Pale swan in her watery nest, Begins the sad dirge of her certain ending.[177] Prince Henry, son of King John, when told that his dying father had been singing, muses thus: ’Tis strange that death should sing: I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death.[178] In the scene wherein Othello discovers the double-dyed villainy of Iago, a touching incident is the wandering language of the faithful dying Emilia, whose mind goes back to her beloved mistress: What did thy song bode, lady? Hark, canst thou hear me? I will play the swan, And die in music. [_Singing_] Willow, willow, willow.[179] More cheerful is the use of the legend by Portia when Bassanio stands before the caskets, and she, deeply interested in the result, commands Let music sound while he doth make his choice; Then, if he lose, he makes a swan-like end, Fading in music.[180] [Sidenote: _The Turkey-cock and Peacock_] The TURKEY-COCK, introduced into Europe from the New World in the early part of the sixteenth century, had become quite naturalised in the farm-yards of England by the time of Elizabeth. It is several times alluded to by Shakespeare, sometimes as a symbol of conceited ostentation, and also as an article of food. When in _King Henry V._ Gower sees Pistol approaching, he exclaims to Fluellen “Here he comes, swelling like a turkey-cock,” to which the Welshman, who had resolved to make the braggart eat the leek, replies, “’Tis no matter for his swellings nor his turkey-cocks.”[181] Not less appropriately is the comparison used of Malvolio, who, as Maria said, had been “yonder i’ the sun practising behaviour to his own shadow this half hour.” As the three concealed onlookers watch him strutting down the walk, talking to himself, they can scarcely restrain themselves. Fabian entreats silence: O, peace! Contemplation makes a rare turkey-cock of him: how he jets under his advanced plumes.[182] [Illustration: THE MAGPIE] It will be remembered that among the produce on its way to London in the carts of the two carriers at the Rochester inn there was a pannier of live turkeys.[183] The PEACOCK is alluded to several times in the Plays as the accepted personification of pride. Joan of Arc is represented as counselling the Princes: Let frantic Talbot triumph for a while And like a peacock sweep along his tail; We’ll pull his plumes and take away his train.[184] Thersites says of Ajax that he “goes up and down the field asking for himself; he stalks up and down like a peacock――a stride and a stand.”[185] When King Henry V. mingles incognito among his soldiers in France, one of them tells him: That’s a perilous shot out of an elder-gun, that a poor and a private displeasure can do against a monarch! you may as well go about to turn the sun to ice with fanning in his face with a peacock’s feather.[186]