It is a common notion that the fable here alluded to is a classical one, but this is an error. Shakespeare, says Mr. Harting, “was content to accept the story as he found it, and to apply it metaphorically as the occasion required.” Mr. Houghton, in an interesting letter to “Land and Water”[297] on this subject, remarks that the Egyptians believed in a bird feeding its young with its blood, and this bird is none other than the vulture. He goes on to say that the fable of the pelican doubtless originated in the Patristic annotations on the Scriptures. The ecclesiastical Fathers transferred the Egyptian story from the vulture to the pelican, but magnified the story a hundredfold, for the blood of the parent was not only supposed to serve as food for the young, but was also able to reanimate the dead offspring. Augustine, commenting on Psalm cii. 6—“I am like a pelican of the wilderness”—remarks: “These birds [male pelicans] are said to kill their offspring by blows of their beaks, and then to bewail their death for the space of three days. At length, however, it is said that the mother inflicts a severe wound on herself, pouring the flowing blood over the dead young ones, which instantly brings them to life.” To the same effect write Eustathius, Isidorus, Epiphanius, and a host of other writers.[298]
According to another idea[299] pelicans are hatched dead, but the cock pelican then wounds his breast, and lets one drop of blood fall upon each, and this quickens them.
Pheasant. This bird is only once alluded to, in “Winter’s Tale” (iv. 4), where the Clown jokingly says to the Shepherd, “Advocate’s the court-word for a pheasant; say, you have none.”
Phœnix. Many allusions are made to this fabulous bird, which is said to rise again from its own ashes. Thus, in “Henry VIII.” (v. 4), Cranmer tells how
“when
The bird of wonder dies, the maiden phœnix,
Her ashes new create another heir,
As great in admiration as herself.”
Again, in “3 Henry VI.” (i. 4), the Duke of York exclaims:
“My ashes, as the phœnix, may bring forth
A bird that will revenge upon you all.”
Once more, in “1 Henry VI.” (iv. 7), Sir William Lucy, speaking of Talbot and those slain with him, predicts that
“from their ashes shall be rear’d
A phœnix that shall make all France afeard.”[300]
Sir Thomas Browne[301] tells us that there is but one phœnix in the world, “which after many hundred years burns herself, and from the ashes thereof ariseth up another.” From the very earliest times there have been countless traditions respecting this wonderful bird. Thus, its longevity has been estimated from three hundred to fifteen hundred years; and among the various localities assigned as its home are Ethiopia, Arabia, Egypt, and India. In “The Phœnix and Turtle,” it is said,