The dastard crow, that to the wood made wing,
With her loud caws her craven kind does bring,
Who, safe in numbers, cuff the noble bird.

DRYDEN.

The new dissembled eagle, now endued
With beak and pounces, Hercules pursued.
DRYDEN.

Then as an eagle who with pious care
Was beating widely on the wing for prey,
To her now silent eyrie does repair,

And finds her callow infants forced away.
DRYDEN.

Spread upon a lake, with upward eye,
A plump of fowl behold their foe on high,
They close their trembling troop, and all attend
On whom the soaring eagle will descend.

DRYDEN.

A goldfinch there I saw, with gaudy pride
Of painted plumes that hopp'd from side to side.
DRYDEN.

Some haggard hawk, who had her eyrie nigh,

The musket and the coyshet were too weak,
Too fierce the falcon; but above the rest
The noble buzzard ever pleased me best.

DRYDEN.

73

Who taught the parrot human notes to try,

Well pounced to fasten, and well wing'd to fly. Or with a voice endued the chattering pie?

DRYDEN.

When watchful herons leave their watery stand,
And, mounting upward with erected flight,
Gain on the skies, and soar above the sight.
DRYDEN.

And how in fields the lapwing Tereus reigns,
The warbling nightingale in woods complains.
DRYDEN.

The lark, the messenger of day,
Saluted in her song the morning gray.

DRYDEN.

They strain their warbling throats

To welcome in the spring.

'Twas witty want.

Twelve swans behold in beauteous order move, The noisy geese that gabbled in the pool. And stoop with closing pinions from above.

DRYDEN. Like a long team of snowy swans on high, Which clap their wings, and cleave the liquid sky,

While homeward from their wat'ry pastures borne,

They sing, and Asia's lakes their notes return.

DRYDEN.

Your words are like the notes of dying swans;
Too sweet to last.

DRYDEN.

The titmouse and the peckers' hungry brood,
And Progne with her bosom stain'd in blood.

DRYDEN.

A rav'nous vulture in his open'd side
Her crooked beak and cruel talons tried.

DRYDEN.

Such dread his awful visage on them cast;
So seem poor doves at goshawk's sight aghast.
FAIRFAX.

They long'd to see the day, to hear the lark
Record her hymns, and chant her carols blest.

FAIRFAX.

Thus boys hatch game-eggs under birds of prey,
To make the fowl more furious for the fray.
GARTH.

The widow'd turtle hangs her moulting wings,
And to the woods in mournful murmur sings.

GARTH.

Thy younglings, Cuddy, are but just awake,
No thrustles shrill the bramble bush forsake,
No chirping lark the welkin sheen invokes.
GAY.
See yon gay goldfinch hop from spray to spray,
Who sings a farewell to the parting day.

GAY.

Such strains ne'er warble in the linnet's throat.

GAY.

The peacock's plumes thy tackle must not fail,
Nor the dear purchase of the sable's tail.

GAY.

He told us that the welkin would be clear
When swallows fleet soar high and sport in air.

GAY.

Soon as in doubtful day the woodcock flies,
Her cleanly pail the pretty housewife bears.
GAY.