Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Cuckoo
The Attic warbler pours her throat
Responsive to the cuckoo’s note.
Gray—Ode on the Spring.
And now I hear its voice again,
And still its message is of peace,
It sings of love that will not cease,
For me it never sings in vain.
Fred’k Locker-Lampson.—The Cuckoo.
Oh, could I fly, I’d fly with thee!
We’d make, with joyful wing,
Our annual visit o’er the globe,
Companions of the spring.
John Logan—To the Cuckoo. Attributed also to Michael Bruce.
Sweet bird! thy bower is ever green,
Thy sky is ever clear;
Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,
No winter in thy year.
John Logan—To the Cuckoo. Attributed also to Michael Bruce. Arguments in favor of Logan in Notes and Queries, April, 1902. P. 309. In favor of Bruce, June 14, 1902. P. 469.
The cuckoo builds not for himself.
Antony and Cleopatra. Act II. Sc. 6. L. 28.
And being fed by us you used us so
As that ungentle gull, the cuckoo’s bird,
Useth the sparrow.
Henry IV. Pt. I. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 59.
The cuckoo then on every tree,
Mocks married men; for thus sings he,
Cuckoo!
Cuckoo! Cuckoo! O word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear.
Love’s Labour’s Lost. Act V. Sc. 2. L. 908.
The merry cuckow, messenger of Spring,
His trumpet shrill hath thrice already sounded.
Spenser—Sonnet. 19.
While I deduce,
From the first note the hollow cuckoo sings,
The symphony of spring.
Thomson—The Seasons. Spring. L. 576.
List—’twas the cuckoo—O, with what delight
Heard I that voice! and catch it now, though faint,
Far off and faint, and melting into air,
Yet not to be mistaken. Hark again!
Those louder cries give notice that the bird,
Although invisible as Echo’s self,
Is wheeling hitherward.
Wordsworth—The Cuckoo at Laverna.
O blithe New-comer! I have heard,
I hear thee and rejoice;
O Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird,
Or but a wandering Voice?
Wordsworth—To the Cuckoo.