"What a droll house Mother Stork seems to be building!" said the saucy swallow, cocking up one eye at the long-legged pair on the roof above. "I shouldn't like such an one at all. Sharp sticks everywhere, no conveniences, great holes for eggs to drop into and be broken. And how the wind must blow up there! Give me a cosey place like this of ours."
"Give me a nice, smooth wooden box," cooed the dove. "I don't fancy plaster; it's damp and rheumatic, my mate says. But you needn't worry about Mother Stork's eggs. They're too large to drop through the holes in the branches and be broken."
"What coarse things they must be!" remarked the swallow, looking complacently at the tiny clouded spheres beneath her own wings.
"They are big," agreed the dove. "But then, Mother Stork is big too."
"Listen to those absurd creatures!" said Mother Stork to her partner. "Coarse, indeed! My eggs! I like that."
"Never mind them," replied Papa Stork, good-humoredly, giving a crooked twig the final shove to the side of the nest.
Below on the grass, which was still winter-brown, three little children stood gazing wistfully up at the storks.
"They flew straight to our roof," said Annchen. "Frau Perl says that means good luck before the year ends."
"What does good luck mean?" asked Carl, the youngest boy.
"It means—oh, all sorts of things," replied Annchen, vaguely: "that the mother should not work so hard; that we should have plenty,—plenty to eat every day,—and money, I suppose,—and my new shoes I've waited for so long;—all sorts of things."