LECTURE VI. 201 



the united testimonies of all modern naturalists, 

 the admired song of the Nightingale is that of 

 the male bird, who thus employs himself, as if to 

 entertain and soothe the female during her task 

 of incubation; so that the celebrated lines of 

 Virgil, however beautiful in point of poetry, are 

 in reality inaccurate in point of natural history. 



Qualis populea moerens Philomela sub umbra 

 Amissos queritur foetus^ quos durus arator 

 Observans, nido implumes detraxit ; at ilia 

 Flet noctem, ramoque sedens^ miserabile carmen 

 Integrat, et moestis late loca questibus implet. 



So close in poplar shades, her children gone. 



The mother Nightingale laments alone : 



Whose nest some prying churl had found, and thence^ 



By stealth, convey'd th' unfeather'd innocence. 



But she supplies the night with mournful strains. 



And melancholy music fills the plains. 



Among the very numerous species of the genus 

 Motacilla, every one must be acquainted with the 

 common Water- Wagtail, or M. Alba of Linnaeus^ 

 but so very marked and peculiar is the appearance 

 of this bird and a few others nearly allied to it, 

 that Dr. Latham in his excellent Ornithology, 

 has instituted for these birds a separate genus to 



