The SWAN, perhaps in Shakespeare’s day more abundant in this country than it is now, was then regarded as a “Bird Royal” which nobody could keep without a licence from the Crown, and provision for making a certain mark on the bird’s bill to denote its ownership. Our Sovereigns still maintain the Royal Swans on the Thames, and the young birds are regularly taken up in summer to receive the mark. To this bird full recognition has been paid by our dramatist. He places it before us in its usual watery domain, where its nest serves as a symbol of Britain set in the midst of the sea, “like a swan’s nest in a great pool.”[172] He lets us see

We watch the bird’s ungainly gait on land and are told that

The perfect stillness of the surface of a sheet of water is marked by

Again, we watch

The time-honoured legend that the “death-divining swan” utters a musical note or wail at the time of dying is repeatedly alluded to by the poet, and sometimes as if it were a reality. Lucrece, at her approaching death, like a

Prince Henry, son of King John, when told that his dying father had been singing, muses thus:

In the scene wherein Othello discovers the double-dyed villainy of Iago, a touching incident is the wandering language of the faithful dying Emilia, whose mind goes back to her beloved mistress:

More cheerful is the use of the legend by Portia when Bassanio stands before the caskets, and she, deeply interested in the result, commands

The TURKEY-COCK, introduced into Europe from the New World in the early part of the sixteenth century, had become quite naturalised in the farm-yards of England by the time of Elizabeth. It is several times alluded to by Shakespeare, sometimes as a symbol of conceited ostentation, and also as an article of food. When in King Henry V. Gower sees Pistol approaching, he exclaims to Fluellen “Here he comes, swelling like a turkey-cock,” to which the Welshman, who had resolved to make the braggart eat the leek, replies, “’Tis no matter for his swellings nor his turkey-cocks.”[181] Not less appropriately is the comparison used of Malvolio, who, as Maria said, had been “yonder i’ the sun practising behaviour to his own shadow this half hour.” As the three concealed onlookers watch him strutting down the walk, talking to himself, they can scarcely restrain themselves. Fabian entreats silence:

It will be remembered that among the produce on its way to London in the carts of the two carriers at the Rochester inn there was a pannier of live turkeys.[183]

The PEACOCK is alluded to several times in the Plays as the accepted personification of pride. Joan of Arc is represented as counselling the Princes:

Thersites says of Ajax that he “goes up and down the field asking for himself; he stalks up and down like a peacock—a stride and a stand.”[185] When King Henry V. mingles incognito among his soldiers in France, one of them tells him:

“‘Fly pride,’ says the peacock,” is a pithy proverb put into the mouth of Dromio of Syracuse.[187]

The DOVE and the PIGEON are often mentioned in Shakespeare’s writings, without any essential distinction being drawn between them. Thus, we read in one passage that “Venus yokes her silver doves,”[188] while in another place the birds appear as “Venus’ pigeons.”[189] Again, in a less poetical sphere, they are even interchanged as articles of food. On the one hand we find Justice Shallow ordering “some pigeons” and any other “pretty little tiny kickshaws” for the entertainment of Falstaff,[190] and on the other hand, we note that old Gobbo, when he wanted Bassanio to take his son into service, presents to that gentleman “a dish of doves.”[191]

The Dove is typically pure white, and stands as the recognised emblem of gentleness, purity and innocence. Yet in direst emergencies this timid bird may show fight in defence of its young. We are told that

It was believed that when “frighted out of fear” the dove would peck the ostrich,[193] and it had probably been actually observed in hawking experience, that as

The TURTLE-DOVE, long the accepted symbol of conjugal affection and loving tenderness, has an honoured place in Shakespeare’s pages.[195] We there read of “a pair of loving turtle-doves that could not live asunder day or night.”[196] Florizel takes Perdita’s hand in Winter’s Tale, with the significant assertion:

And at the end of the same Play, the widowed Paulina, when all around her has at last ended happily, desires to retire into solitude:

