FABLE AND FOLKLORE 267 



Said the abbot, "God will help us 



In this hour of bitter loss." 

 Then one spied a little redbreast 



Sitting on a wayside cross. 



Doubtless came the bird in answer 



To the words the monk did speak, 

 For a heavy wheat-ear dangled 



From the robin's polished beak. 



Then the brothers, as he dropped it 



Picked it up and careful sowed; 

 And abundantly in autumn 



Reaped the harvest where they strewed. 21 



Greater poets than Baring-Gould or even Bishop 

 Trench have found literary material in these monastic 

 tales. Witness Longfellow's Golden Legend, where he 

 sings of good St. Felix, the Burgundian missionary who 

 crossed the Channel, and in A. D. 604 converted to 

 Christianity the wild king of the East Saxons; and who 

 listened to the singing of a milk-white bird for a hun- 

 dred years, although it had seemed to him but an hour, 

 so enchanted was he with the music. No doubt myth- 

 mongers might discourse very scientifically on this and 

 some other of these episodes in the penumbra of his- 

 tory, but we will leave the pleasure of it to them. 



None of these traditions of early bird-lovers and 

 teachers of kindness are so pleasant as are those inspired 

 by the gracious life of St. Francis. 22 A familiar classic 

 is his sermon to the birds when 



Around Assisi's convent gate 

 The birds, God's poor who cannot wait, 

 From moor and mere and darksome wood 

 Came flocking for their dole of food. 



