I 



THE RAVEN. 151 



Thou social, thou noisy, intelligent Bird ! ' ^ h"^ 



How oft I, delighted, thy cawing have heard !* 



a hoarse croaking noise ; may be taught to speak ; thievish, as 

 indeed are many of the genus ; builds inliigh trees, or on rocks ; 

 eggs bluish green, spotted with brown ; feeds on carrion, fishes, 

 &c; long lived ; smell said to be exquisite. The Greenlanders, 

 it is said, eat the flesh, make the skin into, garments, and the 

 split feathers into fishing lines. 



The croaking of the Raven is extremely disagreeable ; in the 

 silence and solitude of remote woods it is peculiarly appalling. . 

 It was formerly considered extremely ominous. The poets 

 have, of course, seized upon this : Drayton says 



" The greedy Raven ih?i{ for death dqtb call :" ^j 



' ;: ,■,■, Owl. .,, 



And quotes Pliny for his authority. And Shakespeare, 



** The Raven himself is hoarse "''' '*' . 

 That croaks the fatal entrance of I>laft<^ii' * 

 Under my battlements." '^^'"' '<^'' ^ 



MacbetKf Act i. Scene 5. 



* **^I Mfed *em at tha cottage door, 



When niornin, in tha spreng, 

 WAk'd vooath in youth an beauty too, 



An birds beginn'd ta zeng. 

 I hired 'em in tha winter-time, 



When, roustin vur aw^, 

 Tha visited tha Rookery, 



A whiverin by dk.'^ 



See a poem called the l^ooKERyf iti ray Observationg on the 



Dialects of the West of England^SccSic. 



