File:The Cabinet of natural history and American rural sports (1830) (14592300029).jpg

Identifier: cabinetofnatural01phil (find matches)
Title: The Cabinet of natural history and American rural sports
Year: 1830 (1830s)
Authors:
Subjects: Zoology Hunting
Publisher: Philadelphia, John Doughty
Contributing Library: University of Pittsburgh Library System
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Pittsburgh Library System

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dew as ere my mother brushdWith Ravens feather, from unwholesome fenDrop on you both! t * That the science of augury is very ancient, we learn from the Hebrewlawgiver, who prohibits it, as well as every other kind of divination. Deut.chap, xviii. The Romans derived their knowledge of augury chiefly fromthe Tuscans or Etrurians, who practised it in the earliest times. This artwas known in Italy before the time of Romulus, since that prince did notcommence the building of Rome till he had taken the auguries. The suc-cessors of Romulus, from a conviction of the usefulness of the science, andat the same time not to render it contemptible, by becoming too familiar, em-ployed the most skilful augurs from Etruria, to introduce the practice of itinto their religious ceremonies. And by a decree of the senate, some of theyouth of the best families in Rome were annually sent into Tuscany, to beinstructed in this art. Vide Ciceron. de Divin. Also Calraet, and tlie abb£ t Tempest, act i. scene 2.
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AND AMERICAN RURAL SPORTS. The ferocious wife of Macbeth, on being advised of theapproach of Duncan, whose death she had conspired, thusexclaims: The Raven himself is hoarse,That croaks the fatal entrance of DuncanUnder my battlements ! * The Moor of Venice says: It comes oer my memory,As doth the Raven oer the infected house,Boding- to all.t The last quotation alludes to the supposed habits of thisbird flying over those houses which contain the sick, whosedissolution is at hand, and thereby announced. Thus Mar-lowe, in the Jew of Malta, as cited by Malone: The sad presaging Raven tolls The sick mans passport in her hoUow beak. And in the shadow of silent night Doth shake contagion from her sable wing. But it is the province of philosophy to dispel those illu-sions which bewilder the mind, by pointing out the simpletruths which Nature has been at no pains to conceal, butwhich the folly of mankind has shrouded in all the obscu-rity of mystery. The Raven is a general inhabitant of the U

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