The Pigeon is not only presented as an article of food; but is sometimes slightingly alluded to, with reflections on its mode of feeding and its timidity. Of the “honey-tongued Boyet” it was remarked

And Hamlet, reflecting on his slowness to avenge his father’s murder, reproaches himself as “pigeon-liver’d and lacking gall.”[199]

I have reserved for the last section of this Essay the smaller birds, including the songsters, as these are noticed in Shakespeare’s Poems and Dramas. A number of them are grouped together by Bottom in the ditty, singing which he wakes the sleeping Fairy Queen:

Of the birds recounted in this song, Shakespeare’s favourite, if we may judge from the frequency and appreciation with which he mentions it, was the LARK. He makes this bird a rival to Chanticleer in the honour of setting the day agoing. He calls it “the morning lark,” “the herald of the morn,” specially associated with the brightness and glory of dawn.

Again

The blithe sound of the bird’s carol is commemorated in the line

How joyfully does this feeling find expression in the exquisite song in Cymbeline:

The bird-melodies of night and morning were never more delicately commingled than in the garden scene where Juliet, from her window above, would fain persuade her lingering lover that it was not yet near day:

The BLACKBIRD or OUZEL, depicted in Bottom’s song as “so black of hue, with orange-tawny bill,” though one of our most melodious songsters, receives no commendation from Shakespeare. It is only once again mentioned by him, when its name is used with a rather uncomplimentary meaning. When Justice Shallow enquires of his brother magistrate regarding his god-daughter, Silence replies, “Alas, a black ousel, cousin Shallow.”[205] It is a pity that the old and distinctive name ouzel for this bird has become obsolete, though it may still be heard in use in Scotland. On the other side of the Tweed, also, where so many linguistic relics of the old alliance with France still remain, the blackbird is likewise known by its French name of merle, while the common name of the thrush is mavis, likewise from the French mauvis.

The THRUSH or THROSTLE, another of our most musical warblers, is cited thrice by Shakespeare without any further comment on his voice than the compliment in Bottom’s song—“with his note so true.” The bird comes into one of Autolycus’ songs:

Our great dramatist refers to the WREN no fewer than nine times in his different Plays. Its small size is noticed, and the bird is credited with an amount of courage disproportionate to its stature. When Macduff flees to England his wife bitterly complains that he should have left her and his children without his protection:

When Imogen, recovering in the cave, hardly knows where she is, she muses With herself and prays:

Shakespeare hardly does justice to the notes of the wren, which are louder, sweeter and more varied than might have been looked for in so tiny a bird. Portia thought that if the nightingale sang by day it would be thought no better than the wren.[209] And, in another passage, words of consolation “from a hollow breast” are likened to “the chirping of a wren.”[210]

The WAGTAIL is alluded to once by the poet, when its name is used in contempt by Kent towards Goneril’s steward:

There is one reference by Shakespeare to the BUNTING, probably the common corn-bunting or bunting-lark, which is not unlike the lark, and further resembles that bird in nesting on the ground. In All’s Well that Ends Well, the old lord Lafeu, when assured by Bertram that he had mistaken the character of Parolles, remarks; “Then my dial goes not true; I took this lark for a bunting.”[212]

The REDBREAST or RUDDOCK is most fully referred to in Cymbeline. Arviragus enters, bearing in his arms Imogen, seemingly dead, and as he lays the body down he thus addresses it:

The list of signs whereby Speed knows that his master Valentine is in love begins thus: “first, you have learned, like Sir Proteus, to wreathe your arms, like a male-content; to relish a love-song, like a robin-redbreast; to walk alone, like one that had the pestilence.”[214] When Hotspur presses his wife to sing and she twice refuses, his only remark is, “’Tis the next way to turn tailor, or be redbreast-teacher.”[215]

The only allusion to the HEDGE-SPARROW occurs in King Lear. When Goneril has gone some way in her recrimination of her father, the Fool, who had just before called the old king “a shealed peascod,” breaks into the conversation with these lines:

The FINCH, included in Bottom’s song, is not elsewhere mentioned by the poet, though the epithet “finch-egg,” as a term of reproach, is hurled by Thersites at Patroclus.[217] Of the various English finches we may suppose that the bird intended was the common chaffinch.

