Forest World Read Online Free PDF

wonderful mystery in this hour of vanishing night and wakening day. At such a time the turning of the globe seemed to him like the turning of fate, like a delivery from darkness and anxiety to happiness and courage.
    He crossed a small clearing. Giant oaks rustled, the shadow of their tops spreading wide. In the gloaming four slender birches stood out silvery and clear.
    Martin re-entered the forest on a narrow trail that snaked its way through the underbrush.
    Nearby stood a doe, her newborn kid beside her. She stiffened to attention, ears quivering. Her sharp hearing had caught Martin’s almost inaudible step. The kid listened too, its legs braced ready to leap away. The mother roe calmed her child. “Don’t be afraid. There’s no need to run away. It’s He! He never hurts us.”
    The oak trees began to talk among themselves in soft whispers.
    â€œOh, times have been good since He has ruled here and while His father ruled before him. You young birches, you don’t remember how it was before father and son protected the forest.”
    A young birch lisped, “Protected the forest? How?”
    â€œWhat was there before?” another young one asked.
    The old oak answered, “Never a day passed that the thunder-stick did not resound. At times the Hes came in crowds. Roes, stags, hares fell over and died. Even squirrels were knocked off our branches. What madness and what horrible shouting! All the forestresidents were terrified. The thunder-sticks roared. And there were not only the thunder-sticks. The Hes carried great teeth also and in winter bit into stalwart trees with them so that the trees fell over. We ourselves were afraid of being bitten and losing our lives.”
    The third birch inquired, “This He who’s here now—He does nothing harmful? Nothing at all?”
    â€œNo!” the oaks chorused. “Neither His father who used to be here, nor He. Nothing—nothing bad!”
    â€œBut He throws the thunder-stick,” a birch called out.
    â€œOnly the older two-legged one does, the one with gray fur on his head,” whispered the ancient oak. “And then but rarely. Very rarely. Really only to help us.”
    The strongest oak made himself heard. “When a stag or a doe falls by that thunder-stick, it is because he is past his time, ill and rotten as a tree which must fall soon. It is kindness then.”
    Martin could hear only the soft morning rustle of the forest. He understood the language of the trees no more than he understood the speech of the animals. Yet he had an instinctive feeling of oneness withother forms of life. This happy feeling swelled his misshapen chest so that he drew in his breath lightly and freely.
    The growing light spread. The leaves and the sky took on a hue of delicate green.
    Martin climbed to his lookout platform built in the shadow of a birch tree at the edge of a large meadow. From there he could see the green arch of the treetops and a tremendous sky in which the morning star was twinkling its farewell.
    In the meadow three stags, with the horns still covered by their velvet, were grazing at ease. They strolled around in the manner of great gentlemen, nibbling a bit here and there or merely looking off into space for moments at a time.
    Regretfully they glanced at a roe which they had scared into flight. “We wouldn’t have done anything to him,” said a stag whose horns had ten branches.
    The youngest, who had only six branches, said, “Certainly not.”
    Tambo added, “When have we ever done anythingto one of these little fellows? They are relatives of ours. It’s painful to see them avoid us.”
    The first stag stretched out his head in thought. His horns lay almost flat on his back. “My father,” he recalled, “told me a story he heard from one of our forefathers. A long time ago a roebuck was speared by one of our ancient ancestors—in anger.”
    Tambo said,