Dove

“ Flocks of sea birds fluttered around our masts, for this colder region is the home of the beautiful sea dove, the great white albatross and an innumerable multitude of smaller kinds, that on the approach of stormy weather seem to rise, as by the stroke of a magician’s wand, from the sea. ”

“ To any one who knows anything of doves, who will merely go out into the field or the farm-yard and look at them, and who will use his own eyes, that figure is striking enough, and grand enough. It is the swiftness of the dove, and not its fancied gentleness that is spoken of. The dove appearing, as you may see it again and again, like a speck in the far off sky, rushing down with a swiftness which outstrips the very eagle ”

“ Why, surely that she looks like a beautiful white dove. It is a summer day; the winds are soft; fly south, then, White Dove, and carry to her this message of tenderness, and entreaty, and peace? Surely the gentle ear will listen to you before the winter comes and the skies grow dark overhead, and there is no white dove at all, but an angry sea-eagle, with black wings outspread and talons ready to strike, Oh, what is the sound in the summer air? Is it the singing of the sea-maiden of Colonsay, bewailing still the loss of her lovers in other years? We cannot stay to listen; the winds are fair ”

“ Thereupon the dove flew away over the meadow into the mountain glen, where the farmer stood digging a well. He stood in a deep hole which he had dug, three yards below the surface; it was just as if he were standing in his grave.
The dove settled on a fir tree and sung of the joy of Heaven, quite convinced that the man in the hole, who could see neither sky, nor sea, nor meadow, must be longing for Heaven. ”

“ And skirts of wide horizons round her spread
White as the white wing-feathers of a dove.
Her feet, a flash of silver on the sea,
Chase silver sails that fly untiringly
Towards the enchanted Islands of the West. ”

“ In the midst of its most ardent love-song—call it cooing, murmuring, moaning, or what you will—the dove breaks off suddenly as if inspired by its own music, then claps its wings loudly and sharply several times, soars aloft, spreads its wings and floats slowly down to a tree-top, there to begin its song anew. ”

“ My wild, white dove,
My tempest-driven dove that I gave house,
You cannot be my Love.
She died. I used to hold her all night long;
Come awake
At dawn beside her. Try to ease with loving
A thirst too deep to slake. ”

“ And now though she lies 'neath the coffin-lid,
We cannot think her dead;
But we think of her as of some delicate bird
To a milder country fled.
'Twas a long, dark flight for our gentle dove,
Our bird so tender and fair;
But we know she has reached the summer land
And folded her white wings there.
THE TIME THAT IS TO BE. I am thinking of fern forests that once did towering stand,
Crowning all the barren mountains, shading all the dreary land.
Oh, the dreadful, quiet brooding, the solitude sublime, That reigned like shadowy spectres o'er the third great day of time. ”

“ Resting within the cup of the flower, lies the perfect image of a dove, with its beautifully formed wings spread out from its side, its head bent forward, and its tiny bill delicately tipped with red almost touching its snowy breast. ”

“ Colder and fiercer swept the wind without, cutting and more piercing grew the frozen, crystalline needles of air, but each dove that had sheltered a frost-coated sparrow beneath her own shivering wings lived to rejoice in the glowing gladsome sunshine of the days to come. ”

“ Thine eyes are as dove's,
or
Thou hast dove's eyes.
The hawk is a beautiful bird, and has beautiful eyes, quick and penetrating; but the Bridegroom desires not hawk's eyes in His bride. The tender eyes of the innocent dove are those which He admires. It was as a dove that the Holy Spirit came upon Him at His baptism, and the dove-like character is that which He seeks for in each of His people. ”

“ All was perfect stillness round him.
Many times he saw a White Dove
Flitting through the deepest shadows,
Noiseless as the sailing cloudlet,
Shining out against the darkness,
Whiter than the snows of winter. ”

“ The bare rock would frighten her, and the sun would dazzle her eyes. So man bindeth the eagle by a bond long enough for the dove, and quoth he, ‘Be patient!’ I am not patient. I am not a silly dove, that I should be so. ”

“ The owner throws the dove from her with a gesture of the hand, first toward herself and then away, as a dove might be tossed for flight in the air, and the little dove sails away, with arms floating like wings. ”

“ A deep and narrow valley lay now before us, into whose recesses our eye was prevented from penetrating, by the winding course it pursues, and the shutting in of its precipices, which fold into each other, and preclude all distant view. Through this magic feature of country the river Dove leads his stream, murmuring innocently and agreeably over his stony bed in the halcyon days of summer, but swelling into rage during the winter months ”

