NOTES BY THE WAY. 189 



we have the " red-hipped humble-bee," and we have 

 the thistle, and there is no more likely place to look 

 for the humble-bee in midsummer than on a thistle- 

 blossom. 



But the following picture of a " wet spell " is more 

 English than American : 



" The ox hath therefore stretch'd his yoke in vain, 

 The plowman lost his sweat ; and the green corn 

 Hath rotted ere his youth attain'd a beard ; 

 The fold stands empty in the drowned field, 

 And crows are fatted with the murrain flock." 



Shakespeare knew the birds and wild fowl, and 

 knew them perhaps as a hunter, as well as a poet. 

 At least this passage would indicate as much : 



" As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye, 

 Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort, 

 Rising and cawing at the gun's report, 

 Sever themselves and madly sweep the sky.'* 



In calling the choughs " russet-pated," he makes the 

 bill tinge the whole head, or perhaps gives the effect 

 of the birds' markings when seen at a distance ; the 

 bill is red, the head is black. The chough is a spe- 

 cies of crow. 



A poet must know the birds well to make one of 

 his characters say, when he had underestimated a 

 man, " I took this lark for a bunting," as Lafeu says 

 of Parolles in All 's Well that Ends Well." The 

 English bunting (Emberiza miliaria) is a field bird 

 ike the lark, and much resembles the latter in form 

 nd color, but is far inferior as a songster. Indeed, 



