"Are you there again, you robber?" said the oak and shook a heap of leaves over him.
"You really ought not to be so with your leaves, old friend," said the bear, licking his paws. "They are the only thing you have to keep off the sun with."
"If you don't like me, you can go," replied the oak, proudly. "I am lord of the land and, look where you may, you will find none but my brothers."
"True enough," the bear. "That's just the part of it. I've been for a little trip abroad, you see, and have been a bit spoilt. That was in a country down south. I took a nap under the beech-trees there. They are tall, slender trees, not old fellows like you. And their tops are so that the sunbeams can't pierce through them at all. It was a real delight to sleep there of an afternoon, believe me."
"Beech-trees?" asked the oak, . "What are they?"
"You might wish that you were half so handsome as a beech-tree," said the bear. "But I'm not going to gossip with you any more just now. I've had to over a mile in front of a confounded hunter, who caught me on one of my hind-legs with an arrow. Now I want to sleep; and perhaps you will be so kind as to provide me with rest, since you can't provide me with shade."
The bear lay down and closed his eyes, but there was no sleep for him this time. For the other trees had heard what he said and there came such a and a
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