234 The Birds of Virgil. 



Inter se in foliis strepitant ; juvat imbribus actis, 

 Progeniem parvam dulcesque revisere natos. 1 



That in these last beautiful lines corvus means a 

 Rook, no Englishman is likely to deny ; yet there 

 are two difficulties to be put aside before we can 

 make the assertion with entire confidence. The 

 first is, that Virgil, here following Aratus, trans- 

 lated by corvus the Greek word xopo, which is 

 not generally accepted as meaning a Rook. This 

 is the word which the Greek historian Polybius 

 uses for those naval machines invented by the 

 Romans, in the first war with Carthage, for 

 grappling with a hooked projecting beak the 

 galleys of the enemy ; and the rook's bill is 

 hardly so well suited to give a name to such an 

 engine as that of the crow or raven, 2 which has 

 the tip of the upper mandible sharply bent down- 



1 Soft then the voice of rooks from indrawn throat 

 Thrice, four times, o'er repeated, and full oft 

 On their high cradles, by some hidden joy 

 Gladdened beyond their wont, in bustling throngs 

 Among the leaves they riot ; so sweet it is 

 When showers are spent, their own loved nests again 

 And tender brood to visit. Georg. i. 410. 

 2 Sundevall (Thierarten des Aristoteles, p. 123) pronounces 

 t;6a to have been our Raven. 



