ings as sweetly in
the day as at night-time. There is an old superstition[270] that the
nightingale sings all night, to keep itself awake, lest the glow-worm
should devour her. The classical fable[271] of the unhappy Philomela
turned into a nightingale, when her sister Progne was changed to a
swallow, has doubtless given rise to this bird being spoken of as _she_;
thus Juliet tells Romeo (iii. 5):

"It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear;
Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree;
Believe me, love, it was the nightingale."

[270] Southey's "Commonplace Book." 5th series. 1851, p. 305.

[271] Ovid's "Metamorphoses," bk. vi. ll. 455-676; "Titus
Andronicus," iv. 1.

Sometimes the nightingale is termed Philomel, as in "Midsummer-Night's
Dream" (ii. 2, song):[272]

"Philomel, with melody,
Sing in our sweet lullaby."

[272] Cf. "Lucrece," ll. 1079, 1127.

_Osprey._ This bird,[273] also called the sea-eagle, besides having a
destructive power of devouring fish, was supposed formerly to have a
fascinating influence, both which qualities are alluded to in the
following passage in "Coriolanus" (iv. 7):

"I think he'll be to Rome,
As is the osprey to the fish, who takes it
By sovereignty of nature."

[273] See Yarrell's "History of British Birds," 1856, vol. i.
p. 30; Nares's "Glossary," vol. ii. p. 620; also Pennant's
"British Zoology;" see Peele's Play of the "Battle of Alcazar"
(ii. 3), 1861, p. 28.

Drayton, in his "Polyolbion" (song xxv.), mentions the same fascinating
power of the osprey:

"The osprey, oft here seen, though seldom here it breeds,
Which over them the fish no sooner do espy,
But, betwixt him and them by an antipathy,
Turning their bellies up, as though their death they saw,
They at his pleasure lie, to stuff his gluttonous maw."

_Ostrich._ The extraordinary digestion of this bird[274] is said to be
shown by its swallowing iron and other hard substances.[275] In "2 Henry
VI." (iv. 10), the rebel Cade says to Alexander Iden: "Ah, villain, thou
wilt betray me, and get a thousand crowns of the king by carrying my
head to him; but I'll make thee eat iron like an ostrich, and swallow my
sword like a great pin, ere thou and I part." Cuvier,[276] speaking of
this bird, says, "It is yet so voracious, and its senses of taste and
smell are so obtuse, that