The Ostrich (Emblem 41)

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The Ostrich (Emblem 41)

Poem #106

Original Source

Hester Pulter, Poems breathed forth by the nobel Hadassas, University of Leeds Library, Brotherton Collection, MS Lt q 32

Versions

  • Facsimile of manuscript: Photographs provided by University of Leeds, Brotherton Collection

  • Transcription of manuscript: By Leah Knight and Wendy Wall.
  • Elemental edition: By Leah Knight and Wendy Wall.
  • Amplified edition: By Claire Richie.

How to cite these versions

Conventions for these editions

The Pulter Project: Poet in the Making

  • Created by Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
  • Encoded by Katherine Poland, Matthew Taylor, Elizabeth Chou, and Emily Andrey, Northwestern University
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X (Close panel)Notes: Transcription

 Editorial note

In these transcriptions we preserve as many details of the original material, textual, and graphic properties of Hester Pulter’s manuscript verse as we have found practical. Whenever possible, for instance, original spelling, punctuation, capitalization, lineation, insertions, deletions, alterations, spacing between words and lines, and indentation are all maintained; abbreviations and brevigraphs are not expanded; and superscript and subscript representations are retained. See full conventions for the transcriptions here.
Line number 26

 Physical note

“ich” appears written over earlier letters
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Transcription
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[Emblem 41]
The Ostrich
(Emblem 41)
Emblem 41
In these transcriptions we preserve as many details of the original material, textual, and graphic properties of Hester Pulter’s manuscript verse as we have found practical. Whenever possible, for instance, original spelling, punctuation, capitalization, lineation, insertions, deletions, alterations, spacing between words and lines, and indentation are all maintained; abbreviations and brevigraphs are not expanded; and superscript and subscript representations are retained. See full conventions for the transcriptions here.

— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
The aim of the elemental edition is to make the poems accessible to the largest variety of readers, which involves modernizing spelling and punctuation as well as adding basic glosses. Spelling and punctuation reflect current standard American usage; punctuation highlights syntax which might otherwise be obscure. Outmoded but still familiar word forms (“thou,” “‘tis,” “hold’st”) are not modernized, and we do not modernize grammar when the sense remains legible. After a brief headnote aimed at offering a “way in” to the poem’s unique qualities and connections with other verse by Pulter or her contemporaries, the edition features a minimum of notes and interpretative framing to allow more immediate engagement with the poem. Glosses clarify synonyms or showcase various possible meanings in Pulter’s time. Other notes identify named people and places or clarify obscure material. We rely (without citation) primarily on the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the Oxford Reference database, and the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible. When we rely on Alice Eardley’s edition of Pulter’s work, we cite her text generally (“Eardley”); other sources are cited in full. The result is an edition we consider a springboard for further work on Pulter’s poetry. See full conventions for this edition here.

— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
I have utilized a semi-diplomatic transcription convention and maintained original spelling, except where the double ff has been reduced to a single f throughout. Abbreviations have been expanded and brevigraphs preserved. I have maintained original punctuation and capitalization from the manuscript so that the reader might interpret the potential significance and ambiguities of those scribal choices on their own. In any cases where the capitalization is ambiguous, I have defaulted to lowercase.. All biblical quotations are from the 1612 King James Version.

— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
The mother ostrich in this emblem is doubly vain, since her high self-regard (or vanity) coincides with her deeply inadequate parenting skills, such that “she lays and labors all in vain.” While the speaker might first play the haughty ostrich for laughs, this emblem’s primary concern connects with several deeply serious poems by Pulter on the importance of loving (or even “indulgent”) parenting. Examples of birds who exhibit better and worse mothering are woven throughout this heartfelt critique of English parents who “sell their children, ne’er to see them more”—a shocking claim that brings into the poem’s orbit the slave trade in Africa and the English subjection of the Irish. These moral and social failures provide a sharp contrast to the divine parent-child relations she posits as a model for the wisdom of her attachment to her own offspring. The speaker ends with a humble plea to God to let her be an instrument to reproduce not just children but the blessing of love.

— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
Hester Pulter’s “The Ostrich” (Emblem 41) is numerically the last of what Elizabeth Kolkovich terms her indulgent parenting emblems, following The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71] and Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76]. Beginning with an account of the ostrich, who arrogantly leaves her eggs in the sand to hatch on their own, Pulter compares this form of bad parenting to the cuckoo, subject of The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94]. For Pulter, the ostrich is far worse than a bird who leaves her eggs for another species to hatch, as abandoning her eggs to the sand to incubate is tantamount to selling her children into slavery, a brief but startling reference to contemporary practices of forced labor in the English colonies. Pulter offers an alternative animal exemplar in the stork, whose children return the care that their parents gave them when the elders age. Ending with a typical Pulterian prayer that she receive holy wisdom so that she may pass it along to her own children, Pulter crafts a scale of animal parenting to which any mother could compare herself.
The ostrich has a surprisingly prominent place in Renaissance and early modern popular culture, the subject of many myths and folk legends that made it a rich source for metaphor and images. Its feathers and eggs, especially, were regarded as luxurious goods that could be found everywhere from the fashions of the nobility to church decorations. Ostriches were also thought to be able to consume and digest anything, even metals, a myth invoked by Jack Cade in William Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part II: “I’ll make thee eat iron like an ostrich and swallow my sword like a great pin, ere thou and I part.”
Gloss Note
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare 7th ed., ed. David Bevington (New York: Pearson, 2014), 4.10.28–29.
1 They were the subjects of emblems by both Geoffrey Whitney in 1586, who emphasized the hypocrisy of a bird who cannot fly, and George Wither in 1655, who used the ostrich’s plumes to warn against trusting ostentatious courtiers. Instead of following many of the popular conceptions of the ostrich, Pulter emphasizes the bird as a neglectful parent, a portrayal that can also be found in William Gouge’s parenting guide, Of Domestical Duties (1622). Pulter relies on the biblical description of the ostrich that appears in the Book of Job (39: 13–18) for her portrayal in this poem, largely eschewing Pliny the Elder’s History of the World, which first appeared in translation by Philemon Holland in 1601 and has been noted as a source in many of Pulter’s other emblems. In the biblical description and Pulter’s, the ostrich is portrayed as a vain and arrogant mother who leaves her newly laid eggs in the sand, leaving them vulnerable to being crushed by passerby. This careless act of pride betrays the ostrich’s actions as sinful. Good parents, argues Pulter, would never abandon their children as this callous bird does.
Emphasizing the need to both be a loving parent and devout Christian, Pulter also invokes a political practice of exile and servitude that was deeply rooted in the English colonial endeavor as the poem turns further outward in line 20. She condemns the “base English” who would dare sell their own young into servitude. During the Interregnum, forcibly transported indentured servants and Royalist political exiles made up a significant percentage of the labor force sent to colonies in the Atlantic, including the Caribbean and the Americas. Royalist soldiers captured by Parliamentarian armies could be placed into a seven-year labor contract and transported to Jamaica or Barbados. This practice existed in tandem with an increasing trade in enslaved people from Africa, also held up as an example in this poem. Pulter condemns the neglectful ostrich mother with the same vigor that she does the Cromwellian government’s practice of sending prisoners to labor in British colonial holdings. The transport of prisoners, poor, and convicts to labor in the colonies was especially prevalent during Cromwell’s conquest of Ireland, a plight in which Pulter may have had a particular interest given her Irish connections. Her stark comparison between a neglectful parent and forced labor practices emphasizes the dire implications of parenting without a deep love for the child. For this ostrich, whose great vanity and thoughtlessness endangers her young, neglectful parenting can be equated with exiling innocents to thankless labor.


— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
1
41The Estrich with her gallant gaudy plumes
The ostrich, with her
Gloss Note
gorgeous or showy (“gallant”) brilliantly fine or ornate (“gaudy”) feathers
gallant gaudy plumes,
The Estrich with her
Critical Note
Describing the ostrich’s feathers as “gallant” (gorgeous or showy in appearance [OED 1]) and “gaudy” (brilliantly fine or colourful, highly ornate, showy [OED 3]) attaches signifiers of boasting luxury to the bird. Ostrich feathers were fashionable and expensive, appearing on headdresses and helmets of the nobility. Pulter emphasizes them as a sign of wealth and excess that the bird naturally carries, associating her with those traits. Ostrich eggs, too, were valued for their large size and pleasing shape, and they were collected as display items. See Joan Barclay Lloyd, African Animals in Renaissance Literature and Art (1971).
gallant gaudy plumes
2
In her great wit and Courage Soe Preſumes
In her great
Gloss Note
intellect
wit and courage so presumes
In her great
Critical Note
understanding, intellect, reason (OED 1); Pulter is utilizing sarcasm here, as will become apparent when she derides the ostrich’s lack of intellect in lines 11–12.
wit and Courage soe Presumes
3
That as with wind and wing upright Shees bo’rn
That,
Gloss Note
since with
as with wind and wing upright she’s borne,
That as with wind and wing upright shees born
4
The Horſe and’s valient Rider Shee doth Scorn
The horse
Gloss Note
and his
and’s valiant rider she doth scorn.
The Horse
Gloss Note
and his
and’s valient Rider shee doth scorn
5
But folly is Concom̃itant with Pride
But folly is
Gloss Note
concurrent, accompanied
concomitant with pride,
But folly is
Gloss Note
going together, accompanying (OED 1)
Concommitant with Pride
6
ffor Shee her precious Egs in Sand doth hide
For she her precious eggs in sand doth hide,
For shee her precious Egs in sand doth hide
7
fforgetting that the Travellor’s foot may Cruſh
Forgetting that the traveler’s foot may crush
Forgetting that the Travellor’s foot may Crush
8
Their Tender Shell, nor doth Shee Care a Ruſh
Critical Note
The preceding account closely tracks the biblical book of Job 39:14–18, in which the ostrich is described as scorning the horse and rider and being negligent of her offspring: she “leaveth her eggs in the earth, … and forgetteth that the foot may crush them.”
Their tender shell; nor doth she
Gloss Note
care at all
care a rush
Their Tender shell, nor doth shee
Gloss Note
as for something of little or no value or importance (OED P.2)
Care a Rush
9
Though Shee her young doe never See again
Though she her young do never see again.
Though shee her young doe never see again
10
And thus Shee lays and labours all in vain
And thus she lays and labors all in vain,
And thus shee lays and
Critical Note
Pairing “labours” with the action of egg-laying suggests both labor as childbirth and as physical or manual exertion. The ostrich lays her eggs only to leave them in the sand and never see them hatch, while her prideful actions betray a lack of godliness.
labours all in vain
11
Cauſ God hath Underſtanding her deni’de
’Cause God hath understanding her denied.
Critical Note
The substance of Pulter’s description of the Ostrich in lines 3–11 is drawn directly from the Bible. Job 39: 13–18 gives this account: “Gavest thou the goodly wings unto the peacocks or wings and feathers unto the ostrich? / Which leaveth her egges in the earth, and warmeth them in dust / And forgetteth that the foote may crush them, or that the wilde beast may breake them./ She is hardened against her yong ones, as though they were not hers; labour is in vaine without feare: / Because God hath deprived her of wisedom, neither hath hee imparted to her understanding. / What time she lifteth up by her selfe on high, she scorneth the horse and his rider.” Pulter uses this description to emphasize the ostrich as a careless mother, willing to leave her eggs to incubate in the sand and risk them being crushed by a passing traveler rather than sit on them herself. She has no sympathy for, nor intelligence enough to understand, the risk to her young.
Caus God hath Understanding her deni’de
12
ffor Love, and Wiſdome, never will Reſide
For love and wisdom never will reside
For Love, and Wisdome, never will reside
13
With Arogance for they Are from above
With arrogance, for they are from above,
With Arogance for they Are from above
14
ffrom God who is the ffountain of all Love
From God, who is the fountain of all love.
From God who is the fountain of all Love
15
The Estrich then the Cuckow is ffar worſs
The ostrich than the cuckoo is far worse,
The Estrich then the Cuckow is far worss
16
ffor Shee doth onely put her Egs to Nurſs
For
Gloss Note
Many cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, who feed (“nurse”) them.
she doth only put her eggs to nurse;
For shee doth onely
Critical Note
The cuckoo was understood to lay its eggs in the nests of other birds, a practice known as brood parasitism. Pliny describes: “These lay alwaies in other birds nests, and most of all in the Stock-doves, commonly one egge and no more (which no other bird doth besides) and seldome twaine” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, X.IX, p. 275). Pulter’s ambivalent representation of the cuckoo is consistent with The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94].
put her Egs to Nurss
17
Hard is her Meat but harder is her Heart
Gloss Note
The flesh of the cuckoo is tough for humans to eat.
Hard is her meat, but harder is her heart,
Hard is her Meat but harder is her Heart
18
That with her new lay’d Ovums thus can part
That with her new laid
Gloss Note
eggs
ovums thus can part.
That with her new lay’d
Gloss Note
eggs. The word “ovum” is directly from Latin and predominantly appears in scientific texts in the early modern period. Pulter’s literary use is notable, if not unusual.
Ovums thus can part
19
Oh my Sad Soul this mak’s my Heart e’ne bleed
Oh, my sad soul: this makes my heart e’en bleed!
Oh my sad soul this mak’s my Heart e’ne bleed
20
None but baſe Engliſh and Cams curſed Seed
None but base English and
Gloss Note
In the Bible, Ham’s son Canaan is cursed by his grandfather, Noah (Genesis 9:20–27) causing his descendants to become subject to Israelites. Numerous early modern texts suggest that Ham’s dark-skinned lineage populated Africa.
Ham’s curséd seed
None but
Critical Note
morally low; despicable (OED I.2). As the English Civil War raged and Cromwell invaded Ireland, Royalist prisoners and the poor were often shipped to the West Indies as labor. It is important to note that none of these political prisoners endured lifelong bondage in the form of slavery, but instead had finite contracts for servitude that ended usually after a period of seven years. However, much of the rhetoric surrounding this practice was of outrage that even noble English citizens were treated like common criminals or subhuman animals. A particularly scandalous case of this political trafficking was that of two Royalists, Marcellus Rivers and Oxenbridge Foyle, who were forcibly transported to Barbados in 1655. The popular pamphlet, Englands Slavery, or Barbados Merchandize that related their ensuing petition to Parliament, also described the inhuman treatment the pair suffered at the hands of the planters to whom their contracts were sold. Pulter’s tone towards this practice resonates with the petition’s argument that this practice was “a thing not known amongst the cruell Turks, to sell and enslave these of their own Countrey and Religion, much lesse the Innocent” (7). Pulter makes explicit reference to the Parliamentarian practice of exiling captured Royalists to Jamaica and elsewhere in Phalaris and the Brazen Bull (Emblem 50) [Poem 115], a political emblem against Cromwell. For further information on Pulter’s relationship to English colonies in the Caribbean, see Jonathan Koch’s curation for that poem, Pulter and Jamaica. For forced labor practices in the interregnum, see Carla Gardina Pestana, The English Atlantic in an Age of Revolution, 1640–1661(2004).
base English and
Critical Note
In Genesis, Ham’s (also spelled Cham) son Canaan is cursed with servitude by Noah as a punishment for Ham seeing Noah naked: “And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger sonne had done unto him. / And he said, Cursed be Canaan: a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren” (Gen. 9: 24–25). Eardley notes that this story is often conflated with a curse of blackness upon Ham’s other son, Chus. (Alice Eardley, “An Edition of Lady Hester Pulter’s Book of ‘Emblemes’”. PhD diss., University of Warwick [2008], 128).This conflated curse was also for many years used as an explanation for blackness and a justification for the enslavement of Africans, especially throughout the transatlantic slave trade. At the same time that indentured servant labor was being transported to the islands, the African slave trade to the Caribbean, especially Barbados, was also increasing. While Pulter does not explicitly equate Black Africans with the enslaved Canaan in this line, she also uses this phrase in Aristomenes (Emblem 45) [Poem 110] to refer to an Ethiopian biblical character. This would certainly suggest that Pulter had some associations between dark-skinned inhabitants of African nations and slavery. For more on the curse of Ham and its relationship to slavery, see David M. Goldenberg, Black and Slave: The Origins and History of the Curse of Ham (2017).
Cams cursed seed
doe
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21
Doe Sell their Children ne’re to See them more
Do
Critical Note
Eardley suggests that this line might refer to the sale of royalist political prisoners, criminals, and Irish to the West Indies as indentured servants or slaves in the 1650s.
sell their children, ne’er to see them more!
Doe
Critical Note
It was often the poor and vagrant (including children) who would be selected, willingly or not, for transportation to both the North American and Caribbean colonial holdings. Henry Cromwell, Oliver Cromwell’s son and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, at one point proposed that one thousand Irish girls and two thousand boys be transported to Jamaica to work in the colony (“Henry Cromwell,” ODNB). The kidnap and transport of children as labor forces was a particular source of anxiety for the public, as stories circulated of even well-off English children being kidnapped for labor.
sell their Children ne’re to see them more
22
Such Barbariſme all Christians muſt deplore
Such barbarism all Christians must
Gloss Note
lament
deplore.
Such Barbarisme all Christians must deplore
23
Cruell’s the Eſtrich crueller their heart
Cruel’s the ostrich: crueller their heart
Cruell’s the Estrich crueller their heart
24
That with their dear bought Children thus can part
That with their
Gloss Note
obtained at a great cost
dear-bought children thus can part,
That with their dear bought Children
Critical Note
The repetition of the construction of this statement, beginning on line 23 and mirroring lines 17–18, creates a refrain that emphasizes the negative traits of both the ostrich and the Cromwellian government. Though the ostrich’s “hard heart” toward her young has already been emphasized, those who would willingly send children into servitude are even worse than this bad mother.
thus can part
25
When as the Stork her Young doe bear & feed
Gloss Note
When; seeing that
Whenas the stork her young do bear and feed,
When as the stork her Young doe bear & feed
26
Physical Note
“ich” appears written over earlier letters
Which they Retaliate in Age and Need
Gloss Note
The young storks support their parents when old. Here, “retaliate” means to repay a kindness or service.
Which they retaliate in age and need—
Which they
Gloss Note
to repay a kindness or service; to reciprocate (OED 2.b)
retaliate
Critical Note
In opposition to ostriches, storks exemplify the ideal parent-child relationship as the parents care for their young, and young storks do the same for their parents as they age. Pliny: “Storkes keepe one nest still from yeare to yeare, and never chaunge: and of this kind nature they are, that the yong will keepe and feed their parents when they be old, as they themselves were by them nourished in the beginning” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, XXIII, p. 282).
in Age and need
27
By which the Noble Reader plain may See
By which the noble reader plain may see
By which the noble Reader plain may see
28
That ffooliſh Creatures least indulgent bee
That foolish creatures least indulgent be.
Critical Note
The mirror of this statement appears in Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76], “The wisest creatures most indulgent be,” placing the ostrich in opposition to the good animal parents described in that poem. See also Elizabeth Kolkovich’s Curation for Emblem 10, Indulgent Parenting.
That foolish Creatures least indulgent bee
29
Let Parents then to theirs extend their Love
Let parents then to
Gloss Note
their offspring
theirs extend their love,
Let Parents then to theirs extend their Love
30
Seeing Naturall affection’s from above
Seeing natural affection’s from above.
Seeing
Critical Note
Parents extending care to their children, even if indulgent, is natural, as opposed to the unnatural mothering practices of the ostrich. Gouge’s Of Domestical Duties (1622) uses this same language to shame mothers who do not care for their infants: “It is noted as a point of vnnaturalnesse in the Ostrich, to leaue her eggs in the earth, and in the dust” (507). This phrase also mimics the “naturall affection” mentioned in 2 Timothy 3:3, further emphasizing the Christian nature of familial care.
Naturall affection’s from above
31
Then Gracious God into my Soul infuſe
Then, gracious God, into my soul infuse
Then Gracious God into my soul infuse
32
Thy Love and Wiſdome that it may diffuſe
Thy love and wisdom, that it may diffuse
Thy Love and Wisdome that it may
Critical Note
Pulter here uses “diffuse” (to send forth an immaterial thing in many directions [OED 1]) in a similar way as in The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71]. Lara Dodds describes in the Amplified Edition headnote that Pulter prays “that she may serve as an intermediary between the divine and her relations on earth.” Pulter mirrors that concept here, in another indulgent-parenting poem, in which she asks God to “infuse” her with his love and wisdom, so that she may share it with her children.
diffuse
33
To all my Children great as well as leſs
To all my children, great as well as less;
To all my Children
Gloss Note
older as well as younger
great as well as less
34
Then ô my God that Love and Wiſdome bleſs.
Then, O my God, that love and wisdom bless.
Then o’ my God that Love and Wisdome bless.
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X (Close panel)Notes: Elemental Edition

