e
country flew every night from far and wide to the famous crow-roost, not
far from a big peach orchard. They came down from the mountain that
showed like a long blue ridge against the sky. They flew across a road
that looked, on account of the color of the dirt, like a pinkish-red
ribbon stretching off and away. They left the river-edge and the fields.
Every night they gathered together, a thousand or more of them. Corbie's
father and mother were among them, and Corbie's two brothers and two
sisters. But Corbie was not with those thousand crows.

No cage held him, and no one prevented his flying whither he wished;
but Corbie stayed with the folk who had adopted him. A thousand wild
crows might come and go, calling in their flight, but Corbie, though
free, chose for his comrades the Brown-eyed Boy and the Blue-eyed Girl.

I thought all along it would be so if they were good to him; and that is
why I said, the day he was kidnaped, that you need not be sorry for
Corbie--not very.

VIII

ARDEA'S SOLDIER

In years long gone by, soldiers called "knights" used to protect the
rights of other people; and, when the weak were in danger, these
soldiers went forth to fight for them. They were so brave, these knights
of old, that there was nothing that could make them afraid. Dragons
even, which looked like crocodiles, with leather wings and terrible
snatching claws and fiery eyes and breath that smoked--dragons, even, so
the stories go, could not turn a knight away from his path of duty.
Mind, I am not telling you that there ever were creatures that looked
like that; but certain it is that there were dangers dreadful to meet,
and "dragon" is a very good name to call them by.

You know, do you not, that there are soldiers, still, who protect the
rights of others; and although we do not commonly call them "knights,"
they still fight for the weak, and are so brave that dangers as fearsome
as dragons, even, cannot scare them.

There was such a soldier in Ardea's camp; and if he had lived in olden
days, he would probably have been called "Knight of the Snowy Heron."

Ardea was a bride that spring, and perhaps never was there one much
lovelier. Her wedding garment was the purest white; and instead of a
veil she wore, draped from her shoulders, snowy plumes of rare beauty,
which reached to the bottom of her gown, where the dainty tips curled up
a bit, then hung like the finest fringe.

[Illustration: _She wore, draped f