284 THE swallow's stone. 



the allusion which Longfellow has made to it in his poem 

 of "Evangeline" would seem to confirm this impression, 

 inasmuch as we may assume that the tradition found its 

 way into Acadia through the French colonists who were 

 the first to settle there. 



Longfellow, in his " Evangeline," says, — 



" Oft in the barns they climbed to the populous nests in 



the rafters, 

 Seeking with eager eyes that wondrous stone which the 



swallow 

 Brings from the shore of the sea to restore the sight of 



its fledglings ; 

 Lucky was he who found that stone in the nest of the 



swallow ! " 



The connection between the stone and the herb is, 

 that both were said to be brought to the nest by the 

 swallow, and both were deemed remedies for defective 

 sight. There is this difference, however, between the cur- 

 rent opinion in Brittany and the popular notion in Acadia, 

 that in the former case it is the finder of the stone who 

 is thereby benefited, in the latter it is the sight of the 

 fledglings which is thereby restored. 



A friend has suggested that the tradition may have 

 originated with the Chinese, to whom the edible swallows' 



bird! "In ventre hirundinum pullus lapilli oandido aut rubenti colore, qui 

 ' chelidonii ' vocantur, magicis narrati artibus reperiuntur. " 