 Editorial note

The aim of the elemental edition is to make the poems accessible to the largest variety of readers, which involves modernizing spelling and punctuation as well as adding basic glosses. Spelling and punctuation reflect current standard American usage; punctuation highlights syntax which might otherwise be obscure. Outmoded but still familiar word forms (“thou,” “‘tis,” “hold’st”) are not modernized, and we do not modernize grammar when the sense remains legible. After a brief headnote aimed at offering a “way in” to the poem’s unique qualities and connections with other verse by Pulter or her contemporaries, the edition features a minimum of notes and interpretative framing to allow more immediate engagement with the poem. Glosses clarify synonyms or showcase various possible meanings in Pulter’s time. Other notes identify named people and places or clarify obscure material. We rely (without citation) primarily on the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the Oxford Reference database, and the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible. When we rely on Alice Eardley’s edition of Pulter’s work, we cite her text generally (“Eardley”); other sources are cited in full. The result is an edition we consider a springboard for further work on Pulter’s poetry. See full conventions for this edition here.

 Headnote

The mother ostrich in this emblem is doubly vain, since her high self-regard (or vanity) coincides with her deeply inadequate parenting skills, such that “she lays and labors all in vain.” While the speaker might first play the haughty ostrich for laughs, this emblem’s primary concern connects with several deeply serious poems by Pulter on the importance of loving (or even “indulgent”) parenting. Examples of birds who exhibit better and worse mothering are woven throughout this heartfelt critique of English parents who “sell their children, ne’er to see them more”—a shocking claim that brings into the poem’s orbit the slave trade in Africa and the English subjection of the Irish. These moral and social failures provide a sharp contrast to the divine parent-child relations she posits as a model for the wisdom of her attachment to her own offspring. The speaker ends with a humble plea to God to let her be an instrument to reproduce not just children but the blessing of love.
Line number 1

 Gloss note

gorgeous or showy (“gallant”) brilliantly fine or ornate (“gaudy”) feathers
Line number 2

 Gloss note

intellect
Line number 3

 Gloss note

since with
Line number 4

 Gloss note

and his
Line number 5

 Gloss note

concurrent, accompanied
Line number 8

 Critical note

The preceding account closely tracks the biblical book of Job 39:14–18, in which the ostrich is described as scorning the horse and rider and being negligent of her offspring: she “leaveth her eggs in the earth, … and forgetteth that the foot may crush them.”
Line number 8

 Gloss note

care at all
Line number 16

 Gloss note

Many cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, who feed (“nurse”) them.
Line number 17

 Gloss note

The flesh of the cuckoo is tough for humans to eat.
Line number 18

 Gloss note

eggs
Line number 20

 Gloss note

In the Bible, Ham’s son Canaan is cursed by his grandfather, Noah (Genesis 9:20–27) causing his descendants to become subject to Israelites. Numerous early modern texts suggest that Ham’s dark-skinned lineage populated Africa.
Line number 21

 Critical note

Eardley suggests that this line might refer to the sale of royalist political prisoners, criminals, and Irish to the West Indies as indentured servants or slaves in the 1650s.
Line number 22

 Gloss note

lament
Line number 24

 Gloss note

obtained at a great cost
Line number 25

 Gloss note

When; seeing that
Line number 26

 Gloss note

The young storks support their parents when old. Here, “retaliate” means to repay a kindness or service.
Line number 29

 Gloss note

their offspring
Sorry, but there are no notes associated with any currently displayed witness.
X (Close panel)Elemental Edition
Elemental Edition
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[Emblem 41]
The Ostrich
(Emblem 41)
Emblem 41
In these transcriptions we preserve as many details of the original material, textual, and graphic properties of Hester Pulter’s manuscript verse as we have found practical. Whenever possible, for instance, original spelling, punctuation, capitalization, lineation, insertions, deletions, alterations, spacing between words and lines, and indentation are all maintained; abbreviations and brevigraphs are not expanded; and superscript and subscript representations are retained. See full conventions for the transcriptions here.

— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
The aim of the elemental edition is to make the poems accessible to the largest variety of readers, which involves modernizing spelling and punctuation as well as adding basic glosses. Spelling and punctuation reflect current standard American usage; punctuation highlights syntax which might otherwise be obscure. Outmoded but still familiar word forms (“thou,” “‘tis,” “hold’st”) are not modernized, and we do not modernize grammar when the sense remains legible. After a brief headnote aimed at offering a “way in” to the poem’s unique qualities and connections with other verse by Pulter or her contemporaries, the edition features a minimum of notes and interpretative framing to allow more immediate engagement with the poem. Glosses clarify synonyms or showcase various possible meanings in Pulter’s time. Other notes identify named people and places or clarify obscure material. We rely (without citation) primarily on the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the Oxford Reference database, and the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible. When we rely on Alice Eardley’s edition of Pulter’s work, we cite her text generally (“Eardley”); other sources are cited in full. The result is an edition we consider a springboard for further work on Pulter’s poetry. See full conventions for this edition here.

— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
I have utilized a semi-diplomatic transcription convention and maintained original spelling, except where the double ff has been reduced to a single f throughout. Abbreviations have been expanded and brevigraphs preserved. I have maintained original punctuation and capitalization from the manuscript so that the reader might interpret the potential significance and ambiguities of those scribal choices on their own. In any cases where the capitalization is ambiguous, I have defaulted to lowercase.. All biblical quotations are from the 1612 King James Version.

— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
The mother ostrich in this emblem is doubly vain, since her high self-regard (or vanity) coincides with her deeply inadequate parenting skills, such that “she lays and labors all in vain.” While the speaker might first play the haughty ostrich for laughs, this emblem’s primary concern connects with several deeply serious poems by Pulter on the importance of loving (or even “indulgent”) parenting. Examples of birds who exhibit better and worse mothering are woven throughout this heartfelt critique of English parents who “sell their children, ne’er to see them more”—a shocking claim that brings into the poem’s orbit the slave trade in Africa and the English subjection of the Irish. These moral and social failures provide a sharp contrast to the divine parent-child relations she posits as a model for the wisdom of her attachment to her own offspring. The speaker ends with a humble plea to God to let her be an instrument to reproduce not just children but the blessing of love.

— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
Hester Pulter’s “The Ostrich” (Emblem 41) is numerically the last of what Elizabeth Kolkovich terms her indulgent parenting emblems, following The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71] and Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76]. Beginning with an account of the ostrich, who arrogantly leaves her eggs in the sand to hatch on their own, Pulter compares this form of bad parenting to the cuckoo, subject of The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94]. For Pulter, the ostrich is far worse than a bird who leaves her eggs for another species to hatch, as abandoning her eggs to the sand to incubate is tantamount to selling her children into slavery, a brief but startling reference to contemporary practices of forced labor in the English colonies. Pulter offers an alternative animal exemplar in the stork, whose children return the care that their parents gave them when the elders age. Ending with a typical Pulterian prayer that she receive holy wisdom so that she may pass it along to her own children, Pulter crafts a scale of animal parenting to which any mother could compare herself.
The ostrich has a surprisingly prominent place in Renaissance and early modern popular culture, the subject of many myths and folk legends that made it a rich source for metaphor and images. Its feathers and eggs, especially, were regarded as luxurious goods that could be found everywhere from the fashions of the nobility to church decorations. Ostriches were also thought to be able to consume and digest anything, even metals, a myth invoked by Jack Cade in William Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part II: “I’ll make thee eat iron like an ostrich and swallow my sword like a great pin, ere thou and I part.”
Gloss Note
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare 7th ed., ed. David Bevington (New York: Pearson, 2014), 4.10.28–29.
1 They were the subjects of emblems by both Geoffrey Whitney in 1586, who emphasized the hypocrisy of a bird who cannot fly, and George Wither in 1655, who used the ostrich’s plumes to warn against trusting ostentatious courtiers. Instead of following many of the popular conceptions of the ostrich, Pulter emphasizes the bird as a neglectful parent, a portrayal that can also be found in William Gouge’s parenting guide, Of Domestical Duties (1622). Pulter relies on the biblical description of the ostrich that appears in the Book of Job (39: 13–18) for her portrayal in this poem, largely eschewing Pliny the Elder’s History of the World, which first appeared in translation by Philemon Holland in 1601 and has been noted as a source in many of Pulter’s other emblems. In the biblical description and Pulter’s, the ostrich is portrayed as a vain and arrogant mother who leaves her newly laid eggs in the sand, leaving them vulnerable to being crushed by passerby. This careless act of pride betrays the ostrich’s actions as sinful. Good parents, argues Pulter, would never abandon their children as this callous bird does.
Emphasizing the need to both be a loving parent and devout Christian, Pulter also invokes a political practice of exile and servitude that was deeply rooted in the English colonial endeavor as the poem turns further outward in line 20. She condemns the “base English” who would dare sell their own young into servitude. During the Interregnum, forcibly transported indentured servants and Royalist political exiles made up a significant percentage of the labor force sent to colonies in the Atlantic, including the Caribbean and the Americas. Royalist soldiers captured by Parliamentarian armies could be placed into a seven-year labor contract and transported to Jamaica or Barbados. This practice existed in tandem with an increasing trade in enslaved people from Africa, also held up as an example in this poem. Pulter condemns the neglectful ostrich mother with the same vigor that she does the Cromwellian government’s practice of sending prisoners to labor in British colonial holdings. The transport of prisoners, poor, and convicts to labor in the colonies was especially prevalent during Cromwell’s conquest of Ireland, a plight in which Pulter may have had a particular interest given her Irish connections. Her stark comparison between a neglectful parent and forced labor practices emphasizes the dire implications of parenting without a deep love for the child. For this ostrich, whose great vanity and thoughtlessness endangers her young, neglectful parenting can be equated with exiling innocents to thankless labor.


