Translation:The High Mountains/61

They stopped at a small fountain where one could only just hear the fresh water flowing.

They knew that you shouldn't drink such cold water when you're hot after having walked, and so they just wet their hands in the meantime.

It was a quiet, simple little spring, which rarely saw travellers so high up.

—Where does this little trickle of water come from? asked Panos.

—From the mountain! said the other children.

—Yes, but how did it come to be in the mountain? asked the Chief Engineer.

Nobody knew what to say.

“With the rain and snow, said the Chief Engineer, the water infiltrates the ground; and it goes into the great stone reservoirs inside the earth.

“From there it come out in fountains and rivers.

“Animals, men, cultivations and mills all draw water from the fountains.

“Only, so that the water infiltrates the soil and goes into the earth, there must be ground vegetation.

“If there are no dry leaves and greenery to retain it, then the water runs into the dry river beds and is lost in the sea or in the air.

“So even the fountains are given to us thanks to the blessed forest.

“If we let men cut down the forest, this little spring here would dry up. All the fountains that we have seen from the town up until here would dry up, and with them, even the river.”