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A Modern Fable
THE TREE THAT DIDN'T GET TRIMMED
by Christopher Morley
F YOU WALK THROUGH a grove
of balsam trees, you will notice that
the young trees are silent; they are
listening. But the old tall ones es
pecially the firs are whispering. They
are telling the story of The Tree That
Didn't Get Trimmed. It sounds like a
painful story, and the murmur of the
old trees as they tell it is rather solemn;
but it is an encouraging story for young saplings to hear. On
warm Autumn days when your trunk is tickled by ants and
insects climbing, and the resin is hot and gummy in your knots,
and the whole glade smells sweet, drowsy, and sad, and the hard
wood trees are boasting of the gay colors they are beginning to
show, many a young evergreen has been cheered by it.
All young fir trees, as you know by that story' of Hans
Andersen's if you've forgotten it, why not read it again?
dream of being a Christmas Tree some day. They dream about
it as young girls' dream of being a bride or young poets of having
a volume of verse published. With the vision of that brightness
and gayety before them, they patiently endure the sharp sting
of thq ax, the long hours pressed together on a freight car. But
every December there are more trees cut down than are needed.
And that is the story that no one has thought to put down.
The tree in this story should never have been cut. He wouldn't
have been, but it was getting dark in the Vermont woods, and the
man with the ax said to himself, "Just one more." Cutting young
trees with a sharp, beautifully balanced ax is fascinating; you
go on and on; there's a sort of cruel pleasure in it. The blade
goes through the soft wood with one whistling stroke and the
boughs sink down with a soft swish.
He was a fine, well-grown youngster but too tall for his age;
his branches were rather scraggly. If he'd been left there, he
would have been an unusually big tree some day; but now he
was in the awkward age and didn't have the tapering shape and
the thick, even foliage that people like on Christmas trees.
Worse still, instead of running up to a straight, clean spire, his
top was a bit lopsided, with a fork in it.
But he didn't know this as he stood with many others, leaning
against the side wall of the greengrocer's shop. In those cold
December days he was very happy, thinking of the pleasures to
come. He had heard of the delights of Christmas Eve: the
stealthy setting-up of the tree, the tinsel balls and colored
toys, the peppermint canes and birds with spun-glass tails.
Even that old anxiety of Christmas trees burning candles
did not worry him, for he had been told that nowadays people
use strings of tiny electric bulbs which cannot set one on fire.
"I shall be very grand," he said. "I hope there will be children
to admire me. It must be a great moment when the children
hang their stockings on you!" He even felt sorry for the first
(Copyright I92S, 1927, 1953 by Christopher Morley. published by J. B. Lippincott Co.)
trees that were chosen and taken away. It would be best, he
considered, not to be bought until Christmas Eve. Then, in
the shining darkness someone would pick him out, put him
along the running board of a car, and away they would go. The
tire-chains would clack and jingle merrily on the snowy road.
He imagined a big house with fire glowing on a hearth; the
hushed rustle of wrapping paper and parcels being unpacked.
Someone would say, "Oh, what a beautiful tree!" How erect and
stiff he would brace himself in his iron tripod stand.
But day after day went by, one by one the other trees were
taken, and he began to grow troubled. For everyone who looked
at him seemed to have an unkind word. "Too tall," said one lady.
"The branches are too skimpy," said another. "If I chop off the
top," said the greengrocer, "it wouldn't be so bad."
The tree shuddered, but the customer had already passed on
to look at others. Some of his branches ached where the grocer
had bent them upward to make his shape appear more attractive.
Across the street was a variety store. Its bright windows were
full of scarlet odds and ends; when the doors opened, he could
see people crowded along the aisles, cheerfully jostling one
another with bumpy packages. A buzz of talk, a shuffle of feet,
a constant ringing of cash drawers came noisily out of that
doorway. He could see flashes of marvelous color, ornaments for
luckier trees.
Every evening, as the time drew nearer, the pavements were
more thronged. The handsomer trees, not so tall as he but more
bushy and shapely, were ranked in front of him; as they were
taken away he could see the gayety only too well. Then he was
shown to a lady who wanted a tree very cheap.
"You can have this one for a dollar," said the grocer. This
was only one third of what the grocer had asked for him at first,
but even so the lady refused him and went across the street to
buy a little artificial tree at the toy store. The man pushed him
back carelessly, and he toppled over and fell alongside the wall.
No one bothered to pick him up. He was almost glad, for now
his pride would be spared.
Klow it was Christmas Eve. It was a foggy evening with a
drizzling rain; the alley alongside the store was thick
with trampled slush. As he lay among broken boxes and
fallen scraps of holly, strange thoughts came to him. In the still
northern forest, already his wounded stump was buried in forget
ful snow. He remembered the Wintry sparkle of the woods, the
big trees with crusts and clumps of silver on their broad boughs,
the keen singing of the lonely wind. .
He remembered the strong, warm feeling of his roots reaching
down into the safe earth. That is" a good feeling; it means to a
tree just what it means to you to stretch your toes down toward
the bottom of a well-tucked bed. And he had given up all this
to lie here, disdained and forgotten, in a littered alley. The
splash of feet, the chime of bells, the cry of cars went past him.
He trembled a little with self-pity and vexation. "No toys and
stocking for me," he thought sadly and shed some of his needles.
Late that night, after all the shopping was over, the grocer
12
Family Weekly, December 22, 1957
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