Johnny Appleseed

No one has ever counted all the apple trees in America, but there are a lot of them. According to some people, we have all these apple orchards because a man called Johnny Appleseed (his real name was John Chapman) spent his life planting apple seeds. That was back in the days when most of our country was still a wilderness...

Johnny sat up, rubbing his eyes. He looked at the sky again. Shimmering in the air, like a bridge of braided flowers, was a rainbow.

Johnny Appleseed leaped to his feet. He picked up all of his seed puches and slung them over his shoulder. Then he called to the animals, "Brother Wolf, Sister Sparrow, Brother Bear..."

He started up the rainbow. The animals and the birds followed. Brother Wolf was the first, tagging at Johnny Appleseed's heels. Two orioles rode on the wolf's shoulders.

When they reached the top of the rainbow, Johnny began throwing apple seeds all over the sky. If they stuck in the sky, they would grow into stars. If they fell to the earth, they would become trees. Johnny looked down at the land covered with orchards and knew that his work was done.