young prince into a bird the color of the deep sky,
and of the great sorrow the princess felt when she saw the change and
beheld her lover flying all ruddy and dripping toward the window of the
tower in which she was shut up.

Fanny is very thoughtful when she hears this story.

"Was it a long, long time ago, Grandmother, that the blue bird flew
toward the tower where the princess was shut up?"

Grandmother replies that it was all a good while ago, those things, in
the days when animals could talk.

"Were you young then?" asks Fanny. "I wasn't born yet," says
Grandmother. And Fanny says to her: "I suppose a great many things
happened before you were born, didn't they, Grandmother?"

When they are through with their little talk Grandmother gives Fanny an
apple and some bread.

"Now run away, pet, and eat this in the yard."

And Fanny goes out into the yard, where there are trees and grass and
flowers and little birds.

II

[Illustration]

Trees and grass and flowers and little birds there were in
grandmother's yard. Fanny did not believe there was a prettier yard than
this in all the world. Already she takes her knife from her pocket to
cut her bread as the village people do. She crunches into the apple
first thing of all and then begins to munch her bread. Just then a
little bird comes fluttering near her, then another, and then a third,
then ten, twenty, thirty of them, all circling about her, some of them
gray, some red, some brown and green and blue, all of them so pretty,
and all singing. Fanny could not guess at first what they all wanted.
But soon she perceives that they are after bread, like little beggars.
They are indeed beggars, but they are also songsters. Fanny was too
kindhearted to refuse them bread when they paid for it with songs. She
was only a little farmer's girl and she did not know that once upon a
time, in a country where white rocks bathe in the blue sea, a blind old
man earned his bread singing songs to the shepherds, songs that learned
men admire even to this day. But her heart heard the little birds, and
she threw them crumbs that scarcely touched the earth before they caught
them in the air.

[Illustration: SOON SHE PERCEIVED THAT THEY WERE AFTER BREAD, LIKE
LITTLE BEGGARS. THEY WERE INDEED BEGGARS, BUT THEY WERE ALSO SONGSTERS.
FANNY WAS TOO KINDHEARTED TO REFUSE THEM BREAD WHEN THEY PAID FOR IT
WITH SONGS.

_Printed in France_]

Fanny saw that the birds were not all of t