10
10THE PIED PIPER
Their resolve was strong, as their purpose and their skill,
But to man’s cunning that draws them out at his will,
And to the piper’s tunes that with false promises lure,
An antidote they must seek, very quickly to be sure.
Athena was a fine raconteur, but even she found telling the history of the animals very difficult. Though it was eventful, it was not so, in the sense that the progress from the first day they met together and brooded on the tragedy, to the day ultimately when they could say that they had become free, took a long time to happen; and between each perceptible change, and progress from one stage to another took a dreary length of time. Crossing each stage and graduating to the next needed a fresh trigger which did not come by so easily because it w