— Leah Knight and Wendy Wall
1
41The Estrich with her gallant gaudy plumes
The ostrich, with her
Gloss Note
gorgeous or showy (“gallant”) brilliantly fine or ornate (“gaudy”) feathers
gallant gaudy plumes,
The Estrich with her
Critical Note
Describing the ostrich’s feathers as “gallant” (gorgeous or showy in appearance [OED 1]) and “gaudy” (brilliantly fine or colourful, highly ornate, showy [OED 3]) attaches signifiers of boasting luxury to the bird. Ostrich feathers were fashionable and expensive, appearing on headdresses and helmets of the nobility. Pulter emphasizes them as a sign of wealth and excess that the bird naturally carries, associating her with those traits. Ostrich eggs, too, were valued for their large size and pleasing shape, and they were collected as display items. See Joan Barclay Lloyd, African Animals in Renaissance Literature and Art (1971).
gallant gaudy plumes
2
In her great wit and Courage Soe Preſumes
In her great
Gloss Note
intellect
wit and courage so presumes
In her great
Critical Note
understanding, intellect, reason (OED 1); Pulter is utilizing sarcasm here, as will become apparent when she derides the ostrich’s lack of intellect in lines 11–12.
wit and Courage soe Presumes
3
That as with wind and wing upright Shees bo’rn
That,
Gloss Note
since with
as with wind and wing upright she’s borne,
That as with wind and wing upright shees born
4
The Horſe and’s valient Rider Shee doth Scorn
The horse
Gloss Note
and his
and’s valiant rider she doth scorn.
The Horse
Gloss Note
and his
and’s valient Rider shee doth scorn
5
But folly is Concom̃itant with Pride
But folly is
Gloss Note
concurrent, accompanied
concomitant with pride,
But folly is
Gloss Note
going together, accompanying (OED 1)
Concommitant with Pride
6
ffor Shee her precious Egs in Sand doth hide
For she her precious eggs in sand doth hide,
For shee her precious Egs in sand doth hide
7
fforgetting that the Travellor’s foot may Cruſh
Forgetting that the traveler’s foot may crush
Forgetting that the Travellor’s foot may Crush
8
Their Tender Shell, nor doth Shee Care a Ruſh
Critical Note
The preceding account closely tracks the biblical book of Job 39:14–18, in which the ostrich is described as scorning the horse and rider and being negligent of her offspring: she “leaveth her eggs in the earth, … and forgetteth that the foot may crush them.”
Their tender shell; nor doth she
Gloss Note
care at all
care a rush
Their Tender shell, nor doth shee
Gloss Note
as for something of little or no value or importance (OED P.2)
Care a Rush
9
Though Shee her young doe never See again
Though she her young do never see again.
Though shee her young doe never see again
10
And thus Shee lays and labours all in vain
And thus she lays and labors all in vain,
And thus shee lays and
Critical Note
Pairing “labours” with the action of egg-laying suggests both labor as childbirth and as physical or manual exertion. The ostrich lays her eggs only to leave them in the sand and never see them hatch, while her prideful actions betray a lack of godliness.
labours all in vain
11
Cauſ God hath Underſtanding her deni’de
’Cause God hath understanding her denied.
Critical Note
The substance of Pulter’s description of the Ostrich in lines 3–11 is drawn directly from the Bible. Job 39: 13–18 gives this account: “Gavest thou the goodly wings unto the peacocks or wings and feathers unto the ostrich? / Which leaveth her egges in the earth, and warmeth them in dust / And forgetteth that the foote may crush them, or that the wilde beast may breake them./ She is hardened against her yong ones, as though they were not hers; labour is in vaine without feare: / Because God hath deprived her of wisedom, neither hath hee imparted to her understanding. / What time she lifteth up by her selfe on high, she scorneth the horse and his rider.” Pulter uses this description to emphasize the ostrich as a careless mother, willing to leave her eggs to incubate in the sand and risk them being crushed by a passing traveler rather than sit on them herself. She has no sympathy for, nor intelligence enough to understand, the risk to her young.
Caus God hath Understanding her deni’de
12
ffor Love, and Wiſdome, never will Reſide
For love and wisdom never will reside
For Love, and Wisdome, never will reside
13
With Arogance for they Are from above
With arrogance, for they are from above,
With Arogance for they Are from above
14
ffrom God who is the ffountain of all Love
From God, who is the fountain of all love.
From God who is the fountain of all Love
15
The Estrich then the Cuckow is ffar worſs
The ostrich than the cuckoo is far worse,
The Estrich then the Cuckow is far worss
16
ffor Shee doth onely put her Egs to Nurſs
For
Gloss Note
Many cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, who feed (“nurse”) them.
she doth only put her eggs to nurse;
For shee doth onely
Critical Note
The cuckoo was understood to lay its eggs in the nests of other birds, a practice known as brood parasitism. Pliny describes: “These lay alwaies in other birds nests, and most of all in the Stock-doves, commonly one egge and no more (which no other bird doth besides) and seldome twaine” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, X.IX, p. 275). Pulter’s ambivalent representation of the cuckoo is consistent with The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94].
put her Egs to Nurss
17
Hard is her Meat but harder is her Heart
Gloss Note
The flesh of the cuckoo is tough for humans to eat.
Hard is her meat, but harder is her heart,
Hard is her Meat but harder is her Heart
18
That with her new lay’d Ovums thus can part
That with her new laid
Gloss Note
eggs
ovums thus can part.
That with her new lay’d
Gloss Note
eggs. The word “ovum” is directly from Latin and predominantly appears in scientific texts in the early modern period. Pulter’s literary use is notable, if not unusual.
Ovums thus can part
19
Oh my Sad Soul this mak’s my Heart e’ne bleed
Oh, my sad soul: this makes my heart e’en bleed!
Oh my sad soul this mak’s my Heart e’ne bleed
20
None but baſe Engliſh and Cams curſed Seed
None but base English and
Gloss Note
In the Bible, Ham’s son Canaan is cursed by his grandfather, Noah (Genesis 9:20–27) causing his descendants to become subject to Israelites. Numerous early modern texts suggest that Ham’s dark-skinned lineage populated Africa.
Ham’s curséd seed
None but
Critical Note
morally low; despicable (OED I.2). As the English Civil War raged and Cromwell invaded Ireland, Royalist prisoners and the poor were often shipped to the West Indies as labor. It is important to note that none of these political prisoners endured lifelong bondage in the form of slavery, but instead had finite contracts for servitude that ended usually after a period of seven years. However, much of the rhetoric surrounding this practice was of outrage that even noble English citizens were treated like common criminals or subhuman animals. A particularly scandalous case of this political trafficking was that of two Royalists, Marcellus Rivers and Oxenbridge Foyle, who were forcibly transported to Barbados in 1655. The popular pamphlet, Englands Slavery, or Barbados Merchandize that related their ensuing petition to Parliament, also described the inhuman treatment the pair suffered at the hands of the planters to whom their contracts were sold. Pulter’s tone towards this practice resonates with the petition’s argument that this practice was “a thing not known amongst the cruell Turks, to sell and enslave these of their own Countrey and Religion, much lesse the Innocent” (7). Pulter makes explicit reference to the Parliamentarian practice of exiling captured Royalists to Jamaica and elsewhere in Phalaris and the Brazen Bull (Emblem 50) [Poem 115], a political emblem against Cromwell. For further information on Pulter’s relationship to English colonies in the Caribbean, see Jonathan Koch’s curation for that poem, Pulter and Jamaica. For forced labor practices in the interregnum, see Carla Gardina Pestana, The English Atlantic in an Age of Revolution, 1640–1661(2004).
base English and
Critical Note
In Genesis, Ham’s (also spelled Cham) son Canaan is cursed with servitude by Noah as a punishment for Ham seeing Noah naked: “And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger sonne had done unto him. / And he said, Cursed be Canaan: a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren” (Gen. 9: 24–25). Eardley notes that this story is often conflated with a curse of blackness upon Ham’s other son, Chus. (Alice Eardley, “An Edition of Lady Hester Pulter’s Book of ‘Emblemes’”. PhD diss., University of Warwick [2008], 128).This conflated curse was also for many years used as an explanation for blackness and a justification for the enslavement of Africans, especially throughout the transatlantic slave trade. At the same time that indentured servant labor was being transported to the islands, the African slave trade to the Caribbean, especially Barbados, was also increasing. While Pulter does not explicitly equate Black Africans with the enslaved Canaan in this line, she also uses this phrase in Aristomenes (Emblem 45) [Poem 110] to refer to an Ethiopian biblical character. This would certainly suggest that Pulter had some associations between dark-skinned inhabitants of African nations and slavery. For more on the curse of Ham and its relationship to slavery, see David M. Goldenberg, Black and Slave: The Origins and History of the Curse of Ham (2017).
Cams cursed seed
doe
Facsimile Image Placeholder
Facsimile Image Placeholder
Facsimile Image Placeholder
21
Doe Sell their Children ne’re to See them more
Do
Critical Note
Eardley suggests that this line might refer to the sale of royalist political prisoners, criminals, and Irish to the West Indies as indentured servants or slaves in the 1650s.
sell their children, ne’er to see them more!
Doe
Critical Note
It was often the poor and vagrant (including children) who would be selected, willingly or not, for transportation to both the North American and Caribbean colonial holdings. Henry Cromwell, Oliver Cromwell’s son and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, at one point proposed that one thousand Irish girls and two thousand boys be transported to Jamaica to work in the colony (“Henry Cromwell,” ODNB). The kidnap and transport of children as labor forces was a particular source of anxiety for the public, as stories circulated of even well-off English children being kidnapped for labor.
sell their Children ne’re to see them more
22
Such Barbariſme all Christians muſt deplore
Such barbarism all Christians must
Gloss Note
lament
deplore.
Such Barbarisme all Christians must deplore
23
Cruell’s the Eſtrich crueller their heart
Cruel’s the ostrich: crueller their heart
Cruell’s the Estrich crueller their heart
24
That with their dear bought Children thus can part
That with their
Gloss Note
obtained at a great cost
dear-bought children thus can part,
That with their dear bought Children
Critical Note
The repetition of the construction of this statement, beginning on line 23 and mirroring lines 17–18, creates a refrain that emphasizes the negative traits of both the ostrich and the Cromwellian government. Though the ostrich’s “hard heart” toward her young has already been emphasized, those who would willingly send children into servitude are even worse than this bad mother.
thus can part
25
When as the Stork her Young doe bear & feed
Gloss Note
When; seeing that
Whenas the stork her young do bear and feed,
When as the stork her Young doe bear & feed
26
Physical Note
“ich” appears written over earlier letters
Which they Retaliate in Age and Need
Gloss Note
The young storks support their parents when old. Here, “retaliate” means to repay a kindness or service.
Which they retaliate in age and need—
Which they
Gloss Note
to repay a kindness or service; to reciprocate (OED 2.b)
retaliate
Critical Note
In opposition to ostriches, storks exemplify the ideal parent-child relationship as the parents care for their young, and young storks do the same for their parents as they age. Pliny: “Storkes keepe one nest still from yeare to yeare, and never chaunge: and of this kind nature they are, that the yong will keepe and feed their parents when they be old, as they themselves were by them nourished in the beginning” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, XXIII, p. 282).
in Age and need
27
By which the Noble Reader plain may See
By which the noble reader plain may see
By which the noble Reader plain may see
28
That ffooliſh Creatures least indulgent bee
That foolish creatures least indulgent be.
Critical Note
The mirror of this statement appears in Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76], “The wisest creatures most indulgent be,” placing the ostrich in opposition to the good animal parents described in that poem. See also Elizabeth Kolkovich’s Curation for Emblem 10, Indulgent Parenting.
That foolish Creatures least indulgent bee
29
Let Parents then to theirs extend their Love
Let parents then to
Gloss Note
their offspring
theirs extend their love,
Let Parents then to theirs extend their Love
30
Seeing Naturall affection’s from above
Seeing natural affection’s from above.
Seeing
Critical Note
Parents extending care to their children, even if indulgent, is natural, as opposed to the unnatural mothering practices of the ostrich. Gouge’s Of Domestical Duties (1622) uses this same language to shame mothers who do not care for their infants: “It is noted as a point of vnnaturalnesse in the Ostrich, to leaue her eggs in the earth, and in the dust” (507). This phrase also mimics the “naturall affection” mentioned in 2 Timothy 3:3, further emphasizing the Christian nature of familial care.
Naturall affection’s from above
31
Then Gracious God into my Soul infuſe
Then, gracious God, into my soul infuse
Then Gracious God into my soul infuse
32
Thy Love and Wiſdome that it may diffuſe
Thy love and wisdom, that it may diffuse
Thy Love and Wisdome that it may
Critical Note
Pulter here uses “diffuse” (to send forth an immaterial thing in many directions [OED 1]) in a similar way as in The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71]. Lara Dodds describes in the Amplified Edition headnote that Pulter prays “that she may serve as an intermediary between the divine and her relations on earth.” Pulter mirrors that concept here, in another indulgent-parenting poem, in which she asks God to “infuse” her with his love and wisdom, so that she may share it with her children.
diffuse
33
To all my Children great as well as leſs
To all my children, great as well as less;
To all my Children
Gloss Note
older as well as younger
great as well as less
34
Then ô my God that Love and Wiſdome bleſs.
Then, O my God, that love and wisdom bless.
Then o’ my God that Love and Wisdome bless.
horizontal straight line
X (Close panel)Notes: Amplified Edition

