Didjaknow T.H. White’s  “The Book of Beasts” is a translation from a twelfth century Latin Bestiary?   Strange animals and birds are described therein by those who contributed to the bestiary at that time. One Dr. Ansel Robins describes the  unicorns, “which can only be captured by  making them run their horns into trees, behind which the huntsman has dodged.” Also described are “Antalops, with saw like horns by which they can cut down large trees.” Field studies were then, as they are now, hard to  prove.

 Birds are given considerable attention in the Bestiary; most particularly bird migration is wondered about, several explanations being offered. One suggests,  regarding swallows,  that in off season, they fly to the moon. Another expert of the day states, “Swallows certainly sleep all winter. A number of them conglobulate together, by flying round and round, and then all in a heap throw themselves  under water, and lie in the bed of a river.”

Of course we do know differently now, science has so much improved, what with banding and radio collars; robot watchers for the ivory billed wood peckers, and so forth … or do we?

In February of 1417, King Henry V, of England, was busily preparing for his effort to reclaim the territories of France, to which he was convinced he was entitled.  Shakespeare’s play tells us of that effort, to some extent, but he does caution , in his prologue, that the armies of two mighty Monarchies and the “vasty fields of France” can hardly fit into the “wooden ‘O‘” of his theater.  …”Into a thousand parts divide one man …Think when we talk of horses , that you see them … for ‘tis your thought that now must deck our kings.” All of which means merely use you imagination. and “Gently to hear, and kindly to judge our play.”

Henry won, of course and  the culminating battle was fought at Agincourt,  where he was outnumbered five to one, the French mounting 30,000 against 6,000  Englishmen. 5,000 of whom were archers and it was because of the archers and their long-bows that he did so.  But  were there  others with whom the honor and glory of victory should have been shared?

Well, you bet there were. Each of those 5,000 archers carried  at least two dozen arrows. Each arrow fletched with three guiding feathers.  Early in his planning Henry  instructed  all of the sheriffs in England to require everyone in their jurisdictions to pluck six wing feathers  from every goose and send them on to London, these to be delivered to the fletchers for those arrows. So to insure the victory of the English against formidable odds 60,000 geese lost their flight feathers.