They spared to him the sore-bought Deer;
And in that lowly cell
For many weary days and drear
The King came there to dwell.

The King, who was a godless man,
A pagan, heart and soul,
Played nurse until the wound began
To heal, and Giles was whole.

But in the little forest cave
The King learned many things
Known to the meanest Christian slave,
But secrets from the kings.

For good Saint Giles had won his heart
By his brave deed and bold,
And ere the great King did depart
His Christian faith he told.

And while the red Deer stood beside,
The King gave Giles his word
That e'er a Christian he would bide,
And keep what he had heard.

And so the monarch rode away
And left the two alone,
Saint Giles a happy man that day,
The good Deer still his own.

Safe from the eager hunting horde
The Saint would keep his friend,
Protected by the King's own word
Thenceforth unto the end.

For unmolested in his cell,
Careless of everything
Giles with his friendly Deer could dwell
Liege to a Christian King.

THE WOLF-MOTHER OF SAINT AILBE

THIS is the story of a poor little Irish baby whose cruel father and
mother did not care anything about him. But because they could not sell
him nor give him away they tried to lose him. They wrapped him in a
piece of cloth and took him up on the mountain side, and there they left
him lying all alone on a bush of heather.

Now an old mother wolf was out taking her evening walk on the mountain
after tending her babies in the den all day. And just as she was passing
the heather bush she heard a faint, funny little cry. She pricked up her
pointed ears and said, "What's that!" And lo and behold, when she came
to sniff out the mystery with her keen nose, it led her straight to the
spot where the little pink baby lay, crying with cold and hunger.

The heart of the kind mother wolf was touched, for she thought of her
own little ones at home, and how sad it would be to see them so helpless
and lonely and forgotten. So she picked the baby up in her mouth
carefully and ran home with him to her den in the rocks at the foot of
the mountain. Here t