The Heart of the Valley would die en route the following year. Her offspring also migrated though five of them also died but the one raised by the dunnocks survived. The mother dunnock died the following winter during a cold spell and was eaten by a fox. The surviving male dunnock mated the following year and had six offspring. The story ends with the writer taking a walk in the valley. The author once narrowly missed hitting a bird whilst driving to a railway station. On the train journey he imagined what might have happened if he hit the bird and it became the starting
The Bird 'Grip' ever after. While the hero in these stories is normally aided by a talking animal, for it to be a ghost is unusual. This is the grateful dead, a common folklore motif, found also in "Fair Brow". The Bird 'Grip' The Bird 'Grip' is a Swedish fairy tale. Andrew Lang included it "The Pink Fairy Book". It is Aarne-Thompson type 550, the quest for the golden bird/firebird; other tales of this type include "The Golden Bird", "The Greek Princess and the Young Gardener", "How Ian Direach got the Blue Falcon", "The Nunda, Eater of People", and "Tsarevitch Ivan, the Fire