. The birds of Shakespeare . enwe speak of mews, however, it is always horses and neverhawks that come into our 41 The ^irds of Shakespeai^e The BUZZARD is mentioned several timesby Shakespeare, and always in a more orless depreciatory sense. It is a large hand-some bird, but compared with the falconis slow and heavy in flight. So in theencounter of wits between Petruchio andKatharine, he in his characteristic falconerslanguage asks her : O slow-winged turtle, shall a buzzard take thee r ^ In a passage already cited the buzzardsare coupled with the disreputable Newton r
. The birds of Shakespeare . enwe speak of mews, however, it is always horses and neverhawks that come into our 41 The ^irds of Shakespeai^e The BUZZARD is mentioned several timesby Shakespeare, and always in a more orless depreciatory sense. It is a large hand-some bird, but compared with the falconis slow and heavy in flight. So in theencounter of wits between Petruchio andKatharine, he in his characteristic falconerslanguage asks her : O slow-winged turtle, shall a buzzard take thee r ^ In a passage already cited the buzzardsare coupled with the disreputable Newton remarks that in the olddays of falconry, buzzards were regardedwith infinite scorn, and hence in commonEnglish to call a man a buzzard^ is todenounce him as stupid.^ In the time of Elizabeth the kite (orPuttock)^ now one of the rarest of ourbirds, was quite common in this was particularly abundant in London,where it fed on the garbage of the streets, ^ Taming of the ShretOy ir. i. of Birds, p. The Common Buzzard The Kite and even of the Thames, and where,together with the raven, it was protectedby law as a useful scavenger without frequency of Shakespeares allusionsto this bird is good evidence of howfamiliar it must then have been. It isalways referred to in some disparagingway. The hungry kite * did not scrupleto carry off any living creature it couldovercome even from the very Warwick mentions to the Queenhis suspicions of foul play in DukeHumphreys death, he tells her : Who finds the partridge in the puttocks nestBut may imagine how the bird was dead,Although the kite soar with unbloodied beak ?Even so suspicious is this tragedy.^ In an earlier part of the same Play Yorkasks : Weret not all one, an empty eagle were set To guard the chicken from a hungry kite. As place Duke Humphrey for the Kings protector ? ^ 2 Henrj FI. iii. ii. 191. Chaucer refers to the cowardKyte. 43 The ^irds of Shakespeare to which the Queen repl
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, booksubjectshakespearewilliam15