“ The shadow of a dove
Falls on the cote, the trees are filled with wings;
And down the valley through the crying trees
The body of the darker storm flies; brings
With its new air the breath of sunken seas
And slender tenuous thunder . . .
But I wait . . .
Wait for the mists and for the blacker rain—
Heavier winds that stir the veil of fate,
Happier winds that pile her hair;
Again
They tear me, teach me, strew the heavy air
Upon me, winds that I know, and storm. ”

“ An immense number of a small kind of dove, with the slightest tinge of red, scarcely a blush, blended with their usual silvery grey plumage, kept darting from bush to bush, as we disturbed them anew, every few yards we advanced, whilst the little antelope of Salt, and a large kind of partridge, were not unfrequently seen running beneath the thin underwood. ”

“ How strange it is; the cry of this bird all at once transports the traveller to his own land! Truly there is a magic in sound. With the poorest appliances, the slightest equipment, the creative fancy can in a moment build a bridge to the Fatherland. The call of this beautiful dove sounding here on every side, its love-inspired circling high in air above the tops of the giants of the primeval forest, surrounds it with a dream-picture, and makes me suddenly breathe the air 297 of the beech woods. ”

“ Britain thy devotion ne’er can forget,
On that field of fields—Waterloo.
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THE DOVE’S SONG.
Listen! for I hear the dove’s sweet song,
So tender and mournfully sad,
Up from the vale where the maples bloom,
And the springtime e’er maketh glad.
Hast wandered afar from a fairer clime?
Was thy home in Southern bowers?
Is life more fair, and more fragrant the air,
Than in this grand Northland of ours?
Tell me, sweet dove; for thy mournful voice
Hath wakened old memories to-day
That have only slept through the weary years
That have silently flown away. ”

“ Not unsuitably came a dove, to point out the Son of God; for nothing so well corresponds to a lamb as a dove. As the lamb among beasts, so is the dove among birds. There is the utmost innocence in each, the utmost gentleness, the utmost guilelessness. What is so opposed to all malice as a lamb and a dove? ”

“ In the very earliest Christian art, of the second and third centuries, the dove represents most generally the soul of the departed set free by death; sometimes also the dove, familiar to those ancient craftsmen as the bird of Venus, becomes the dove of Noah, and thus the messenger of peace after the sufferings of this life ”

“ The flight of the dove for its course of about 540 feet is watched by the peasants with breathless attention, for they take its easy or jerky flight as ominous of the weather for the rest of the year and of the prospects of harvest. ”

“ In ancient Mesopotamia the divine mother of nature is often represented with this dove as having actually alighted on her shoulder or in her open hand. And here again forest worship early became associated with the worship of the dove; for, sixteen hundred years before Christ, we find the dove nurtured in the oak grove at Dodona where its presence was an augury and its wings an omen. ”

“ I had a dove and the sweet dove died;
And I have thought it died of grieving:
O, what could it grieve for? Its feet were tied,
With a silken thread of my own hand's weaving;
Sweet little red feet! why should you die—
Why should you leave me, sweet bird! why?
You lived alone in the forest-tree,
Why, pretty thing! would you not live with me?
I kiss'd you oft and gave you white peas;
Why not live sweetly, as in the green trees? ”

“ Why did the Spirit elect the form of a dove?
This Raulin answers in the following manner:
1. A dove is without gall, and is harmless, and therefore represents the character of those born of the Spirit.
2. A dove bore the olive-branch to the ark, in token of God being reconciled. And by baptism we are reconciled to God.
3. A dove has seven qualities, resembling the Spirit’s sevenfold gifts. These are,
(1) It moans instead of warbling; this represents the spirit of holy Fear.
(2) It is a gentle bird, and is offered in sacrifice; thus representing the spirit of Piety. ”

“ Because doves fare like men. Whoever shines very brightly and is seen from a distance, is set upon by opponents and envious people, and birds of prey pounce upon the white doves first. I tell you, Captain, whoever has eyes in his head, can learn in a dove-cote how things come to pass among Adam and Eve's posterity on earth. ”

“ "I used to call her, in my stupidity—for want of anything better—a dove. ”

