126 



THE DOMESTIC SWAN. 



no guns alarm them, and no foxes prowl to 

 pounce upon them. Hence they are seen 

 walking to and fro in all parts of the park ; 

 and they will take the bread from your hand 

 with a familiarity that at once bespeaks their 

 unconsciousness of danger. 



The supposed melody of the dying swan 

 seems to be a fable of remote antiquity. I 

 have long been anxious to find out upon what 

 grounds the ancients could possibly attach 

 melody to an expiring bird, which neither in 

 youth nor in riper years ever shows itself gifted 

 with the power of producing a single inflection 

 of the voice that can be pronounced melodious. 



Ovid, no doubt, was well skilled in real 

 ornithology, for in every part of his Metamor- 

 phoses we can trace some of the true habits of 

 birds, and often see their natural propensities 

 through the mystic veil which his poetical 

 fancy had so dexterously placed before them* 

 Still the swan is an exception ; for there is 

 nothing whatever to be perceived in the entire 

 economy of this bird that can, by any turning 

 or twisting, justify Ovid's remark, that it will 

 warble its own funereal song on the near ap- 

 proach of death. 



