How the Mountain Was Clothed
A Norwegian story-teller wrote a story “How the Mountain Was Clothed.” This is his story:
Through a deep cut between two mountains, a river hurried down over the rocks. The mountain walls on either side were high and steep. But one side of the mountain was bare. But at the foot even of this side, and so near the river that it was bathed in its spray, stood a cluster of trees. They gazed upward and outward, but they could not move one way or another.
“Suppose we clothe the mountain,” said the juniper to the fir.
The fir looked up at the naked mountainside and replied, “If any body is to do it, I suppose it will have to be we.”
The fir looked over toward the birch and asked, “What do you think, Birch?”
The birch glanced up the bare mountainside. The wall leaned over so that it seemed to the birch as if it could scarcely breathe. “Yes, indeed, let us clothe it,” he said.
So the three took upon themselves the task to clothe the bare mountain. That was their goal, and they soon set out to see whether they could reach that goal. The juniper went first.
When they had gone but a little way, they met the heather. The juniper seemed to want to pass it by. “No, take it along,” said the fir. So the heather joined them.