"That's not true, Wind," said the linnet. "There's a beautiful grey cloud far away in the west."
"Re-ally?" said the wind. "Ah ... I happen to be the east wind just now, so I can't help you."
"Turn round, dear Wind, and bring us the cloud," asked the bell-flower, civilly. "You can blow wherever you please and we shall be grateful to you as long as we live."
"You will earn the thanks of the whole community," said the hazel-bush.
"The whole community," whispered the blades of grass.
"I daresay," said the wind. "But I am not what you take me for. You believe that I am my own master, because I come shifting and shifting about and sometimes blow gently and sometimes hard and am sometimes mild and sometimes keen. But I am merely a dog that comes when his master calls."
"Who is your master then?" asked the linnet. "I will go to him, even if he lives at the end of the earth."
"Ah ... if that were enough!" said the wind. "My master is the sun. I run my race at his behest. When he shines really strong anywhere, than I go up with the warm air and fetch cold air from somewhere else and fly with it along the earth. Whether it be east or west does not concern me."
"I don't understand it," said the linnet.
"I don't understand it either," said the wind. "But I do it!"