The Ornithology of Shakespeare Part 11

The word "enmew," quoted above in the pa.s.sage from _Measure for Measure_, would seem rather to signify here, "to seize upon," or "to disable." It is sometimes written "enewe." In Nash's "Quaternio; or, a Fourefold Way to a Happie Life," published in 1633, it occurs in a spirited description of hawking at water-fowl:--"And to hear an accipitary relate againe how he went forth in a cleare, calme, and sunshine evening, about an houre before the sunne did usually maske himselfe, unto the river, where finding of a mallard, he whistled off[51] his falcon, and how shee flew from him as if shee would never have turned head againe, yet presently upon a shoote came in; how then by degrees, by little and little, by flying about and about, shee mounted so high, until shee had lessened herselfe to the view of the beholder to the shape of a pigeon or partridge, and had made the height of the moon the place[52] of her flight; how presently, upon the landing of the fowle, shee came downe like a stone and _enewed_ it, and suddenly got up againe, and suddenly upon a second landing came down againe, and missing of it, in the downe course recovered it beyond expectation, to the admiration of the beholder at a long flight."

Another method of spelling the same word may be instanced by the following quotation from Turbervile's "Book of Falconrie," 1575:--

"And if shee misse, to mark her how shee then gets up amaine, For best advantage, to _eneaw_ the springing fowle againe."

[Sidenote: IMPING.]

In the days of falconry[53] a peculiar method of repairing a broken wing-feather was known to falconers by the term "imping." The verb "to imp," appears to be derived from the Anglo-Saxon "impan," signifying to graft, or inoculate; and the mode of operation is thus described in a scarce pamphlet by Sir John Sebright, ent.i.tled "Observations on Hawking":--

"When any of the flight or tail-feathers of a hawk are accidentally broken, the speed of the bird is so injured, that the falconer finds it necessary to repair them by an expedient called 'imping.'

"This curious process consists in attaching to the part that remains an exact subst.i.tute for the piece lost. For this purpose the falconer is always provided with pinions (right and left) and with tail-feathers of hawks, or with the feathers separated from the pinion carefully preserved and numbered, so as to prevent mistake in taking a true match for the injured feather. He then with a sharp knife gently parts the web of the feather to be repaired at its thickest part, and cuts the shaft obliquely forward, so as not to damage the web on the opposite edge. He next cuts the subst.i.tute feather as exactly as possible at the corresponding point and with the same degree of slope.

"For the purpose of uniting them, he is provided with an iron needle with broad angular points at both ends, and after wetting the needle with salt-and-water, he thrusts it into the centre of the pith of each part, as truly straight and as nearly to the same length in each as may be.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

"When this operation has been skilfully performed, the junction is so neat, that an inexperienced eye would hardly discern the point of union, and as the iron rusts from having been wetted with brine, there is little or no danger of separation."

After this explanation, the meaning of the following lines is clear:--

"If then we shall shake off our slavish yoke, _Imp_ out our drooping country's _broken wing_."

_Richard II._ Act ii. Sc. 1.

Pa.s.sages such as this are likely enough to be overlooked by the majority of readers, but it is in such chiefly that the ornithologist sees a proof that Shakespeare, for the age in which he lived, possessed a surprising knowledge of ornithology.

[Sidenote: SEELING.]

Besides "imping," there was another practice in use, now happily obsolete, termed "seeling," to which we find several allusions in the Plays. It consisted in sewing a thread through the upper and under eyelids of a newly-caught hawk, to obscure the sight for a time, and accustom her to the hood.

[Sidenote: HOW TO SEEL A HAWK.]

Turbervile, in his "Book of Falconrie," 1575, gives the following quaint directions "how to seele a hawke":--"Take a needle threeded with untwisted thread, and (casting your Hawke) take her by the beake, and put the needle through her eye-lidde, not right against the sight of the eye, but somewhat nearer to the beake, because she may see backwards.

