Although he had been father to nine
generations of eaglets, he sent Puck to the stag.
This splendid creature, with magnificent antlers, lived at the edge of
the forest, near the trunk of an oak tree. It was still standing, but
was now a mere shell. Old men said that the children of the aborigines
played under it, and here was the home of the god of lightning, which
they worshiped.
So to the withered oak, Puck went, and offered him the honor of
leadership to an embassy to the King.
But the stag answered and said:
"Well do I remember when an acorn fell from the top of the parent oak.
Then, for three hundred years it was growing. Children played under
it. They gathered acorns in their aprons, and the archers made bows
from its boughs.
"Then the oak tree began to die, and, during nearly thirty tens of
years it has been fading, and I have seen it all.
"Yet there is one older than I. It is the salmon that swims in the
Llyn stream. Inquire there."
So of the old mother salmon, Puck went to ask, and this was the answer
which he received.
"Count all the spots on my body, and all the eggs in my roe--one for
each year.
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