Hark, canst thou hear me? I will play the swan,
And die in music. [Singing.] Willow, willow, willow.
Moor, she was chaste; she loved thee, cruel Moor,
So come my soul to bliss, as I speak true;
So speaking as I think, I die, I die. [Dies.]”
After this long dissertation anent swans, there may be readers who will press hard upon me with the couplet from Coleridge,—
“Swans sing before they die: ’twere no bad thing,
Should certain persons die before they sing.”
From Heraldry itself the Midsummer Night’s Dream (act iii. sc. 2, l. 201, vol. ii. p. 239) borrows one of its most beautiful comparisons; it is in the passage where Helena so passionately reproaches Hermia for supposed treachery,—
“O, is all forgot?