An owl flew by us, it is a fortunate omen, our project will succeed, or we shall hear good news from our friends. The raven, on the contrary, was considered as a bird of ill omen, and its appearance was supposed to predict evil. "That raven on you left hand oak, Curse on his ill foreboding croak, Bodes me no good." The owl was in a particular manner reverenced by the Athenians, as it was the favoured bird of Minerva, their patroness. When Pericles was haranguing his men on board one of his vessels, who had mutinied, an owl, flying by on the right hand, is said to have settled on the mast of the ship, and the men observing the omen were immediately pacified, and came into his opinion. The phrase, noctua volavit, was also sometimes used to intimate that any advantage obtained was procured by bribery, by giving money on which the figure of an owl was impressed, such coin being common among the Athenians.