“ At that she took off the bridle; but nearly fainted with astonishment when the horse turned into a dove and flew away just as the old man came out of the house. Directly he saw what had happened he changed himself into a hawk and flew after the dove. Over the woods and fields they went, and at length they reached a king’s palace surrounded by beautiful gardens. The princess was walking with her attendants in the rose garden when the dove turned itself into a gold ring and fell at her feet. ”

“ Catullus, speaking of Cæsar's salacitas, makes mention of the columbulum albulum, or little dove of Venus. [443] In this passage the dove becomes a phallical symbol; and we are reminded of the well-known mythical episode of the animal, bird, or fish which laughs, by the equivocal Italian proverb, "The dove that laughs wants the bean" (said of a woman when she smiles upon her lover [444] ) . It is narrated of Aphroditê, that she cured Aspasia of a tumour by the help of a dove; here the dove does to Aspasia the same service as the rudder of Indras's chariot to Apalâ in the Vedic legend. ”

“ Now, doves which have red and featherless legs are of the sort that Noah sent forth. The dove returning showed her legs to Noah, who said, May God render thee well-pleasing to men! For that reason the dove is dear to men's hearts. ”

“ THE DOVE WHO SPOKE TRUTH BY ABBIE FARWELL BROWN
The dove and the wrinkled little bat once went on a journey together. When it came toward night a storm arose, and the two companions sought everywhere for a shelter. But all the birds were sound asleep in their nests and the animals in their holes and dens. They could find no welcome anywhere until they came to the hollow tree where old Master Owl lived, wide awake in the dark. ”

“ The dove is an emblem of a gracious soul, which finding no rest for its foot, no solid peace or satisfaction in this world, this deluged defiling world, returns to Christ as to its ark, as to its Noah. The carnal heart, like the raven, takes up with the world, and feeds on the carrions it finds there ”

“ The dove's hole, near the village of Cong, in the west of the county Mayo, is a deep cavity in the ground, and when a stone is thrown down into it you hear it rumbling and crashing from side to side of the rocky wall, as it descends, until the sound becomes too faint to hear. It is the very place to be connected with the marvellous. ”

“ The dove is an airy emblem of the sea upon which Venice and the Venetians live, but more than that—the most permanent quality in the color of the lagoons, where the lights are always shifting, is the dove-tone of sea and sky; [Pg 185] a tone which holds all colors in solution, and out of which they emerge as the water-ripples or the cloud-flakes pass—just as the colors are shot and varied on a young dove's neck.
There is some doubts as to the origin of these flocks of pigeons which shelter in Saint Mark's. ”

“ Sometimes the form of a dove is voluntarily assumed by the two young lovers, to flee from the persecution of the monster; as, for instance, in the sixth of the Novelline di Santo Stefano. Sometimes the funereal dove (like the funereal crow) is the bringer of joy and good things to men and gods. ”

“ What a quantity of old lore one might collect about the dove, and as for the allusions in ancient and modern literature they must be legion—from the familiar Scriptural phrase about the turtle to Chaucer’s ‘the wedded turtil with her heartë trewe,’ from Greek myth or Roman poem to Tennyson’s ‘moan of doves in immemorial elms.’ Doubtless much of the dove-lore is so well known that it would be superfluous to repeat it here. As the symbol of peace, of the Spirit, the dove herself is universally familiar. ”

“ The dove is the emblem of purity and constancy. Ps. lvi. 1; Matt. x. 16. ‏עֵינַיִךְ יוֹנִים‎ are taken by the Syriac, Vulg., Ibn Ezra, Rashbam, Immanuel, Luther, Authorized Version, Kleuker, Percy, Gesenius, Döpke, Rosenmüller, Meier, &c. as an ellipsis for ‏עֵינֶיךָ עֵינֵי יוֹנִים‎, thine eyes are doves’ eyes. Gesen. § 144, Rem. Ewald, § 296, b. But such an ellipsis can be tolerated only in extreme emergencies, whereas here the natural construction yields an excellent sense. ”

“ She hung her cage in a pink rose tree in the sunniest part of the garden, and she often invited the Prince to sit with her under the tree and listen to the dove's sweet song.
WHY THE DOVE IS ON OUR VALENTINES
A long time ago when there were no white men in our country, but only Indians who lived in the forest, there was a timid little Indian boy.
All the other Indian lads loved the dark, so full of stars, and moonlight; but this boy was afraid of the [214] dark and did not venture out of his father's wigwam after the sun had set. ”