246 
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 considera- 
tion, one would suppose that the lot of the subject of this chap- 
ter would have been of a different complexion from what his- 
tory and tradition inform us is the fact. But in every country 
we are told the raven is considered an ominous bird, whose 
croakings foretell approaching evil ,* and many a crooked beldam 
has given interpretation to these oracles, of a nature to infuse 
terror into a whole community. Hence this ill-fated bird, 
from time immemorial, has been the innocent 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 trans- 
mitted to the Romans.f The crafty legislators of those cele- 
brated nations, from a deep knowledge of human nature, made 
superstition a principal 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 de- 
solation. Hence to the purposes of polity the raven was made 
* Song of Solomon, v. 9, 10, 11. ' 
f That the science of augury is very ancient, we learn from the Hebrew law- 
giver, 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 build- 
ing 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 contemptible by becoming too familiar, employed the most skilful augurs from 
Etruria to introduce 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 an- 
nually sent into Tuscany to be instructed in this art. — Vide Ciceron, de JDivin, ; 
also Calmet and the Abbe Banier. 
