BIRDS IN " THE ILIAD. 
EMII.Y C. THOMPSON. 
THE universe is so ordered that 
Birds are essential to the life of 
Man. To-day we believe this 
and value them accordingly. 
Years ago as well as now the birds held 
the same relation toward man but the 
latter did not then understand this re- 
lationship as we do in this age of scien- 
tific enlightenment. About twenty- 
eight hundred years ago, nine hundred 
years before the beginning of our era, a 
poet flourished in the East, or certain 
poets as some scholars maintain. He 
is supposed to have been a blind bard, 
who wandered around to the courts of 
the petty kings, sang his heroic lays and 
left them for our inheritance, and a no- 
ble inheritance it is to those who have 
the desire and will to go to the depth 
of the treasure. These poems tell of 
the people of that time and show us 
many sides of their life and the chief 
characteristics of their civilization. 
One scarcely expects from a great 
poem, dealing with war and adventure, 
to gather information about birds. Yet 
it is there, but not so much scientific as 
ethical. Birds, they believed, were here 
on earth as the messengers of the gods. 
Rarely did a bird appear before them or 
raise a cry which did not do so by the 
direct command of some ruling divinity. 
Imagine with what anxiety these old 
Greek heroes watched for and listened 
to the heaven-sent messages. Great 
was the fear at certain omens, and great 
the rejoicing at others. As a rule only 
special men could interpret these signs 
and these men were of immense impor- 
tance in a community. They were 
almost a priesthood in nature, as nearly 
so as any order which the people then 
possessed, for the priesthood was not 
developed at that time. 
In the Iliad, at four of the critical 
points in the story a bird appears and 
shows the will of the gods to mortals. 
It is related that before the Greeks 
sailed to Troy, while the ships were yet 
assembled at Aulis, one of these omens 
occurred and was interpreted thus: 
Near the ships was an altar and by the 
altar stood a plane-tree, upon the bough 
of which a little bird had built its nest, 
and already within the nest were nine 
fledglings. Suddenly a serpent darted 
forth from beneath the altar straight 
toward the tree; the nine little birds 
were soon devoured and at last the ser- 
pent ended his feast by catching the 
mother which had flown crying about 
it. At once the serpent was turned into 
stone. This wonderful prodigy was 
shown by one of the prophets to mean 
that for nine years the Greeks would 
toil fruitlessly before Troy as the ser- 
pent had devoured the nine little birds; 
but in the tenth year they would seize 
the city. 
The flight of birds was watched and 
upon this rested often the movements 
of whole armies. As the seer had fore- 
told for nine years the Greeks had been 
fighting before the walls of Troy; their 
ships were drawn up on the shore of 
the sea and before them they had built 
a wall and dug a ditch for protection. 
The nine years had passed, the tenth 
year was already going by and never 
had the people from the beleaguered 
city dared to approach their ships. 
But now, after so many years, all was 
changed. The great hero of the Greeks, 
the great swift-footed Achilles, was an- 
gry and refused to fight for them and 
sat apart at the stern of his ship on the 
shore of the barren sea wearing out his 
heart with anger. Now the Trojans, 
never before so successful, had reached 
the wall and were encamped there for 
the night. The Greeks felt that it was 
necessary to send out spies to observe 
the movements of their foes. Diomede 
volunteered his services and chose 
Odysseus for his comrade. They crept 
away from their companions in the 
darkness but had gone only a few steps 
when the cry of a Heron was heard on 
their right. This meant good luck for 
them, for they knew that Athene, the 
protecting goddess of Odysseus, had 
sent this favoring sign, and it proved 
true, for their sally was prospered and 
they returned unharmed, having slain 
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