to fear her, for her smile was always cheerful, and she had a kindly word for each of them if they chanced to meet her on her way to and from the village.  With this old, old woman lived a very little girl.  So bright and happy was she that the travellers who passed by the lonesome little house on the edge of the forest often thought of a sunbeam as they saw her.  These two people were known in the village as Granny Goodyear and Little Gretchen.

The winter had come and the frost had snapped off many of the smaller branches from the pine-trees in the forest.  Gretchen and her Granny were up by daybreak each morning.  After their simple breakfast of oatmeal, Gretchen would run to the little closet and fetch Granny’s old woollen shawl, which seemed almost as old as Granny herself.  Gretchen always claimed the right to put the shawl over her Granny’s head, even though she had to climb onto the wooden bench to do it.  After carefully pinning it under Granny’s chin, she gave her a good-bye kiss, and Granny started out for her morning’s work in the forest.  This work was nothing more nor less than the gathering up of the twigs and branches which the autumn winds and winter frosts had thrown upon the ground.  These were carefully gathered into a large bundle which Granny tied together with a strong linen band.  She then managed to lift the bundle to her shoulder and trudged off to the village with it.  Here she sold the fagots for kindling wood to the people of the village.  Sometimes she would get only a few pence each day, and sometimes a dozen or more, but on this money little Gretchen and she managed to live; they had their home, and the forest kindly furnished the wood for the fire which kept them warm in cold weather.

In the summer time Granny had a little garden at the back of the hut where she raised, with little Gretchen’s help, a few potatoes and turnips and onions.  These she carefully stored away for winter use.  To this meagre supply, the pennies, gained by selling the twigs from the forest, added the oatmeal for Gretchen and a little black coffee for Granny.  Meat was a thing they never thought of having.  It cost too much money.  Still, Granny and Gretchen were very happy, because they loved each other dearly.  Sometimes Gretchen would be left alone all day long in the hut, because Granny would have some work to do in the village after selling her bundle of sticks and twigs.  It was during these long days that little Gretchen had taught herself to sing the song which the wind sang to the pine branches.  In the summer time she learned the chirp and twitter of the birds, until her voice might almost be mistaken for a bird’s voice; she learned to dance as the swaying shadows did, and even to talk. to the stars which shone through the little square window when Granny came home too late or too tired to talk.