And you must take good heede that you hurt not the webbe, which is under the eye-lidde, or on the inside thereof. Then put your needle also through that other eye-lidde, drawing the endes of the thread together, tye them over the beake, not with a straight knotte, but cut off the threedes endes neare to the knotte, and twist them together in such sorte, that the eye-liddes may be raysed so upwards, that the Hawke may not see at all, and when the threed shall ware loose or untyed, then the Hawke may see somewhat backwardes, which is the cause that the threed is put nearer to the beake. For a Sparrow-hawke should see somewhat backwardes, and a Falcon forwardes. The reas is that if the Sparrow-hawke should see forwardes, shee would beate off her feathers, or break them when she bateth upon the fist, and seeing the companie of men, or such like, she would bate too much."

In _Antony and Cleopatra_ (Act iii. Sc. 13) we read--

"The wise G.o.ds _seel_ our eyes."

And in the same play (Act v. Sc. 2) Seleucus says:--

"Madam, I had rather _seel_ my lips, than, to my peril, Speak that which is not."

In his beautiful soliloquy on sleep, Henry IV., addressing the fickle G.o.ddess, exclaims,--

"Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast _Seel_ up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains In cradle of the rude imperious surge?"

_Henry IV._ Part II. Act iii. Sc. 1.

The word occurs again in _Oth.e.l.lo_ (Act i. Sc. 3)--

"When light-wing'd toys Of feather'd Cupid _seel_ with wanton dulness," &c.

And in the same play (Act iii. Sc. 3)--

"She that, so young, could give out such a seeming, To _seel_ her father's eyes up close as oak."

In the last line it is more probable, considering the use of the technical term "seel," above explained, that Shakespeare wrote "close as hawk's."

Sir Emerson Tennant, in his "Sketches of the Natural History of Ceylon,"

speaking of the goshawk (p. 246), says:--"In the district of Anaraj.a.poora, where it is trained for hawking, it is usual, in lieu of a hood, to darken its eyes by means of a silken thread pa.s.sed through holes in the eyelids." This practice of "seeling" appears to be of some antiquity, but has happily given way, to a great extent, to the more merciful use of the hood.

[Sidenote: QUAINT RECIPES.]

The old treatises on falconry contain numerous quaint recipes for the various ailments to which hawks are subject. From one of these we learn that petroleum is nothing new, as some people now-a-days would have us believe. Turbervile, writing in 1575, says, in his "Booke of Falconrie":--"An other approued medecine is to annoint the swelling of your hawkes foot with _Oleum petrlium_ (which is the oyle of a rocke) and with oyle of white Lillies, taking of each of these like quant.i.ty, the blood of a pigeon, and the tallow of a candle, heating all these together a little at the fire. This unguent wil throughly resolue the mischief."--P. 258.

[Sidenote: GOING A-BIRDING.]

Hawking was sometimes called "birding." In the _Merry Wives of Windsor_ (Act iii. Sc. 3), Master Page says,--

"I do invite you to-morrow morning to my house to breakfast; after, we'll _a-birding_ together; I have a fine hawk for the bush."

This was probably a goshawk, for, being a short-winged hawk and of slower flight, this species was considered the best for a woody district, or, as Shakespeare terms it, "the bush."

In the same play (Act iii. Sc. 5) Dame Quickly, referring to Mistress Ford, says,--"Her husband goes this morning _a-birding_;" and Mistress Ford, herself, says (Act iv. Sc. 2),--"He's _a-birding_, sweet Sir John."

But it seems that birding was not always synonymous with hawking, for, later on in the last-mentioned scene, we read as follows:--

"_Falstaff._ What shall I do? I'll creep up into the chimney.

_Mrs. Ford._ There they always use to discharge their _birding-pieces_."

The word "hawk," as in the case of the eagle, is almost invariably employed by Shakespeare in its generic sense:--

"Dost thou love hawking? thou hast hawks will soar Above the morning lark."

_Taming of the Shrew_, Induction, Sc. 2.

In _Henry V._ (Act iii. Sc. 7), the Dauphin, when speaking in praise of his horse, says,--

"When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk."

And in the first part of _Henry VI._ (Act ii. Sc. 4), the Earl of Warwick boasts that

"Between two hawks, which flies the higher pitch;