glittering with dew, as the summer sun shone down upon it, the birds
sang, the hare hopped about, and the woodmouse piped.
The day finally came when the heather could peep over the top with one
eye. “Oh dear, oh dear!” said the heather, and away it went.
“Dear me,” said the juniper, “what is it the heather sees?” and just
managed to reach high enough to peer over. “Oh dear, oh dear!” it
exclaimed and was off.
“What is it the juniper’s up to today?” the fir wondered, taking longer
steps in the heat of the sun. Before long it rose on its toes and peered
over. “Oh dear, oh dear!” Its branches and needles rose straight up on
end.
“What is it all the others see and I don’t?” the birch asked, as it
carefully lifted its skirts, and tripped after them. “Oh—oh—! If there
isn’t a huge forest of fir and heather and juniper and birch already on
the other side of the mountain waiting for us!” it exclaimed. The
glittering dew rolled off its leaves as it quivered in the sunshine.
“Ah, that’s what it means to reach our goal!” said the juniper.
(Adapted.)
“Björnstjerne Björnson,” from Norway’s Best
Stories, published by American-Scandinavian
Foundation, New York.