 Editorial note

I have utilized a semi-diplomatic transcription convention and maintained original spelling, except where the double ff has been reduced to a single f throughout. Abbreviations have been expanded and brevigraphs preserved. I have maintained original punctuation and capitalization from the manuscript so that the reader might interpret the potential significance and ambiguities of those scribal choices on their own. In any cases where the capitalization is ambiguous, I have defaulted to lowercase.. All biblical quotations are from the 1612 King James Version.

 Headnote

Hester Pulter’s “The Ostrich” (Emblem 41) is numerically the last of what Elizabeth Kolkovich terms her indulgent parenting emblems, following The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71] and Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76]. Beginning with an account of the ostrich, who arrogantly leaves her eggs in the sand to hatch on their own, Pulter compares this form of bad parenting to the cuckoo, subject of The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94]. For Pulter, the ostrich is far worse than a bird who leaves her eggs for another species to hatch, as abandoning her eggs to the sand to incubate is tantamount to selling her children into slavery, a brief but startling reference to contemporary practices of forced labor in the English colonies. Pulter offers an alternative animal exemplar in the stork, whose children return the care that their parents gave them when the elders age. Ending with a typical Pulterian prayer that she receive holy wisdom so that she may pass it along to her own children, Pulter crafts a scale of animal parenting to which any mother could compare herself.
The ostrich has a surprisingly prominent place in Renaissance and early modern popular culture, the subject of many myths and folk legends that made it a rich source for metaphor and images. Its feathers and eggs, especially, were regarded as luxurious goods that could be found everywhere from the fashions of the nobility to church decorations. Ostriches were also thought to be able to consume and digest anything, even metals, a myth invoked by Jack Cade in William Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part II: “I’ll make thee eat iron like an ostrich and swallow my sword like a great pin, ere thou and I part.”
Gloss Note
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare 7th ed., ed. David Bevington (New York: Pearson, 2014), 4.10.28–29.
1 They were the subjects of emblems by both Geoffrey Whitney in 1586, who emphasized the hypocrisy of a bird who cannot fly, and George Wither in 1655, who used the ostrich’s plumes to warn against trusting ostentatious courtiers. Instead of following many of the popular conceptions of the ostrich, Pulter emphasizes the bird as a neglectful parent, a portrayal that can also be found in William Gouge’s parenting guide, Of Domestical Duties (1622). Pulter relies on the biblical description of the ostrich that appears in the Book of Job (39: 13–18) for her portrayal in this poem, largely eschewing Pliny the Elder’s History of the World, which first appeared in translation by Philemon Holland in 1601 and has been noted as a source in many of Pulter’s other emblems. In the biblical description and Pulter’s, the ostrich is portrayed as a vain and arrogant mother who leaves her newly laid eggs in the sand, leaving them vulnerable to being crushed by passerby. This careless act of pride betrays the ostrich’s actions as sinful. Good parents, argues Pulter, would never abandon their children as this callous bird does.
Emphasizing the need to both be a loving parent and devout Christian, Pulter also invokes a political practice of exile and servitude that was deeply rooted in the English colonial endeavor as the poem turns further outward in line 20. She condemns the “base English” who would dare sell their own young into servitude. During the Interregnum, forcibly transported indentured servants and Royalist political exiles made up a significant percentage of the labor force sent to colonies in the Atlantic, including the Caribbean and the Americas. Royalist soldiers captured by Parliamentarian armies could be placed into a seven-year labor contract and transported to Jamaica or Barbados. This practice existed in tandem with an increasing trade in enslaved people from Africa, also held up as an example in this poem. Pulter condemns the neglectful ostrich mother with the same vigor that she does the Cromwellian government’s practice of sending prisoners to labor in British colonial holdings. The transport of prisoners, poor, and convicts to labor in the colonies was especially prevalent during Cromwell’s conquest of Ireland, a plight in which Pulter may have had a particular interest given her Irish connections. Her stark comparison between a neglectful parent and forced labor practices emphasizes the dire implications of parenting without a deep love for the child. For this ostrich, whose great vanity and thoughtlessness endangers her young, neglectful parenting can be equated with exiling innocents to thankless labor.
Line number 1

