Once upon a time, in a mystical land known as the Whispering Forest, trees were said to sing the sweetest songs when the fall breezes stirred their colorful leaves. But that was long ago. Now, the sad remains of the sweet singers stood longing for the happy days gone by.
It was one lovely autumn day, as the gentle winds stirred the leaves toward their home, that a little Elf named Breeze stopped to listen. She had just flown over a hill covered with pink, white, and yellow blossoms in which she had hidden her nest of eggs for fear some one would steal them, for fairies and elves stole bird’s eggs to make their nests. But for her own home, she wished to find a secluded place where no one could spy her at work.
“Where can that be?” she said, as she flew around the forest looking for a place that suited her best. Suddenly, the gentle breezes began to sigh, and Breeze the Elf listened more closely.
“Oh! Oh!” said she. “How horrible! The trees mourn because of the wrongs inflicted upon them! I must never rest day or night until I have discovered the cause of this great sorrow!”
So she hurried on and on until she found an opening from which she could look down upon the beautiful woods below. Scattered over the brown leaves lay millions of bits of paper, scraps of string, and all kinds of rubbish that human beings throw about them—and terrible smoke and poisonous gases rising from factories and houses polluted the atmosphere.
“It is awful!” exclaimed Breeze the Elf. “Owls and bats would not thrive in such air as this! It is horrible! I must call the others, and we will all protect our poor trees!”
So she flew all over the villages and cities near at hand and called all the fairies and elves and pixies and gnomes and little folks of all kinds, and they came happily flying to the spot.
Breeze told them why she had called them together, and at once they got to work to make the clean-up a success. They pulled up the litter, washed the trees in pure water from the river and brightened their trunks with goblin polishes that were a secret to no one but themselves.
At last all was done, and they turned to the trees and said: “Now sing!” Slowly the leaves began to move, and a song sweet and low began to resound through the forest. Round and round they danced, the fairies waving bright-colored flowers toward Heaven, and all the little people clapping their tiny hands for joy.
Then they all took hands and danced in the leaves, and it is said that this is the beginning of the custom of “gathering nuts”.
Afterward Breeze the Elf called a meeting to speak to her friends. “We must not let this matter rest,” she said. “We must remember that we have to protect our trees, and we must teach all the little children that if they care for nature she will always sweetly sing to them.”