They renewed the War of Wartburg,
Which the bard had fought before.

There they sang their merry carols,

Sang their lauds on every side; And the name their voices uttered Was the name of Vogelweid.

Till at length the portly abbot
Murmured, "Why this waste of food?
Be it changed to loaves henceforward
For our fasting brotherhood."

Then in vain o'er tower and turret,

From the walls and woodland nests,

When the minster bells

rang

noontide, Gathered the unwelcome guests.

Then in vain, with cries discordant,
Clamorous round the Gothic spire,
Screamed the feathered Minnesingers
For the children of the choir.

Time has long effaced the inscriptions
On the cloister's funeral stones,

And tradition only tells us

Where repose the poet's bones.

But around the vast cathedral,
By sweet echoes multiplied,
Still the birds repeat the legend,
And the name of Vogelweid.

H. W. LONGfellow.

THE LEGEND OF THE CROSS-BILL.

On the cross the dying Saviour
Heavenward lifts his eyelids calm,
Feels, but scarcely feels, a trembling
In his pierced and bleeding palm.

And by all the world forsaken,
Sees he how with zealous care
At the ruthless nail of iron

A little bird is striving there.

Stained with blood, and never tiring,
With its beak it does not cease,
From the cross 't would free the Saviour,
Its Creator's son release.

And the Saviour speaks in mildness: "Blest be thou of all the good!

Bear, as token of this moment,

Marks of blood and holy rood!

And that bird is called the cross-bill;
Covered all with blood so clear,

In the groves of pine it singeth
Songs, like legends, strange to hear.

H. W. LONGFellow.

PRETTY BIRDS.

Among the orchards and the groves,
While summer days are fair and long,
You brighten every tree and bush,
You fill the air with loving song.

NURSERY.

THE LITTLE BIRD SITS.

And what is so rare as a day in June?
Then, if ever, come perfect days;

Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune,
And over it softly her warm ear lays:
Whether we look, or whether we listen,
We hear life murmur, or see it glisten;
Every clod feels a stir of might,

An instinct within it that reaches and towers,
And, groping blindly above it for light,
Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers;
The flush of life may well be seen

Thrilling back over hills and valleys;
The cowslip startles in meadows green,

The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice,
And there's never a leaf nor a blade too mean
To be some happy creature's palace :

The little bird sits at his door in the sun,
Atilt like a blossom among the leaves,
And lets his illumined being o'errun

With the deluge of summer it receives;
His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings,
And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and sings;
He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest,
In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best?
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.

THE LIVING SWAN.

Then some one came who said, "My Prince had shot

A swan, which fell among the roses here,

He bids me pray you send it. Will you send?"

"Nay," quoth Siddartha, "if the bird were dead To send it to the slayer might be well,

But the swan lives; my cousin hath but killed

The god-like speed which throbbed in this white wing." And Devadatta answered, "The wild thing,

Living or dead, is his who fetched it down;

'T was no man's in the clouds, but fall'n 't is mine,
Give me my prize, fair Cousin." Then our Lord
Laid the swan's neck beside his own smooth cheek
And gravely spake, "Say no! the bird is mine,
The first of myriad things which shall be mine
By right of mercy and love's lordliness.
For now I know, by what within me stirs,
That I shall teach compassion unto men
And be a speechless world's interpreter,
Abating this accursed flood of woe,

Not man's alone; but, if the Prince disputes,
Let him submit this matter to the wise

And we will wait their word." So was it done;
In full divan the business had debate,

And many thought this thing and many that,
Till there arose an unknown priest who said,
"If life be aught, the savior of a life

Owns more the living thing than he can own

Who sought to slay the slayer spoils and wastes,
The cherisher sustains, give him the bird:"

Which judgment all found just.

Light of Asia.

THE STORMY PETREL.

A thousand miles from land are we,
Tossing about on the roaring sea

From billow to bounding billow cast,

Like fleecy snow on the stormy blast.

The sails are scattered abroad like weeds;
The strong masts shake like quivering reeds;
The mighty cables and iron chains;

The hull, which all earthly strength disdains,

They strain and they crack; and hearts like stone
Their natural, hard, proud strength disown.

From the base of the wave to the billow's crown,
And amid the flashing and feathery foam,
The stormy petrel finds a home.

A home, if such a place may be

For her who lives on the wide, wide sea,
On the craggy ice, in the frozen air,

And only seeketh her rocky lair

To warm her young, and to teach them to spring
At once o'er the waves on their stormy wing!

O'er the deep! — o'er the deep!

Where the whale, and the shark, and the sword-fish

sleep

Outflying the blast and the driving rain,

The petrel telleth her tale

in vain ;

For the mariner curseth the warning bird

Which bringeth him news of the storm unheard!

Ah! thus does the prophet of good or ill

Meet hate from the creatures he serveth still;

Yet he ne'er falters so, petrel, spring

Once more o'er the waves on thy stormy wing!

11

BARRY CORNWALL.