 Critical note

Describing the ostrich’s feathers as “gallant” (gorgeous or showy in appearance [OED 1]) and “gaudy” (brilliantly fine or colourful, highly ornate, showy [OED 3]) attaches signifiers of boasting luxury to the bird. Ostrich feathers were fashionable and expensive, appearing on headdresses and helmets of the nobility. Pulter emphasizes them as a sign of wealth and excess that the bird naturally carries, associating her with those traits. Ostrich eggs, too, were valued for their large size and pleasing shape, and they were collected as display items. See Joan Barclay Lloyd, African Animals in Renaissance Literature and Art (1971).
Line number 2

 Critical note

understanding, intellect, reason (OED 1); Pulter is utilizing sarcasm here, as will become apparent when she derides the ostrich’s lack of intellect in lines 11–12.
Line number 4

 Gloss note

and his
Line number 5

 Gloss note

going together, accompanying (OED 1)
Line number 8

 Gloss note

as for something of little or no value or importance (OED P.2)
Line number 10

 Critical note

Pairing “labours” with the action of egg-laying suggests both labor as childbirth and as physical or manual exertion. The ostrich lays her eggs only to leave them in the sand and never see them hatch, while her prideful actions betray a lack of godliness.
Line number 11

 Critical note

The substance of Pulter’s description of the Ostrich in lines 3–11 is drawn directly from the Bible. Job 39: 13–18 gives this account: “Gavest thou the goodly wings unto the peacocks or wings and feathers unto the ostrich? / Which leaveth her egges in the earth, and warmeth them in dust / And forgetteth that the foote may crush them, or that the wilde beast may breake them./ She is hardened against her yong ones, as though they were not hers; labour is in vaine without feare: / Because God hath deprived her of wisedom, neither hath hee imparted to her understanding. / What time she lifteth up by her selfe on high, she scorneth the horse and his rider.” Pulter uses this description to emphasize the ostrich as a careless mother, willing to leave her eggs to incubate in the sand and risk them being crushed by a passing traveler rather than sit on them herself. She has no sympathy for, nor intelligence enough to understand, the risk to her young.
Line number 16

 Critical note

The cuckoo was understood to lay its eggs in the nests of other birds, a practice known as brood parasitism. Pliny describes: “These lay alwaies in other birds nests, and most of all in the Stock-doves, commonly one egge and no more (which no other bird doth besides) and seldome twaine” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, X.IX, p. 275). Pulter’s ambivalent representation of the cuckoo is consistent with The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94].
Line number 18

 Gloss note

eggs. The word “ovum” is directly from Latin and predominantly appears in scientific texts in the early modern period. Pulter’s literary use is notable, if not unusual.
Line number 20

 Critical note

morally low; despicable (OED I.2). As the English Civil War raged and Cromwell invaded Ireland, Royalist prisoners and the poor were often shipped to the West Indies as labor. It is important to note that none of these political prisoners endured lifelong bondage in the form of slavery, but instead had finite contracts for servitude that ended usually after a period of seven years. However, much of the rhetoric surrounding this practice was of outrage that even noble English citizens were treated like common criminals or subhuman animals. A particularly scandalous case of this political trafficking was that of two Royalists, Marcellus Rivers and Oxenbridge Foyle, who were forcibly transported to Barbados in 1655. The popular pamphlet, Englands Slavery, or Barbados Merchandize that related their ensuing petition to Parliament, also described the inhuman treatment the pair suffered at the hands of the planters to whom their contracts were sold. Pulter’s tone towards this practice resonates with the petition’s argument that this practice was “a thing not known amongst the cruell Turks, to sell and enslave these of their own Countrey and Religion, much lesse the Innocent” (7). Pulter makes explicit reference to the Parliamentarian practice of exiling captured Royalists to Jamaica and elsewhere in Phalaris and the Brazen Bull (Emblem 50) [Poem 115], a political emblem against Cromwell. For further information on Pulter’s relationship to English colonies in the Caribbean, see Jonathan Koch’s curation for that poem, Pulter and Jamaica. For forced labor practices in the interregnum, see Carla Gardina Pestana, The English Atlantic in an Age of Revolution, 1640–1661(2004).
Line number 20

 Critical note

In Genesis, Ham’s (also spelled Cham) son Canaan is cursed with servitude by Noah as a punishment for Ham seeing Noah naked: “And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger sonne had done unto him. / And he said, Cursed be Canaan: a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren” (Gen. 9: 24–25). Eardley notes that this story is often conflated with a curse of blackness upon Ham’s other son, Chus. (Alice Eardley, “An Edition of Lady Hester Pulter’s Book of ‘Emblemes’”. PhD diss., University of Warwick [2008], 128).This conflated curse was also for many years used as an explanation for blackness and a justification for the enslavement of Africans, especially throughout the transatlantic slave trade. At the same time that indentured servant labor was being transported to the islands, the African slave trade to the Caribbean, especially Barbados, was also increasing. While Pulter does not explicitly equate Black Africans with the enslaved Canaan in this line, she also uses this phrase in Aristomenes (Emblem 45) [Poem 110] to refer to an Ethiopian biblical character. This would certainly suggest that Pulter had some associations between dark-skinned inhabitants of African nations and slavery. For more on the curse of Ham and its relationship to slavery, see David M. Goldenberg, Black and Slave: The Origins and History of the Curse of Ham (2017).
Line number 21

 Critical note

It was often the poor and vagrant (including children) who would be selected, willingly or not, for transportation to both the North American and Caribbean colonial holdings. Henry Cromwell, Oliver Cromwell’s son and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, at one point proposed that one thousand Irish girls and two thousand boys be transported to Jamaica to work in the colony (“Henry Cromwell,” ODNB). The kidnap and transport of children as labor forces was a particular source of anxiety for the public, as stories circulated of even well-off English children being kidnapped for labor.
Line number 24

 Critical note

The repetition of the construction of this statement, beginning on line 23 and mirroring lines 17–18, creates a refrain that emphasizes the negative traits of both the ostrich and the Cromwellian government. Though the ostrich’s “hard heart” toward her young has already been emphasized, those who would willingly send children into servitude are even worse than this bad mother.
Line number 26

 Gloss note

to repay a kindness or service; to reciprocate (OED 2.b)
Line number 26

 Critical note

In opposition to ostriches, storks exemplify the ideal parent-child relationship as the parents care for their young, and young storks do the same for their parents as they age. Pliny: “Storkes keepe one nest still from yeare to yeare, and never chaunge: and of this kind nature they are, that the yong will keepe and feed their parents when they be old, as they themselves were by them nourished in the beginning” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, XXIII, p. 282).
Line number 28

 Critical note

The mirror of this statement appears in Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76], “The wisest creatures most indulgent be,” placing the ostrich in opposition to the good animal parents described in that poem. See also Elizabeth Kolkovich’s Curation for Emblem 10, Indulgent Parenting.
Line number 30

 Critical note

Parents extending care to their children, even if indulgent, is natural, as opposed to the unnatural mothering practices of the ostrich. Gouge’s Of Domestical Duties (1622) uses this same language to shame mothers who do not care for their infants: “It is noted as a point of vnnaturalnesse in the Ostrich, to leaue her eggs in the earth, and in the dust” (507). This phrase also mimics the “naturall affection” mentioned in 2 Timothy 3:3, further emphasizing the Christian nature of familial care.
Line number 32

 Critical note

Pulter here uses “diffuse” (to send forth an immaterial thing in many directions [OED 1]) in a similar way as in The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71]. Lara Dodds describes in the Amplified Edition headnote that Pulter prays “that she may serve as an intermediary between the divine and her relations on earth.” Pulter mirrors that concept here, in another indulgent-parenting poem, in which she asks God to “infuse” her with his love and wisdom, so that she may share it with her children.
Line number 33

 Gloss note

older as well as younger
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[Emblem 41]
The Ostrich
(Emblem 41)
Emblem 41
In these transcriptions we preserve as many details of the original material, textual, and graphic properties of Hester Pulter’s manuscript verse as we have found practical. Whenever possible, for instance, original spelling, punctuation, capitalization, lineation, insertions, deletions, alterations, spacing between words and lines, and indentation are all maintained; abbreviations and brevigraphs are not expanded; and superscript and subscript representations are retained. See full conventions for the transcriptions here.

