Then they melted the statue in a furnace, and the Mayor held a meeting of the Corporation to decide what was to be done with the metal. `We must have another statue, of course,' he said, `and it shall be a statue of myself.'

`Of myself,' said each of the Town Councillors, and they quarrelled. When I last heard of them they were quarrelling still.

`What a strange thing!' said the overseer of the workmen at the foundry. `This broken lead heart will not melt in the furnace. We must throw it away.' So they threw it on a dust-heap where the dead Swallow was also lying.

`Bring me the two most precious things in the city,' said God to one of His Angels; and the Angel brought Him the leaden heart and the dead bird.

`You have rightly chosen,' said God, `for in my garden of Paradise this little bird shall sing for evermore, and in my city of gold the Happy Prince shall praise me.'