Nathaniel Hawthorne - A Virtuoso's Collection (From Mosses from an Old Manse)

My guide next pointed out Minerva’s owl and the vulture that preyed upon the liver of Prometheus. There was likewise the sacred ibis of Egypt, and one of the Stymphalides which Hercules shot in his sixth labor. Shelley’s skylark, Bryant’s water-fowl, and a pigeon from the belfry of the Old South Church, preserved by N. P. Willis, were placed on the same perch. I could not but shudder on beholding Coleridge’s albatross, transfixed with the Ancient Mariner’s crossbow shaft. Beside this bird of awful poesy stood a gray goose of very ordinary aspect.

“Stuffed goose is no such rarity,” observed I. “Why do you preserve such a specimen in your museum?”

“It is one of the flock whose cackling saved the Roman Capitol,” answered the virtuoso. “Many geese have cackled and hissed both before and since; but none, like those, have clamored themselves into immortality.”

There seemed to be little else that demanded notice in this department of the museum, unless we except Robinson Crusoe’s parrot, a live phoenix, a footless bird of paradise, and a splendid peacock, supposed to be the same that once contained the soul of Pythagoras. I therefore passed to the next alcove, the shelves of which were covered with a miscellaneous collection of curiosities such as are usually found in similar establishments. One of the first things that took my eye was a strange-looking cap, woven of some substance that appeared to be neither woollen, cotton, nor linen.

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