Eagle.

He went to close his wings so that he might rest them as he went down.
But as he did the Wren came from under his wings.

Up went the Wren, down went the Eagle. Up and up went the Wren. He had
been resting while the Eagle had been flying, and now he was able to
soar past the point the Eagle had reached at his dead-best.

The Eagle flew down and lighted on the Falconer's perch. "Has he flown
high, Falconer?" asked the King. "No bird has flown so high," said the
Falconer. "By the rime on his wings he has gone into the line of
frost."

"The Eagle is King of the Birds and no one can deny it," said the
King. "The village of Windy-Gap has not sent me my tribute."

"Mercy," said the Headman of Windy-Gap.

"The village and all in it shall be sold to the Saracens," said the
King.

Just then the Wren came down and lighted on the perch beside the
Eagle. "Where did the Wren fly to?" said the King. "By my glove," said
the Falconer "he soared past the line of frost, and went into the line
of snow, for what's on his feathers is a drop of snow."

"The Wren is King of the Birds," said the Headman of Windy-Gap.

"Yes, King of the Birds," said the King, "and, therefore, my lawful
tribute."

[Illustration: "No bird will ever out-soar this flight of mine," said
the Eagle.]

And so, for ever after the villages sent to the King, not an Eagle,
but a Wren as tribute. And in no village ever after were the lands
unplowed and the fields unsown, the cloth unspun and the coats not
made, the roofs unthatched and the apple-trees unplanted. And in every
village in the hollow and on the height the people shouted for the
Wren--"The Wren, the Wren, the King of all Birds."

[Illustration]

[Illustration: Bloom-of-Youth and the Witch of the Elders]

Bloom-of-Youth and the Witch of the Elders

[Illustration]

Bloom-of-youth was a young, young girl. But, young as she was, she
would have to be married, her step-mother said. Then married she was
while she was still little enough to walk through the doorway of her
step-mother's hut without stooping her head.

Her husband was a hunter and he took her to live in a hut at the edge
of a wood. He was out hunting the whole of the day. Now what did
Bloom-of-Youth do while she had the house to herself? Little enough
indeed. She swept the floor and she washed the dishes and she laid
them back on their shelf. Then she went to the well for pails of
water. When she went out she staye