Character of the Song of the Nightingale (Vol. vii., p. 397.; Vol. viii., p. 112.).—Although Milton seems to have generally used the epithet solemn in its classical sense (as cleverly pointed out by Mr. Sydney Gedge), and meant to represent the nightingale as the customary attendant of night, yet there is at least one passage where the epithet appears to me not to have this meaning; but to express that the song of the nightingale caused "a holy joy," and was heard not only in the day-time, but all through the night. For although Milton calls the nightingale "the night-warbling bird," and so makes it "the customary attendant of the night," yet he also elsewhere as truly speaks of it as a day singer. The passage I referred to is in Paradise Lost, book vii., and seems to me to bear the meaning above spoken of; though Mr. Gedge may perhaps make "solemn" refer back to the last noun "even." And I confess that the meaning seems dubious:
"From branch to branch, the smaller birds with song
Solac'd the woods, and spread their painted wings
Till even; nor then the solemn nightingale
Ceas'd warbling, but all night tun'd her soft lays."
I can add one other epithet to the one hundred and nine which I have already given of the nightingale's song:
Wond'ring. Dryden ("Palamon and Arcite").
I may add, that Otway and Grainger (erroneously printed Graingle) appear to have used "solemn" in the ordinary meaning of the word.
Cuthbert Bede, B.A.
Adamson's "Lusitania Illustrata" (Vol. viii., p. 104.).—Your correspondent W. M. M. may consult the following works with great advantage: