ILLUSTRATIVE NOTES. 233 
And then, in the deep woody depths, the singer incessantly moves 
from place to place, now drawing near, and now receding ; hence arise 
those distant effects which induce a delightful reverie, and that delicate ° 
cadence which thrills the heart. 
Under our roof his song would be ever the same; but on the 
pinions of the wind the music is divine, it penetrates and ravishes 
the soul. 
Page 241. The robin hastens, singing, to enjoy his share of the 
warmth.—I find this admirable passage in ‘‘ The Conquest of England 
by the Normans” (by Augustin Thierry). The chief of the barbarous 
Saxons assembles his priests and wise men to ascertain if they will 
become Christians. One of them speaks as follows :— 
“Thou mayst remember, O king, a thing which sometimes happens, 
when thou art seated at table with thy captains and men-at-arms, in 
the winter season, and when a fire is kindled and the hall well 
warmed, while there are wind and rain and snow without. There 
comes a little bird, which traverses the room on fluttering wing, 
entering by one door and flying out at another: the moment of its 
passage is full of sweetness for it, it feels neither the rain nor the 
storm ; but this interval is brief, the bird vanishes in the twinkling 
of an eye, and from winter passes away into winter. Such seems to 
me the life of man upon this earth, and its limited duration, compared 
with the length of the time which precedes and follows it.” 
