So Ninorc’h went away with her pallid little girl, who led the poor lean cow by an old cord, and she sent them out upon the common together.
There May-flower stayed all day, watching her black cow, which with much ado contrived to pick a little grass between the stones. She spent her time in making little crosses with blossoms of the broom,[2] or in repeating aloud her Rosary and her favourite hymns.
One day, as she was singing the “Ave Maris Stella,” as she had heard it at Vespers in the church of Guirek, all at once she noticed a little bird perched upon one of the flower-crosses she had set in the earth. He was warbling sweetly, and turned his head from side to side, looking at her as if he longed to speak. Not a little surprised, she gently drew near and listened, but without being able to distinguish any meaning in his song. In vain he sang louder, flapped his wings, and fluttered about before May-flower. Not a whit the wiser was she for all this; and yet such pleasure did she take in watching and listening to him, that night came on without her being able to think of any thing else. At last the bird flew away; and when she looked up to see what had become of him, she saw the stars twinkling in the sky.
With all speed she started off to look for her cow, but to her dismay it was nowhere to be found upon the common. In vain she called aloud, in vain she beat the bushes, in vain she went down into each hollow where the rainwater had formed a pool. At last she heard her mother’s voice, calling her, as if some great misfortune had happened. All in a fright, she ran up to her, and there, at the edge of the heath, on the way homeward, she found the widow beside all that remained of the poor cow,—her horns, that is, and her bones, the latter well picked by the wolves, which had sallied forth from the neighbouring woods and made a meal of her.
At this sight May-flower felt her blood run cold. She burst into tears, for she loved the black cow she had tended so long, and falling on her knees exclaimed,
“Blessed Virgin, why did you not let me see the wolf? I would have scared him away with the sign of the cross; I would have repeated the charm that is taught to shepherd-boys who keep their flocks upon the mountains,—
‘Art thou wolf, St. Hervé shend[3] thee!
Art thou Satan, God defend me!’”[4]
The widow, who was a very saint for piety and resignation, seeing the sorrow of the little girl, sought to comfort her, saying,
“It is not well to weep for the cow as for a fellow-creature, my poor child; if the wolves and wicked men conspire against us, the Lord God will be on our side. Come, then, help me up with my bundle of heath, and let us go home.”