have told in print before, it runs:—The feathered sages assembled to choose a ruler, and they decided on accepting the candidate who should attain the highest flight. Off started the eagle and the wren, and up, up, up they went. At first the latter appeared to have the advantage because he rose in a straight line, while his antagonist, as his manner is, described great circles in his flight. After a time, however, the little wings grew weary, and the crafty wren, all unfelt, dropped down on the labouring eagle's back. When the huge bird was tired, he stopped. "Where art thou, wren?" he said. "Here, above thee!" was the answer, as the cunning tiny one spread his wings and made his last spurt. So the wren was king; and king he is called in most European languages.
When Drayton says that the Falcon "loved the Owl, and held him only dear,"[1] and refers to Pliny as his authority, I suppose he is thinking of what that authority sets down in his chapter[2] concerning the owlet. When surrounded by more enemies than it can overcome, the owlet "throws itself on its back, and so, resisting with feet and rolling up its body into a mass, defends itself with the beak and talons, until the hawk, attracted by a certain natural affinity, comes to his assistance and takes its share of the combat."[3] Pleasant hours must Drayton have spent poring over Holland's translation of the credulous old naturalist, who, however, throws no light (as far as I can find) on the meaning of his disciple's assertion,—
"The hens (to women) sanctity express,
Hallowing their eggs."
- ↑ The Owl [iv. 1295].
- ↑ Book x. ch. 19. In the Owl and the Nightingale, pp. 4, 5 (Percy Society), the owl is reproached with having laid its "fole ey" in the "faukun's" nest, and with causing a domestic broil in consequence. The hen-falcon declares—
"I-wis it was ure ozer brother,
The zond that haved that grete heved."The poem probably belongs to the latter end of the twelfth century.
- ↑ Although the action of The Owl takes place in May, the birds arrange for the consummation of their matrimonial designs at St. Valentine—rather a long engagement in such an unconventional society as theirs must be.—Cf. iv. 1289, 1291, &c.
