190 
&nd melody of voice, thought that real, 
which was only intended figuratively. 
Buffon in his usual flowery style observes 
" that it was not enough that the Swan 
sung admirably ; the ancients ascribed to it 
a prophetic spirit. It alone of animated 
beings, which all shudder at the prospect 
of destruction, chanted in the moment of 
its agony, and, with harmonious sounds, 
prepared to breathe the last sigh. When 
about to expire, they said, and to bid a 
sad and tender adieu to life, the Swan 
poured forth those accents so sweet, so af- 
fecting, and which, like a gentle and dole- 
ful murmur, with a voice low, plaintive, 
and melancholy, formed its funereal song, 
this tearful music was heard at the dawn 
of day, when the winds and the waves 
were still ; and they have been seen ex- 
piring with the notes of their dying hymn. 
No fiction of natural history, no fable of 
antiquity, was ever more celebrated, of- 
tener repeated, or better received. It occu- 
pied the soft and lively imagination of the 
Greeks, Poets, Orators, even Philosophers, 
adopted it as a truth too pkasing to be 
