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Birds-Raven: Quotations from Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations
This fellow pecks up wit as pigeons pease.— Shakespeare — Love's Labour's Lost. Act V. Sc. 2. L. 315
Thou pigeon-egg of discretion.— Shakespeare — Love's Labour's Lost. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 75.
With his mouth full of news Which he will put on us, as pigeons feed their young.— Shakespeare — As You Like It. Act I. Sc. 2. L. 98.
On the cross-beam under the Old South bell The nest of a pigeon is builded well. In summer and winter that bird is there, Out and in with the morning air.— WILLIS — The Belfry Pigeon.
'Tis a bird I love, with its brooding note, And the trembling throb in its mottled throat; There's a human look in its swelling breast, And the gentle curve of its lowly crest; And I often stop with the fear I feel- He runs so close to the rapid wheel.— WILLIS — The Belfry Pigeon.
Quail. In jalousie I rede eek thou hym bynde And thou shalt make him couche as doeth a quaille.— CHAUCER — The Clerke's Tale. L. 13,541.
The song-birds leave us at the summer's close, Only the empty nests are left behind, And pipings of the quail among the sheaves.— LONGFELLOW — The Harvest Moon.
An honest fellow enough, and one that loves quails.— Shakespeare — Troilus and Cressida. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 58.
Raven. The raven once in snowy plumes was drest, White as the whitest dove's unsullied breast, Fair as the guardian of the Capitol, Soft as the swan; a large and lovely fowl; His tongue, his prating tongue had changed him quite To sooty blackness from the purest white.— ADDISON — Translations, Ovid's
Metamorphoses. Story of Coronis. The raven was screeching, the leaves fast fell, The sun gazed cheerlessly down on the sight.— HEINE — Book of Songs. Lyrical Interludes. No. 26.
That Raven on yon left-hand oak (Curse on his ill-betiding croak) Bodes me no good. S.— GAY — Fables. The Farmer's Wife and
the Raven. The Raven's house is built with reeds, - Sing woe, and alas is me! And the Raven's couch is spread with weeds, High on the hollow tree; And the Raven himself, telling his beads In penance for his past misdeeds, Upon the top I see.— THOS. DARCY MCGEE — The Penitent
Raven. And the Raven, never flitting, Still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas Just above my chamber door; And his eyes have all the seeming Of a demon's that is dreaming, And the lamplight o'er him streaming Throws his shadow on the floor, And my soul from out that shadow, That lies floating on the floor, Shall be lifted-nevermore.— POE — The Raven. St. 18.
Did ever raven sing so like a lark, That gives sweet tidings of the sun's uprise? C.— Shakespeare — Titus Andronicus. Act III. Sc. 1. L. 158.
O, it comes o'er my memory, As doth the raven o'er the infected house, Boding to all.— Shakespeare — Othello. Act IV. Sc. 1. L. 20.
The croaking raven doth bellow for revenge.— Shakespeare — Hamlet. Act III. Sc. 2. L. 264.
The raven himself is hoarse That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan Under my battlements. Macbeth. Act L. Sc. 5. L. 40. Robin. Poor Robin sits and sings alone, When showers of driving sleet, By the cold winds of winter blown. The cottage casement beat.— REV. WM. LISLE BOWLES — Winter.
Redbreast. The wood-robin sings at my door, And her song is the sweetest I hear From all the sweet birds that incessantly pour Their notes through the noon of the year.— JAMES G. CLARKE — The Wood Robin.
The redbreast oft, at evening hours, Shall kindly lend his little aid, With hoary moss, and gathered flowers, To deck the ground where thou art laid.— WILLIAM COLLINS — Odes. Dirge in