I returned the salute and again took up my pen. I am undoubtedly an old Rook. Old as I am I have no notion of concealing my age. I was once young, that I can well remember, young as the Starlings yonder, and less giddy, having a proper notion of the respect due to age. Old age, in spite of all its infirmities, would meet with greater marks of tenderness and reverence if we thought a little more of the silent grave, on whose brink the feeble steps are tottering. As far as I can remember I was married then; yes, when I was young, that is true, it is some fifty years ago, and I seemed to grow old in a day when I lost my dear husband. How strangely the scene comes back to my poor old head. It was a dreadful day, the wind was moaning dismally through the crevices of the old tower, while the thunder, bursting in terrible peals from the dark sky, shook the foundations of the grim cathedral, making its grey stones tremble as if with fear. Chill rain fell in torrents, and for the first time menaced our nest, though it was well protected under one of the doorways of the Cathedral of Strasbourg. “I am dying!” said a feeble, yet resolute voice. That was my husband, poor dear; he made up his mind to die {370} and he died. He was always a very determined bird. “Mind the young ones, love!” These were his last words, and I did mind them, at least I tried to, but they, all of them, died within a week. [Illustration] Worst of all, I could not die myself, and a sort of consolation did {371} steal into my widowed heart, that made me feel I would not be justified in dying. “Travel,” said an old Stork, who had nursed my husband. “You will start inconsolable, you will return calmed if not consoled. Many griefs have been starved out and left behind on the king’s highways.” This Stork was esteemed as a very sensible creature, but the world had hardened her heart: I would sooner kill my children than stifle grief! My children, alas! where are they? A number of friendly Crows, our neighbours, lent weight to the Stork’s advice by urging me to leave the old scenes, and I did leave the place, although I almost felt certain that my husband and little ones would reappear some day. Talk of travelling! why, I have travelled without halting almost for the last fifty years, but it did not take me a fiftieth part of that time to find out that the worldly old Stork was right.