Consequently he was about to begin the ten years'
martyrdom which a young man is called upon to endure in the struggle
against an overwhelming force of nature, before he is in a position to
fulfil her laws.
* * * * *
It is a warm afternoon about Whitsuntide. The appletrees are gorgeous
in their white splendour which nature has showered all over them with
a profuse hand. The breeze shakes the crowns and fills the air with
pollen; a part of it fulfils its destination and creates new life, a
part sinks to the ground and dies. What is a handful of pollen more or
less in the inexhaustible store-house of nature! The fertilised blossom
casts off its delicate petals which flutter to the ground and wither;
they decay in the rain and are ground to dust, to rise again through the
sap and re-appear as blossoms, and this time, perhaps, to become fruit.
But now the struggle begins: those which a kind fate has placed on the
sunny side, thrive and prosper; the seed bud swells, and if no frost
intervenes, the fruit, in due time, will set. But those which look
towards the North, the poor things which grow in the shadow of the
others and never see the sun, are predestined to fade and fall off;
the gardener rakes them together and carts them to the pig-sty.
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