254 BIRDS IN LEGEND 



reason of the Corn and all other Provisions were grown 

 strait, their allowance was shorten'd and they themselves 

 in a poor and lean condition. This Creature is by nature 

 of quick sense, and apprehensive of the least noise; so 

 that besides watchful through hunger, and restless, they 

 immediately discovered the coming of the Gauls; so that 

 running up and down, with their noise and cackling they 

 raised the whole camp." 



Manlius sprang from sleep, aroused a body of soldiers 

 and repelled the attack. It was the beginning of an 

 ultimate victory over the enemy. Rome was saved, 

 and in recognition of it Manilus was given the honorary 

 title Capitolinus, and for a long time afterward the 

 incident was celebrated annually by a procession to the 

 Capitol in which a golden goose was carried. Livy also 

 tells us in his history that the prototype of this golden 

 symbol was a single sentinel goose never seen before, 

 hence a divine aid sent to Rome for the purpose by the 

 gods. It is interesting to note that 



These consecrated geese in orders 

 That to the capitol were warders 

 And being then upon patrol 

 With noise alone beat off the Gaul, 



as Hudibras has it, were "sacred" to Juno, for this was 

 before the time when she, having changed from the 

 status of simple wife to Jupiter (and a model to human 

 wives), had become the imperious and trouble-making 

 empress of later days, and had discarded the motherly 

 goose for the exotic, proud, and royally splendid pea- 

 cock. This is a capital example of the adaptive char- 

 acter of the assignment of birds to the various demigods 

 of the Roman pantheon; and it suggests the query 



