280 
RAVEN. 
“ My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among 
ten thousand. His head is as the most fine gold, 
his locks are bushy, and black as a Raven !”* 
The above mentioned circumstances taken into consideration, 
one should suppose that the lot of the subject of this chapter would 
have been of a different complexion from what history and tradi- 
tion inform us is the fact. But in every country we are told the 
Raven is considered an ominous bird, whose croakings foretell ap- 
proaching evil ; and many a crooked beldam has given interpreta- 
tion to these oracles, of a nature to infuse terror into a whole com- 
munity. Hence this ill-fated bird, immemorially, has been the in- 
nocent subject of vulgar obloquy and detestation. 
Augury, or the art of foretelling future events by the flight, 
cries, or motions of birds, descended from the Chaldeans to the 
Greeks, thence to the Etrurians, and from them it was transmitted 
to the Romans. f The crafty legislators of these celebrated nations, 
from a deep knowledge of human nature, made superstition a prin- 
cipal feature of their religious ceremonies ; well knowing that it 
required a more than ordinary policy to govern a multitude, ever 
liable to the fatal influences of passion ; and who without some 
timely restraints would burst forth like a torrent, whose course is 
marked by wide-spreading desolation. Hence to the purposes of 
polity the Raven was made subservient ; and the Romans having 
* Song of Solomon, v, 9, 10, 11. 
f That the science of augury is very ancient, we learn from the Hebrew lawgiver, who 
prohibits it, as well as every other kind of divination. Deut. chap, xviii. The Romans derived 
their knowledge of augury chiefly from the Tuscans or Etrurians, who practised it in the earliest 
times. This art was known in Italy before the time of Romulus, since that prince did not 
commence the building of Rome till he had taken the auguries. The successors of Romulus, 
from a conviction of the usefulness of the science, and at the same time not to render it con- 
temptible by becoming too familiar, employed the most skilful augurs from Etruria to intro- 
duce the practice of it into their religious ceremonies. And by a decree of the senate, some of 
the youth of the best families in Rome were annually sent into Tuscany to be instructed in this 
art. Vide Ciceron, de Divin. Also Calmet, and the abb6 Banier. 
