Identifier: birdsofshakespea00geik (find matches)
Title: The birds of Shakespeare
Year: 1916 (1910s)
Authors: Geikie, Archibald, Sir, 1835-1924
Subjects: Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616 Birds in literature
Publisher: Glasgow, J. Maclehose and sons
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Smithsonian Libraries

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. s Richard 11. iii. iii. 68. 31 The Birds of Shakespeare Nay, if thou be that princely eagles bird,Show thy descent by gazing gainst the sun.^ With delightful hyperbole, Biron, in Love*sLabour s Lost^ discovers a power of visionbeyond that of an eagle, when he is per-suading himself and his friends to abjuretheir foolish vow to fast, to study, andto see no woman. Enlarging on thepotency of love first learned in a ladyseyes he declares that it Gives to every power a double power,Above their functions and their offices.It adds a precious seeing to the eye :A lovers eyes will gaze an eagle blind ;A lovers ear will hear the lowest sound,When the suspicious head of theft is stoppd.^ Again, in the same Play, the comparisonbecomes even more grotesquely exag-gerated, for the same lover in praisinghis lady-love demands to know What peremptory eagle-sighted eye Dares look upon the heaven of her brow.That is not blinded by her majesty r^ ^ 3 Henry VI. ii. i. 91. ^iv. iii. 327. ^iv. iii. 222. 32
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The Eagle p. 30 The Eagle The eagle was credited not only with a wonderful strength of vision, but also with a remarkable length of life. This belief is alluded to by the churlish philosopher who demands of Timon Will these mossd trees,That have outlived the eagle, page thy heels,And skip w^here thou pointst out ? ^ Shakespeare, when he likens the ordersof human society to the various gradesamong the birds, compares the leadersto eagles, and the commonalty to birdsof a less reputable kind. The haughtyCoriolanus stigmatises the Roman plebs asa rabble that Will in timeBreak ope the locks o the Senate, and bring inThe crows to peck the eagles.^ Pandarus, not less contemptuous of thepopulace of Troy, affirms that the eaglesare gone, and that there are left onlycrows and daws, crows and daws/^ The ^ Timon of Athens^ iv. iii. 222. ^CoriolanuSy 111. i. 136. ^Troilus and CressUa, i. ii. 235. The ^irds of Shakespeare same kind of similitude is applied to thepolitical condition of England. The

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