"The Scottish barnacle, if I might choose, That of a worme doth waxe a winged goose."
[152] See Harland and Wilkinson's "Lancashire Folk-Lore," 1867, pp. 116-121; "Notes and Queries," 1st series, vol. viii. p. 224; "Penny Cyclopædia," vol. vii. p. 206, article "Cirripeda."
[153] Nares's "Glossary," 1872, vol. i. p. 56.
[154] See Harting's "Ornithology of Shakespeare," 1871, pp. 246-257.
[155] "Ornithology of Shakespeare," 1871, p. 252.
[156] See "Philosophical Transactions" for 1835; Darwin's "Monograph of the Cirrhipedia," published by the Ray Society; a paper by Sir J. Emerson Tennent in "Notes and Queries," 1st series, vol. viii. p. 223; Brand's "Popular Antiquities," 1849, vol. iii. pp. 361, 362; Douce's "Illustrations of Shakespeare," 1839, p. 14.
Butler, too, in his "Hudibras" (III. ii. l. 655), speaks of it; and Marston, in his "Malecontent" (1604), has the following: "Like your Scotch barnacle, now a block, instantly a worm, and presently a great goose."
_Blackbird._ This favorite is called, in the "Midsummer-Night's Dream" (iii. 1) an ousel (old French, _oisel_), a term still used in the neighborhood of Leeds:
"The ousel cock, so black of hue, With orange-tawny bill."
In "2 Henry IV." (iii. 2) when Justice Shallow inquires of Justice Silence, "And how doth my cousin?" he is answered: "Alas, a black ousel,[157] cousin Shallow," a phrase which, no doubt, corresponded to our modern one, "a black sheep." In Spenser's "Epithalamium" (l. 82), the word occurs:
"The ousel shrills, the ruddock warbles soft."
[157] See Yarrell's "History of British Birds," 2d edition, vol. i. p. 218; "Dialect of Leeds," 1862, p. 329. In "Hamlet" (iii. 2), some modern editions read "ouzle;" the old editions all have _weasel_, which is now adopted.
_Buzzard._ Mr. Staunton suggests that in the following passage of the "Taming of the Shrew" (ii. 1) a play is intended upon the words, and that in the second line "buzzard" means a beetle, from its peculiar buzzing noise:
"_Pet._ O slow-wing'd turtle! shall a buzzard take thee?
_Kath._ Ay, for a turtle, as he takes a buzzard."
The beetle was formerly called a buzzard; and in Staffordshire, a cockchafer is termed a hum-buz. In Northamptonshire we find a proverb, "I'm between a hawk and a buzzard," which means, "I don't know what to do, or how to act."[158]