bow struck the robin and pierced his heart. The robin was carolling in the
linden, but his song was ended suddenly, and the innocent bird fell dying
from the tree. "Oh, it is only a robin," said the huntsman, and with a
careless laugh he went on his way.

The robin lay upon the mosses at the foot of the linden, close beside the
violet. But he neither saw nor heard anything, for his life was nearly
gone. The violet tried to bind his wound and stay the flow of his heart's
blood, but her tender services were vain. The robin died without having
seen her sweet face or heard her gentle voice.

Then the other birds of the greenwood came to mourn over their dead
friend. The moles and the mice dug a little grave and laid the robin in
it, after which the birds brought lichens and leaves, and covered the dead
body, and heaped earth over all, and made a great lamentation. But when
they went away, the violet remained; and after the sun had set, and the
greenwood all was dark, the violet bent over the robin's grave and kissed
it, and sang to the dead robin. And the violet watched by the robin's
grave for weeks and months, her face pressed forward toward that tiny
mound, and her gentle voice always singing softly and sweetly about the
love she never had dared to tell.

Often after that the south wind and the brook came wooing her, but she
never heard them, or, if she heard them, she did not answer. The vine that
lived near the chestnut yonder said the violet was greatly changed; that
from being a merry, happy thing, she had grown sad and reticent; she used
to hold up her head as proudly as the others, but now she seemed broken
and weary. The shrubs and flowers talked it all over many and many a time,
but none of them could explain the violet's strange conduct.