A rough wind gives
us one tint, and heavy rain another, and we look different on a cloudy
day to what we do on a sunny one. All these colours changed on us when
the blackbird was whistling in the oak the lightning struck, the fourth
one backwards from me; and it makes me sad to think that after four more
oaks have gone, the same colours will come on the wheat that will grow
then. It is thinking about those past colours, and songs, and leaves, and
of the colours and the sunshine, and the songs, and the leaves that will
come in the future that makes to-day so much. It makes to-day a thousand
years long backwards, and a thousand years long forwards, and makes the
sun so warm, and the air so sweet, and the butterflies so lovely, and the
hum of the bees, and everything so delicious. We cannot have enough of
it."
"No, that we cannot," said Guido. "Go on, you talk so nice and low. I
feel sleepy and jolly. Talk away, old Wheat."
"Let me see," said the Wheat. "Once on a time while the men were knocking
us out of the ear on a floor with flails, which are sticks with little
hinges--"
"As if I did not know what a flail was!" said Guido. "I hit old John with
the flail, and Ma gave him a shilling not to be cross.
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