Saying, “From these wandering minstrels
      I have learned the art of song;
    Let me now repay the lessons
      They have taught so well and long.”

    Thus the bard of love departed;
      And, fulfilling his desire,
    On his tomb the birds were feasted
      By the children of the choir.

    Day by day, o’er tower and turret,
      In foul weather and in fair,
    Day by day, in vaster numbers,
      Flocked the poets of the air.

    On the tree whose heavy branches
      Overshadowed all the place,
    On the pavement, on the tombstone,
      On the poet’s sculptured face,

    On the crossbars of each window,
      On the lintel of each door,
    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 ’twould 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.

* * * * *