SONG OF THE SWAN. 203 



uttered A while the female gave G sharp, there would 

 result the harshest and most insupportable of discords. 

 We may add that this dialogue is subjected to a constant 

 and regular rhythm, with the measure of two times (?). 

 The keeper assured me that during their amours, these 

 birds have a cry still sharper, but much more agreeable." 



The late Charles Waterton once had an opportunity, 

 which rarely occurs, of seeing a swan die from natural 

 causes. " Although I gave no credence," he says,* " to the 

 extravagant notion which antiquity had entertained of 

 melody from the mouth of the dying swan, still I felt 

 anxious to hear some plaintive sound or other, some soft 

 inflection of the voice, which might tend to justify that 

 notion in a small degree. But I was disappointed. He 

 nodded, and then tried to recover himself, and then 

 nodded again, and again held up his head ; till, at last, 

 quite enfeebled and worn out, his head fell gently on the 

 grass, his wings became expanded a trifle or so, and he 

 died whilst I was looking on. He never even uttered his 

 wonted cry, nor so much as a sound to indicate what he 

 felt within. 



" The silence which this bird maintained to the last 

 tends to show that the dying song of the swan is nothing 

 but a fable, the origin of which is lost in the shades of 

 antiquity. Its repetition can be of no manner of use, 

 save as a warning to ornithologists not to indulge in the 



* " Essays on Natural History," second series, p. 128. 



