Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1871-10-25

says the narrator, from any training, but
simply from an extraordinary ambition it
had to leave nothing unspoken which it
heard, and to perfect itself by intense
study in all kinds of music so that its
tongue was always going with the greatest
variety of sounds imaginable. 1t belonged
to barber, who kept it at his shop in
Rome, just opposite the Greek forum. 1t
happened that rich man of the
neighborhood having died, the funeral
procession, accompanied by many trumpet
ers, halted and made hong stop before the
BARRIERS shop; and the music pleasing the
people it was prolonged and repeated. The
magpie listened, and from that day was al
together mute, not so much as uttering the
usual notes by which it made its wants
known. This was a matter of great won
der to those who had been accustomed to
pass by the shop and listen to the bird
and some attributed its silence to witch
craft, thong ID the greater number were of
opinion that the noise of the trumpets had
struck it deaf No such thing, says Plu-
tarch : the birds unusual silence proceeded
from its studying over in secret the music
| 1t had heard for one day it suddenly
come out with all the fourishes of the
trumpets, observing with the greatest ex-
actness of time all the changes and
cadenees Of the harmony.
1t would seem from the frequency. in
the middle ages of stories turning upon
the talking qualities of animals, that the
idea that they might exercise these quail
ties upon occasion, especially if their
talents were brought out by an education,
maintained hold upon popular belief.
The parrot and maybe, especially, seem
to have lost hardly anything of their
ancient reputation for proficiency in
language. One Of the stories of the
collection entitled The Seven Sages.
turns upon the habit maybe had Of re-
membering whatever it had seen or heard,
and then Of relating it all on being ques-
toned. The burgher to whom this bird
belonged had a good-for-nothing wife,
whose conduct, during her husbands alb
sence, it would tell him all about; and he
could place entire reliance upon the
correctness of what the bird reported.
The Chevalier de la Tour Landy, in |
book Of counsel to his daughter, written
some time in the latter halt Of the four /
teenth century, makes a similar use Of |
maybe in a tale which has a moral to it. |
Il will tell you a story" he says, in |
regard to women who eat dainty morsels /
in the absence of their lords. There was
a lady who had a pie in a cage which |
talked of everything which it saw done |
Now it happened that the lord Of the
household preserved large eel in pond. |
and kept 1t very carefully in order to give /
1t to some Of his lords, or of his friends. in
case they should visit him. So it happen I
ed that the lady said TO her female /
attendant that It would be good to eat the !
great eel accordingly they ate it, and |
agreed that they would tell their lord that !
the otter had eaten it. And when the lord /
returned, the pie began to say to him, NV |
lord, my lady has eaten the eel Then the |
lord went to his pond, and missed the eel |
and he went into the house, and asked his /.
wife what had become Of it. She thought /
to excuse herself easily but he said that |
he knew all about it, and that the pie had |
told him. The result was that there was !
great quarreling and trouble in the house I
but, when the lord was gone away. the /
lady aud her attendant went to the pie, and I.
plucked all its feathers from its head. f.
saying, Y gu told about the eel And
30 thepoor pie was quite bald But, from
that time forward, when it saw any people
who were bald or had large foreheads the
pie said TO them, All you told about the
el.''-OH ami Mar