Page:A book of folk-lore (1913).djvu/16

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the parapets and saw the enemy engaged in planting ladders. Instantly they caught up some bee-hives that were on the walls and flung them among the assailants. The bees rushed out, and proved such terrible lanz-knects that the Linzers were routed and sent flying helter-skelter home. Can the story be doubted? The citizens of Andernach point to the figures of the two youths carved in stone at one of the portals, and tell you that this was done in acknowledgment of their achievement.

At Ballyrawney in Ireland a story is told to this effect. About eight centuries ago a powerful chief, on the point of waging war against the head of another clan, seeing the inferiority of his troops, begged St Gobnat to assist him, and this was in a field near where the battle was about to be fought. In this field was a bee-hive, and the saint granted the request by turning the bees into spearmen, who issued from the hive with all the ardour of warriors, fell on the enemy, and put him to rout. After the battle the conquering chief revisited the spot whence he had received such miraculous aid, when he found that the straw hive had been metamorphosed into an article shaped like a helmet and composed of brass. This relic remains to this day in