[Footnote 7: I am not sure whether this gentleman be the American
Bishop of New Jersey, or a namesake only.]
Tennyson, with all that luxury of dreariness, sadness, and weariness,
which characterises his masterpieces, has also sung of "The Dying Swan."
I subjoin an extract, wishing your limits would admit of the entire:
"The plain was grassy, wild and bare,
Wide, wild, and open to the air,
Which had built up everywhere
An under-roof of doleful gray.
With an inner voice the river ran,
Adown it floated a dying swan,
Which loudly did lament.
It was the middle of the day.
Ever the weary wind went on,
And took the reed-tops as it went.
* * * * *
"The wild swan's death-hymn took the soul
Of that waste place with joy
Hidden in sorrow: at first to the ear
The warble was low, and full, and clear:
And floating about the under-sky,
Prevailing in weakness, the coronach stole
Sometimes afar, and sometimes anear:
But anon her awful _jubilant_ voice,
With a music strange and manifold
Flow'd forth on a carol free and bold."
So much for the melody of the _dying_ swan. That of the _living_ swan
also requires consideration. Mr. Nicol, in his valuable _Iceland,
Greenland, &c._, thus describes the _Cygnus musicus_ which frequents the
lakes and rivers of Iceland:
"The largest and noblest of this class [the natatorial] is
undoubtedly THE WILD OR WHISTLING SWAN, with pure white plumage,
slightly tinged on the head with orange-yellow. This majestic bird
is five feet long, and, with extended wings, eight broad. It is
rarely seen in Greenland, and appears merely to rest in Faroe, on
its journeys to and from Iceland in the spring and autumn. Some of
them, however, remain all the winter in the latter, AND DURING THE
LONG DARK NIGHTS THEIR WILD SONG IS OFTEN HEARD as they are
passing in troops from one place to another. It appears to be a
kind of signal or watchword to prevent the dispersion of the
party, and is described as remarkably pleasant, RESEMBLING THE
TONES OF A VIOLIN, THOUGH SOMEWHAT HIGHER, each note occurring
after a distinct interval. THIS MUSIC IS SAID TO PRESAGE A THAW,
and hence the Icelanders are well pleased when, in long-continued
frosts, it breaks their repose."
He adds in a note, "The account of the MIDNIGHT SONG OF THE SWAN is from
Olafsen, who says it 'das allerangenehmste zu hören ist,' is very
delightful to hear."
Henderson says of the river Nordura in Iceland, near its confluence with
the Hrita:
"The bleakness of the surrounding rocks was greatly enlivened by
the number of SWANS that were swimming and SINGING MELODIOUSLY in
the river."--_Iceland_, 2nd ed. p. 277.
In the Edda we find Njörd, god of the winds and waves, when he came back
to the mountains to please his wife, thus singing:
"How do I hate the abode of the mountains! There one hears nothing
but the howling of wolves, instead of the SWEET SINGING OF THE
SWANS who dwell on the sea-shores."
Waterton gives an account of the last moments of a favourite swan which
he watched, in hopes of catching "some plaintive sound or other, some
soft inflection of the voice," but was "disappointed."