In cradle of the rude imperious surge?”
Henry IV. Part II. Act iii. Sc. 1.
The word occurs again in Othello (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 Anarajapoora, where it is trained for hawking, it is usual, in lieu of a hood, to darken its eyes by means of a silken thread passed 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.