22 HOOPER OR WILD SWAN. 



On this pond also has been killed the HOOPER, or wild 

 swan, whose grand trumpeting note I have heard while 

 skaiting here by moonlight ; and though I cannot say that 

 in this sound there is anything in the way of a song, 

 yet to me it is noble and pleasing. By the way, I would 

 remark that I recollect nothing in Virgil, who is, and ever 

 shall be, the poet of Nature, that leads me to suppose 

 that he considered the swan a bird of song. I will give 

 one or two passages which occur to me at this moment, 

 which, if not very precisely quoted, will certainly convey 

 the poet's meaning : 



Ceu quondam nivei liquida inter nubila cycni 

 Cum sese e pastu referunt, et longa canoros 

 Dant per colla modos : sonat amnis, et Asia longe 

 Pulsa palus. 



Nee quisquam aeratas acies ex agmine tanto 

 Misceri putet, aeriam sed gurgite ab alto 

 Urgeri volucrum raucarum ad litora nubem. 



Now, I grant the word ' canoros/ by a critic disposed to 

 make swans sing, might be translated ' warbling,' ' melo- 

 dious : ' but its true meaning is ' loud,' ' shrill : ' but sup- 

 posing the swan-singers translate the word 'warbling,' how 

 in the name of fortune, will such a translation agree with 



point of land ; once or twice the water grew a few inches deeper, or perhaps 

 only seemed to do so as a larger wave than usual passed by me, but soon it was 

 regularly and gradually shallower, and then one of my two companions took to 

 water and followed in my wake, and thus we walked with all imaginable com- 

 posure to the shore. I have often thought it must have been a fine sight, had 

 there been lookers on, to see us gradually growing taller and taller as the water 

 grew shallower and shallower. When the capsized craft had drifted conside- 

 rably towards the land, my other companion was rescued by a horseman who 

 backed his steed into the water and took the shivering sailor up behind 

 him. E. N. 



