280 The Journey of Rheinfrid

beautiful women who came towards him
singing a song more strange and sweet than
he had everheard. He told his fellows, and
the story spread far and wide. Some said
that the three beautiful women were three
goddesses of the old pagan world, and
thought Eoves had acted very foolishly in
not speaking to them. Others said they
might have been the Three Fates, in whose
hands are the lives of men, and the joy of
their lives, and the sorrow they must endure,
and the death which is the end of their
days; and they thought that perhaps Eoves
had been wise to keep silence. :

But when the holy Bishop Egwin heard
the tale, he visited the place alone, and in
the first glimmer of the sunrise, when all wild
creatures are tame and the earth is most
lovely to look upon, he beheld the three
beautiful women, and he saw in a moment
that they were the Virgin Mother Mary and
two heavenly handmaidens. “And our
Lady,” he used afterwards to say, “ was
more white-shining than lilies and more
freshly sprung than roses, and the savage
forest was filled with the fragrance of Para-
dise.”