The bird of dawning singeth all night long.
By a similar passage in Hamlet, where Bernardo, Heraldo, and Marcellus are discussing the apparition of the ghost of Hamlet’s father, the reader learns of another ancient superstition:
Bern. It was about to speak when the cock crew.
Her. And then it started like a guilty thing
Upon a fearful summons. I have heard
The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn,
Doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat
Awake the god of day; and, at his warning,
Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air,
The extravagant and erring spirit hies