On the side of a hill, in a snug little burrow, lived a little mouse. She stepped out at dawn and saw the sun climbing up, filling the whole sky with gold. And a question popped into her head — who is the greatest of all? Do YOU know? Well then — she would go and ask the Sun himself!
The mouse climbed to the very top of the ridge and called out, "Sun, o Sun! Surely YOU are the greatest?" The Sun laughed, warm and bright. "Me? Oh no, little one. When a cloud drifts across me, my light can't even reach the ground. The cloud is greater than I."
And just then a big gray cloud came rumbling in and covered the sun right up! "Cloud, o Cloud!" called the mouse. "Then the greatest must be YOU!" The cloud shook its gray head. "Not me! One puff of wind and I fly apart like torn cotton. The wind is greater."
WHOOSH! Down swept the wind — off flew the cloud, and the leaves went spinning head over heels! Gripping a grass stem tight, the mouse shouted, "Wind, o Wind! The greatest one is YOU!" The wind laughed as it raced past. "I can blow anything away — but I slam into that mountain and stop dead. The mountain is greater."
In the golden afternoon the mouse came to the foot of the mountain. How enormous it was — so tall she couldn't even see the top! "Mountain, o Mountain!" she called. "Surely the greatest of all is you!" The mountain answered in a deep, rumbling voice, "Listen, little one… there is someone even I cannot stop."
"A little mouse," the mountain whispered, "digs her tunnels right through my heart — scritch, scratch — and there is nothing I can do to stop her." The mouse's eyes went round. "A mouse? You mean… me?" And she looked down at her own two small paws, and was very, very quiet.
That night the mouse sat high on the mountain's shoulder, under a thousand twinkling stars. Greater than the sun is the cloud, greater than the cloud the wind, greater than the wind the mountain — and even the mountain cannot stop one small mouse! She laughed her squeaky little laugh. "No one is the greatest all alone — everyone carries a strength of their own!"