The Prince of Summer nodded once more; Autumn just bowed his head in assent; and Spring hummed his songs and looked out over the land as if he were not even listening. But Winter continued:
“I know not whence they came. I daresay they are some of that vermin which Spring lures up from the mould with his playing and which Summer keeps the life in. I do not know. But this I do know, that they are there, swarming over the land and increasing year by year.”
“That is true,” said Summer.
The Prince of Autumn nodded his head, but Spring went on playing and humming.
“That is how the matter stands,” said Winter. “And I cannot touch them. They are too clever for me and they become more clever each time I see them anew. In vain I send my most piercing colds, my mightiest storms against them. They have built houses in which they sit snug and safe and allow the storms to rage. They light fires to keep themselves warm and have made themselves thick woollen clothes for their bodies and limbs, their hands and feet. And even that is not enough. The animals they have a use for they take into their houses; the bushes they want to protect they bind up in mats and straw. When I send my snow down over the earth, till it lies right up to the roofs of their houses, they shovel it away and make roads and paths right through it. When I bind the water with ice, they break the ice into pieces, if that suits them, or else they put iron under their feet and skate over the ice and derive a pleasure from it into the bargain.”
“That is true,” said Summer. “Men have seized upon the power.”
But the Prince of Winter was not yet done with his grievance:
“It is men that rule the earth,” he said. “And they know it and tease and hinder me everywhere. To show their thorough contempt for me, they have placed their greatest and most important festival in the very midst of my reign. So brazen are they that they simply beg me for ice and snow for their ‘Christmas’!”
“I know them too,” said the Prince of Autumn. “I cannot deny that they have made themselves lords of the earth, even though they do me no particular harm. But they are self-willed and they bring the crops home sometimes earlier and sometimes later than is right.”
“Just so!” shouted Winter. “That is why I cannot starve them to death, because they fill their barns in Autumn’s time. If we kept together, we could crush them.”