A Gossip about the Goose.
The goose figures largely in the history, the legends, and the proverbial lore of our own and other lands. In ancient Egypt it was an object of adoration in the temple and an article of diet on the table. The Egyptians mainly took beef and goose flesh as their animal food, and it has been suggested that they expected to obtain physical power from the beef and mental vigour from the goose. To support this theory, it has been shown that other nations have eaten the flesh of wolves and drunk the blood of lions, hoping thereby to become fierce and courageous. Some other nations have refused to partake of the hare and the deer on account of the timidity of these animals, fearing lest by eating their flesh they should also partake of their characteristic fearfulness and timidity.
Pliny thought very highly of the goose, saying “that one might almost be tempted to think these creatures have an appreciation of wisdom, for it is said that one of them was a constant companion of the peripatetic philosopher Lacydes, and would never leave him, either in public or when at the bath, by night or by day.”
The cackling of the goose saved Rome. According to a very old story, the guards of the city were asleep, and the enemy taking advantage of this, were making their way through a weak part of the fortifications, expecting to take the city by surprise. The wakeful geese hearing them, at once commenced cackling, and their noise awoke the Romans, who soon made short work of their foes. This circumstance greatly increased the gratitude of the Roman citizens for the goose.
We gather from the quaint words of an old chronicler a probable solution of the familiar phrase, “To cook one’s goose.” “The kyng of Swedland”—so runs the ancient record—“coming to a towne of his enemyes with very little company, his enemyes, to slyghte his forces, did hang out a goose for him to shoote; but perceiving before nyghte that these fewe soldiers had invaded and sette their chief houlds on fire, they demanded of him what his intent was, to whom he replyed, ‘To cook your goose’.”
In the days when the bow and arrow were the chief weapons of warfare, it was customary for the sheriffs of the counties where geese were reared to gather sufficient quantities of feathers to wing the arrows of the English army. Some of the old ballads contain references to winging the arrow with goose feathers. A familiar instance is the following:
“‘Bend all your bows,’ said Robin Hood;
‘And with the gray goose wing,
Such sport now show as you would do
In the presence of the king’.”
To check the exportation of feathers, a heavy export duty was put upon them.
The goose frequently figures in English tenures. In a poem by Gascoigne, published in 1575, there is an allusion to rent-day gifts, which appear to have been general in the olden time: