i 4 2 BIRDS IN LEGEND 



glossy are his feet — as old Robert Chester sang it in 

 Love's Martyr: 



The proud sun-loving peacocke with his feathers, 



Walkes all alone, thinking himself a king, 



And with his voyce prognosticates all weathers, 



Although God knows but badly doth he sing; 



But when he lookes downe to his base blacke feete, 



He droops, and is asham'd of things unmeete. 



A still earlier poet had sung of this secret chagrin 

 attributed to the conceited fowl, and had accounted for 

 it by a popular Moslem tradition, illustrated to this day 

 by the fact that the Devil-worshipping sect of Yezd, in 

 northern Mesopotamia, reverence the peacock as the ac- 

 complice of Eblis, which is Satan; my reference is to the 

 Persian Azz' Eddin Elmocadessi, 88 who wrote — 



The peacock wedded to the world, 



Of all her gorgeous plumage vain, 

 With glowing banners wide unfurled, 



Sweeps slowly by in proud disdain; 

 But in her heart a torment lies, 

 That dims the lustre of those eyes; 

 She turns away her glance — but no, 

 Her hideous feet appear below ! 

 And fatal echoes, deep and loud, 



Her secret mind's dark caverns stir; 

 She knows, though beautiful and proud, 



That Paradise is not for her. 

 For, when in Eden's blissful spot 



Lost Eblis tempted man, she dared 

 To join the treach'rous angel's plot 



And thus his crime and sentence shared. 

 Her frightful claws remind her well 

 Of how she sinned and how she fell. 



The native home of this resplendent pheasant is India 

 and Malaya, and the brilliance of its plumage (in the 



