THE BIRD OF POPULAR SONG故事

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　THE BIRD OF POPULAR SONG故事
　　    IT is winter-time. The earth wears a snowy garment, and
　　    looks like marble hewn out of the rock; the air is bright and
　　    clear; the wind is sharp as a well-tempered sword, and the
　　    trees stand like branches of white coral or blooming almond
　　    twigs, and here it is keen as on the lofty Alps.
　　    The night is splendid in the gleam of the Northern Lights,
　　    and in the glitter of innumerable twinkling stars.
　　    But we sit in the warm room, by the hot stove, and talk
　　    about the old times. And we listen to this story:
　　    By the open sea was a giant's grave; and on the
　　    grave-mound sat at midnight the spirit of the buried hero, who
　　    had been a king. The golden circlet gleamed on his brow, his
　　    hair fluttered in the wind, and he was clad in steel and iron.
　　    He bent his head mournfully, and sighed in deep sorrow, as an
　　    unquiet spirit might sigh.
　　    And a ship came sailing by. Presently the sailors lowered
　　    the anchor and landed. Among them was a singer, and he
　　    approached the royal spirit, and said,
　　    "Why mournest thou, and wherefore dost thou suffer thus?"
　　    And the dead man answered,
　　    "No one has sung the deeds of my life; they are dead and
　　    forgotten. Song doth not carry them forth over the lands, nor
　　    into the hearts of men; therefore I have no rest and no
　　    peace."
　　    And he spoke of his works, and of his warlike deeds, which
　　    his contemporaries had known, but which had not been sung,
　　    because there was no singer among his companions.
　　    Then the old bard struck the strings of his harp, and sang
　　    of the youthful courage of the hero, of the strength of the
　　    man, and of the greatness of his good deeds. Then the face of
　　    the dead one gleamed like the margin of the cloud in the
　　    moonlight. Gladly and of good courage, the form arose in
　　    splendor and in majesty, and vanished like the glancing of the
　　    northern light. Nought was to be seen but the green turfy
　　    mound, with the stones on which no Runic record has been
　　    graven; but at the last sound of the harp there soared over
            
            

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　　    the hill, as though he had fluttered from the harp, a little
　　    bird, a charming singing-bird, with ringing voice of the
　　    thrush, with the moving voice pathos of the human heart, with
　　    a voice that told of home, like the voice that is heard by the
　　    bird of passage. The singing-bird soared away, over mountain
　　    and valley, over field and wood- he was the Bird of Popular
　　    Song, who never dies.
　　    We hear his song- we hear it now in the room while the
　　    white bees are swarming without, and the storm clutches the
　　    windows. The bird sings not alone the requiem of heroes; he
　　    sings also sweet gentle songs of love, so many and so warm, of
　　    Northern fidelity and truth. He has stories in words and in
　　    tones; he has proverbs and snatches of proverbs; songs which,
　　    like Runes laid under a dead man's tongue, force him to speak;
　　    and thus Popular Song tells of the land of his birth.
　　    In the old heathen days, in the times of the Vikings, the
　　    popular speech was enshrined in the harp of the bard.
　　    In the days of knightly castles, when the strongest fist
　　    held the scales of justice, when only might was right, and a
　　    peasant and a dog were of equal importance, where did the Bird
　　    of Song find shelter and protection? Neither violence nor
　　    stupidity gave him a thought.
　　    But in the gabled window of the knightly castle, the lady
　　    of the castle sat with the parchment roll before her, and
　　    wrote down the old recollections in song and legend, while
　　    near her stood the old woman from the wood, and the travelling
　　    peddler who went wandering through the country. As these told
　　    their tales, there fluttered around them, with twittering and
　　    song, the Bird o
　　f Popular Song, who never dies so long as the
　　    earth has a hill upon which his foot may rest.
　　    And now he looks in upon us and sings. Without are the
　　    night and the snow-storm. He lays the Runes beneath our
　　    tongues, and we know the land of our home. Heaven speaks to us
　　    in our native tongue, in the voice of the Bird of Popular
　　    Song. The old remembrances awake, the faded colors glow with a
            
            

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　　    fresh lustre, and story and song pour us a blessed draught
　　    which lifts up our minds and our thoughts, so that the evening
　　    becomes as a Christmas festival.
　　    The snow-flakes chase each other, the ice cracks, the
　　    storm rules without, for he has the might, he is lord- but not
　　    the LORD OF ALL.
　　    It is winter time. The wind is sharp as a two-edged sword,
　　    the snow-flakes chase each other; it seems as though it had
　　    been snowing for days and weeks, and the snow lies like a
　　    great mountain over the whole town, like a heavy dream of the
　　    winter night. Everything on the earth is hidden away, only the
　　    golden cross of the church, the symbol of faith, arises over
　　    the snow grave, and gleams in the blue air and in the bright
　　    sunshine.
　　    And over the buried town fly the birds of heaven, the
　　    small and the great; they twitter and they sing as best they
　　    may, each bird with his beak.
　　    First comes the band of sparrows: they pipe at every
　　    trifle in the streets and lanes, in the nests and the houses;
　　    they have stories to tell about the front buildings and the
　　    back buildings.
　　    "We know the buried town," they say; "everything living in
　　    it is piep! piep! piep!"
　　    The black ravens and crows flew on over the white snow.
　　    "Grub, grub!" they cried. "There's something to be got
　　    down there; something to swallow, and that's most important.
　　    That's the opinion of most of them down there, and the opinion
　　    is goo-goo-good!"
　　    The wild swans come flying on whirring pinions, and sing
　　    of the noble and the great, that will still sprout in the
　　    hearts of men, down in the town which is resting beneath its
　　    snowy veil.
　　    No death is there- life reigns yonder; we hear it on the
　　    notes that swell onward like the tones of the church organ,
　　    which seize us like sounds from the elf-hill, like the songs
　　    of Ossian, like the rushing swoop of the wandering spirits'
　　    wings. What harmony! That harmony speaks to our hearts, and
            
            

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　　    lifts up our souls! It is the Bird of Popular Song whom we
　　    hear.
　　    And at this moment the warm breath of heaven blows down
　　    from the sky. There are gaps in the snowy mountains, the sun
　　    shines into the clefts; spring is coming, the birds are
　　    returning, and new races are coming with the same home sounds
　　    in their hearts.
　　    Hear the story of the year: "The night of the snow-storm,
　　    the heavy dream of the winter night, all shall be dissolved,
　　    all shall rise again in the beauteous notes of the Bird of
　　    Popular Song, who never dies!"
　　    THE END