Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 22, 2025
Grayskin was astonished when he saw the enormous leaf-trees spreading like a great canopy above him. He ate both oak leaves and aspen bark. "These taste deliciously bitter and good!" he remarked. "Better than clover!" "Then wasn't it well that you should taste them once?" said the dog. Thereupon he took the elk down to a little forest lake.
Presently they came to an open glade illuminated by the moonlight, where grass and flowers shimmered beneath the dew. Some large animals were grazing on this forest meadow an elk bull, several elk cows and a number of elk calves. When Grayskin caught sight of them he stopped short.
Late in the afternoon he happened to squeeze through some thickets behind a clearing where the soil was muddy and slimy, and in the centre of it was a murky pool. This open space was encircled by tall pines almost bare from age and miasmic air. Grayskin was displeased with the place and would have left it at once had he not caught sight of some bright green calla leaves which grew near the pool.
Karr soon discovered what was in the air and ran over to the elk to have a chat with him. The dog was very much distressed at the thought of losing his friend, but the elk took the matter calmly, and seemed neither glad nor sorry. "Do you think of letting them send you away without offering resistance?" asked Karr. "What good would it do to resist?" asked Grayskin.
Grayskin kept running through the thickets, while Karr was about to lose the trail again. "Karr, Karr!" roared Grayskin; "can't you scent that peculiar odour in the forest?" Karr stopped and sniffed. He had not thought of it before, but now he remarked that the pines sent forth a much stronger odour than usual. "Yes, I catch the scent," he said.
One of these days you, too, will have broad antlers, like those, and just such a mane; and if you were to remain in the forest, very likely you, also, would have a herd to lead." "If he is my kinsman, I must go closer and have a look at him," said Grayskin. "I never dreamed that an animal could be so stately!"
But the birds told Karr confidentially that on several occasions Grayskin had been pursued by poachers, and that only with the greatest difficulty had he escaped. Karr lived in a state of continual grief, yearning, and anxiety. Yet he had to wait two whole summers more before there was an end of the caterpillars!
"Oh, you may be sure that he has dragged himself down to the strand to get the latest news about Grayskin!" Both the boy and the raven jumped to the ground, and hastened down to the shore. All the geese had come out of the lake, and stood talking with an old dog, who was so weak and decrepit that it seemed as if he might drop dead at any moment. "There's Karr," said Bataki to the boy.
It was in the early summer, the season of light nights, and it was as bright as day, although the sun was not yet up. Karr was awakened by some one calling his name. "Is it you, Grayskin?" he asked, for he was accustomed to the elk's nightly visits. Again he heard the call; then he recognized Grayskin's voice, and hastened in the direction of the sound.
But the caterpillars, meanwhile, had spread over miles of pine woods. Not in one summer did the disease reach them all. Many lived to become pupas and moths. Grayskin sent messages to his friend Karr by the birds of passage, to say that he was alive and faring well.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking