His big opportunity

by Amy Le Feuvre

"Then one morning came up the old crow.

"'Why did you tell us to wait?' cried one walnut in petulant tones. 'We're rotting, dying here, and this is the end of us.'

"'Wait a little longer,' said the crow again; 'it is when we are very low that we are lifted very high. When we come to an end a new beginning is coming.'

"The walnuts sighed as he flew away; yet the biggest one turned with a spark of hope to his brothers.

"'I do believe we have been made for something. My skin is rotting and dying, but in spite of it all I feel as if I have something inside that is still alive. Let us wait and be patient a little longer.'

"And then at last one day, when the apple and pear-tree were fruitless and leafless, when the flowers and butterflies and bees had all disappeared, down the garden came the master himself and the gardener.

"He stopped when he came to the walnut-tree, and stooping down in the long grass he gently raised one of the fallen nuts.

"'You must gather these in,' he said to his gardener; 'we have a good many for the first year.'

"'Yes,' said the gardener, 'they are ready now. I've let them lie till you saw them.'

"And the walnuts whispered to themselves in surprised delight that it was not neglect and indifference had left them there, but that the gardener had watched each one fall, and knew where to find them when their time came at last.