The familiar HOUSE-SPARROW, though often mentioned by Shakespeare, receives little commendation from him. He twice connects it with evidence of the care of Providence, in obvious allusion to passages in Holy Writ. Hamlet observes that “there is special providence in the fall of a sparrow.”[218] Reference has already been made to the trust expressed by Orlando’s faithful old Adam in Him “that providently caters for the sparrow.”[219] The bird comes also into the presentation of classical deities in The Tempest, where Iris tells how Venus’

Thersites, who had been soundly thrashed by Ajax, takes his own method of revenge by declaring

The SWALLOW is cited in the Plays for the swiftness of its flight, and for its annual migration.[222] When Richmond gives the order to march for Bosworth Field, he adds,

The rapidity with which this bird can pursue its course, even close to the ground, had not escaped the poet’s notice. Titus, in praise of his stud, affirms

When Falstaff was rebuked for his dilatory journey to the field of battle, he justified himself thus:

The arrival of the swallow with spring is charmingly brought before us in this little picture of vernal flowers:

The regular disappearance of the bird on the approach of autumn is taken as a symbol of human constancy. Timon of Athens is assured by his associates:—“The swallow follows not summer more willing than we your lordship.”[227]

When King Duncan arrives at the Castle of Inverness, and is delighted with the situation of the building and the pleasantness of the air, Banquo calls his attention to the numerous nests of the house-martin as evidence of the salubrity of the climate:

I have reserved for the last place in the list of Shakespeare’s birds his references to the NIGHTINGALE. These are numerous and may be divided into two groups. In one of them the style is somewhat artificial in tone, reflecting not the poet’s own experience of the bird, but the legendary interpretation of its song that had been handed down from remote antiquity. In the other group, the nightingale takes its natural place as one of our familiar English songsters. There was a Greek myth that Philomela, the daughter of an Attic King, after being cruelly treated by her brother Tereus, was compassionately changed by the gods into a nightingale, and that thereafter she spent her life among woods lamenting in mournful notes the fate that had befallen her. Her name came to be given to the bird. Shakespeare, following this legend, introduces the bird as Philomel into his separate Poems and into the lyrics included in his dramas. In the ordinary dialogue of the Plays, however, dropping the Greek name and legend, he uses the common English appellation of the bird, and, like ancient and modern poets, speaks of the bird as feminine, although it is the male alone that sings.

Along with the ancient myth about Philomela he intertwined another and probably much more recent, but equally unfounded belief that the nightingale, when it sings, leans against a thorn that pierces its breast. This combination of ignorant fancies is most fully expressed in the following passage:

The same artificial note of sadness runs through the other allusions to Philomel. In Lucrece we read:

Again in the Sonnets:

The poet has brought Philomel into his fairy-land, and has for the moment left out any reference to the alleged mournfulness of her music:

In the Plays it is pleasant to find the bird with its English name and in natural surroundings. When Valentine, one of the Two Gentlemen of Verona, was banished from Milan and from the lady of his love, he pictured to himself among the woes that lay in front of him:

And when afterwards, through stress of circumstances, he found himself compelled to become the captain of a band of outlaws, he found consolation in this wise:

It will be recollected that among the tantalising tricks played off by the lord and his servants upon Christopher Sly, he was asked

Nor can we forget the magnanimous offer of Bottom when he wanted to play the part of the lion, and the danger of his frightening the duchess and the ladies was pointed out to him:

The romance of the nightingale’s song was never more thoroughly discarded than by Portia when she returned from her memorable trip to Venice and found a light and music in her hall. She remarked to Nerissa that by night music sounds much sweeter than by day, and received in reply the explanation that “Silence bestows that virtue on it, madam.” Portia, however, with her ingenuity of a barrister, insisted in a passage already referred to: