The oystercatcher is still known among the Gaels of northern Scotland as St. Bride’s lad, says Seton Gordon (_Nineteenth Century_, 1923, p. 420) from the fact that when that saint first visited Long Island she carried an oystercatcher in each hand; also, there is an old Gaelic tradition that this bird covered Jesus with seaweed when his enemies appeared in hot pursuit. The oystercatcher was therefore blessed, and still shows, as it flies, the form of a cross on its plumage.
A Spanish legend asserts that the owl was once the sweetest of singers; but that, having been present when Jesus died, from that moment it has shunned daylight, and now only repeats in a harsh tone _Cruz! Cruz!_
Most of the legends of the Cross, so far as concern birds, at least, seem to have arisen in Sweden. The Swedes say, for example, that a swallow hovered over the Crucifixion crying _Svale! Svale!_ “Cheer up! Cheer up!” and it is therefore called in their country the bird of consolation. A similar story is current in Scandinavia of the stork, which is said to have cried to the Redeemer, as it flew about the Cross, _Styrket! Styrket!_ “Strengthen ye.” In both cases there is a play on the Swedish names of these birds; but they testify that the stork, now virtually mute, formerly had a voice. In Sweden, where the red crossbill is a familiar winter bird, arose the tradition that its peculiarly crossed beak became twisted by its efforts to pull the nails from Christ’s hands and feet:
Stained with blood and never tiring With its beak it doth not cease, From the Cross ’t would free the Saviour Its creator’s son release.
And the Saviour speaks in mildness: Blest be thou of all the good! Bear as token of this moment Marks of blood and holy rood.
So Longfellow paraphrases Julius Mosen’s little German hymn.
The same loving service has been attributed to the red-browed goldfinch of Europe in a legend current in Great Britain—a story put into verse in _The Spectator_ (London, 1910) by Pamela Tenant, partly thus:
Held in his slender beak the cruel thing, Still with his gentle might endeavoring But to release it.
Then as he strove, spake One—a dying space— ‘Take, for thy pity, as a sign of grace, ‘Semblance of this, my blood, upon thy face ‘A living glory.’