All the leaves fell terrified to the ground, but the storm did not let them lie in peace. He took them round the waist and waltzed with them over the field, high up in the air and into the wood again, swept them together into great heaps and scattered them once more to every side, just as the fit seized him.
Not until the morning did the storm grow weary and go down.
"Now you can have peace for this time," he said. "I am going down till we have our spring-cleaning. Then we can have another dance, if there are any of you left by then."
And the leaves went to rest and lay like a thick carpet over the whole earth.
The anemones felt that it had grown delightfully warm:
"I wonder if Dame Spring can have come yet?" they asked one another.
"I haven't my buds ready!" cried one of them.
"No more have I! No more have I!" exclaimed the others in chorus.
But one of them took courage and just peeped out above the ground.
"Good-morning!" cried the withered beech-leaves. "It's rather too early, young lady: if only you don't come to any harm!"