“A number of persons, my dear, are spoken of in the Bible who were no better than they should be,” said the eldest Apple tree. “We go back to the ‘Mayflower,’—that is far enough for us; and none of our family ever dreamed of putting on white and pink in February. It would be flying in the face of Providence.”
“White and pink are for Easter,” said the Pear tree, whose grandparents were raised in a bishop’s garden. “I should not wish to put my blossoms on in Lent.”
The Apple tree straightened herself stiffly.
“We do not keep the church fasts and feasts,” she said; “but every one knows that faith without works is dead. What are these vain blossoms that we put forth for a few days in the spring, without the harvest that comes after?”
“Now the Apple tree is going to preach,” said the light-hearted Peach tree, stepping on the Plum tree’s toes. “If we must have preaching, I had rather listen to the Pines. They, at least, have good voices.”
“Those misguided Almonds are putting out all their strength in fleshly flowers,” the Apple tree continued; “but how when the gardener comes to look for his crop? We all know, as the Cherry trees said, what happened last year and the year before. It cannot be expected that the Master of the Garden will have patience with them forever.”
“The Master of the Garden!” Four young Fig trees, who stood apart and listened in sorrowful silence to this talk of blossoms, repeated the words with fear and trembling.
“How long,—how much longer,”—they asked themselves, “will he have patience with us?”
It was now the third spring since they had been planted, but not one of the four sisters had yet produced a single flower. With deep, shy desire they longed to know what the flower of the fig might be like. They were all of one age, and they had no parent tree to tell them. They knew nothing of their own nature or race or history. Two seasons in succession, a strange, distressful change had come upon them. They had felt the spring thrills, and the sap mounting in their veins; but instead of breaking out into pink and white flowers, like the happy trees around them, ugly little hard green knobs had crept out of their tender bark, and these had swollen and increased in size till they were bowed with the burden of their deformity. Fruit this could not be, for they had seen that fruit comes from a flower, and no sign of blossom or bud had ever been vouchsafed them. When inquisitive hands came groping, and feeling of the purple excrescences upon their limbs, they covered them up in shame and tried to hide them with their broad green leaves. In time they were mercifully eased of this affliction; but then the frosts came, and the winter’s dull suspense, and then another spring’s awakening to hope and fear.
“Perhaps we were not old enough before,” they whispered encouragement to one another. “Blossoms no doubt are a great responsibility. Had we had them earlier, we might have been foolish and brought ourselves to blame, like the Almond trees. Let us not be impatient; the sun is warm, but the nights are cold. Do not despair, dear sisters; we may have flowers yet. And when they do come, no doubt they will be fair enough to reward us for our long waiting.”