— Claire Richie
The aim of the elemental edition is to make the poems accessible to the largest variety of readers, which involves modernizing spelling and punctuation as well as adding basic glosses. Spelling and punctuation reflect current standard American usage; punctuation highlights syntax which might otherwise be obscure. Outmoded but still familiar word forms (“thou,” “‘tis,” “hold’st”) are not modernized, and we do not modernize grammar when the sense remains legible. After a brief headnote aimed at offering a “way in” to the poem’s unique qualities and connections with other verse by Pulter or her contemporaries, the edition features a minimum of notes and interpretative framing to allow more immediate engagement with the poem. Glosses clarify synonyms or showcase various possible meanings in Pulter’s time. Other notes identify named people and places or clarify obscure material. We rely (without citation) primarily on the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the Oxford Reference database, and the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible. When we rely on Alice Eardley’s edition of Pulter’s work, we cite her text generally (“Eardley”); other sources are cited in full. The result is an edition we consider a springboard for further work on Pulter’s poetry. See full conventions for this edition here.

— Claire Richie
I have utilized a semi-diplomatic transcription convention and maintained original spelling, except where the double ff has been reduced to a single f throughout. Abbreviations have been expanded and brevigraphs preserved. I have maintained original punctuation and capitalization from the manuscript so that the reader might interpret the potential significance and ambiguities of those scribal choices on their own. In any cases where the capitalization is ambiguous, I have defaulted to lowercase.. All biblical quotations are from the 1612 King James Version.

— Claire Richie
The mother ostrich in this emblem is doubly vain, since her high self-regard (or vanity) coincides with her deeply inadequate parenting skills, such that “she lays and labors all in vain.” While the speaker might first play the haughty ostrich for laughs, this emblem’s primary concern connects with several deeply serious poems by Pulter on the importance of loving (or even “indulgent”) parenting. Examples of birds who exhibit better and worse mothering are woven throughout this heartfelt critique of English parents who “sell their children, ne’er to see them more”—a shocking claim that brings into the poem’s orbit the slave trade in Africa and the English subjection of the Irish. These moral and social failures provide a sharp contrast to the divine parent-child relations she posits as a model for the wisdom of her attachment to her own offspring. The speaker ends with a humble plea to God to let her be an instrument to reproduce not just children but the blessing of love.

— Claire Richie
Hester Pulter’s “The Ostrich” (Emblem 41) is numerically the last of what Elizabeth Kolkovich terms her indulgent parenting emblems, following The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71] and Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76]. Beginning with an account of the ostrich, who arrogantly leaves her eggs in the sand to hatch on their own, Pulter compares this form of bad parenting to the cuckoo, subject of The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94]. For Pulter, the ostrich is far worse than a bird who leaves her eggs for another species to hatch, as abandoning her eggs to the sand to incubate is tantamount to selling her children into slavery, a brief but startling reference to contemporary practices of forced labor in the English colonies. Pulter offers an alternative animal exemplar in the stork, whose children return the care that their parents gave them when the elders age. Ending with a typical Pulterian prayer that she receive holy wisdom so that she may pass it along to her own children, Pulter crafts a scale of animal parenting to which any mother could compare herself.
The ostrich has a surprisingly prominent place in Renaissance and early modern popular culture, the subject of many myths and folk legends that made it a rich source for metaphor and images. Its feathers and eggs, especially, were regarded as luxurious goods that could be found everywhere from the fashions of the nobility to church decorations. Ostriches were also thought to be able to consume and digest anything, even metals, a myth invoked by Jack Cade in William Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part II: “I’ll make thee eat iron like an ostrich and swallow my sword like a great pin, ere thou and I part.”
Gloss Note
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare 7th ed., ed. David Bevington (New York: Pearson, 2014), 4.10.28–29.
1 They were the subjects of emblems by both Geoffrey Whitney in 1586, who emphasized the hypocrisy of a bird who cannot fly, and George Wither in 1655, who used the ostrich’s plumes to warn against trusting ostentatious courtiers. Instead of following many of the popular conceptions of the ostrich, Pulter emphasizes the bird as a neglectful parent, a portrayal that can also be found in William Gouge’s parenting guide, Of Domestical Duties (1622). Pulter relies on the biblical description of the ostrich that appears in the Book of Job (39: 13–18) for her portrayal in this poem, largely eschewing Pliny the Elder’s History of the World, which first appeared in translation by Philemon Holland in 1601 and has been noted as a source in many of Pulter’s other emblems. In the biblical description and Pulter’s, the ostrich is portrayed as a vain and arrogant mother who leaves her newly laid eggs in the sand, leaving them vulnerable to being crushed by passerby. This careless act of pride betrays the ostrich’s actions as sinful. Good parents, argues Pulter, would never abandon their children as this callous bird does.
Emphasizing the need to both be a loving parent and devout Christian, Pulter also invokes a political practice of exile and servitude that was deeply rooted in the English colonial endeavor as the poem turns further outward in line 20. She condemns the “base English” who would dare sell their own young into servitude. During the Interregnum, forcibly transported indentured servants and Royalist political exiles made up a significant percentage of the labor force sent to colonies in the Atlantic, including the Caribbean and the Americas. Royalist soldiers captured by Parliamentarian armies could be placed into a seven-year labor contract and transported to Jamaica or Barbados. This practice existed in tandem with an increasing trade in enslaved people from Africa, also held up as an example in this poem. Pulter condemns the neglectful ostrich mother with the same vigor that she does the Cromwellian government’s practice of sending prisoners to labor in British colonial holdings. The transport of prisoners, poor, and convicts to labor in the colonies was especially prevalent during Cromwell’s conquest of Ireland, a plight in which Pulter may have had a particular interest given her Irish connections. Her stark comparison between a neglectful parent and forced labor practices emphasizes the dire implications of parenting without a deep love for the child. For this ostrich, whose great vanity and thoughtlessness endangers her young, neglectful parenting can be equated with exiling innocents to thankless labor.


— Claire Richie
1
41The Estrich with her gallant gaudy plumes
The ostrich, with her
Gloss Note
gorgeous or showy (“gallant”) brilliantly fine or ornate (“gaudy”) feathers
gallant gaudy plumes,
The Estrich with her
Critical Note
Describing the ostrich’s feathers as “gallant” (gorgeous or showy in appearance [OED 1]) and “gaudy” (brilliantly fine or colourful, highly ornate, showy [OED 3]) attaches signifiers of boasting luxury to the bird. Ostrich feathers were fashionable and expensive, appearing on headdresses and helmets of the nobility. Pulter emphasizes them as a sign of wealth and excess that the bird naturally carries, associating her with those traits. Ostrich eggs, too, were valued for their large size and pleasing shape, and they were collected as display items. See Joan Barclay Lloyd, African Animals in Renaissance Literature and Art (1971).
gallant gaudy plumes
2
In her great wit and Courage Soe Preſumes
In her great
Gloss Note
intellect
wit and courage so presumes
In her great
Critical Note
understanding, intellect, reason (OED 1); Pulter is utilizing sarcasm here, as will become apparent when she derides the ostrich’s lack of intellect in lines 11–12.
wit and Courage soe Presumes
3
That as with wind and wing upright Shees bo’rn
That,
Gloss Note
since with
as with wind and wing upright she’s borne,
That as with wind and wing upright shees born
4
The Horſe and’s valient Rider Shee doth Scorn
The horse
Gloss Note
and his
and’s valiant rider she doth scorn.
The Horse
Gloss Note
and his
and’s valient Rider shee doth scorn
5
But folly is Concom̃itant with Pride
But folly is
Gloss Note
concurrent, accompanied
concomitant with pride,
But folly is
Gloss Note
going together, accompanying (OED 1)
Concommitant with Pride
6
ffor Shee her precious Egs in Sand doth hide
For she her precious eggs in sand doth hide,
For shee her precious Egs in sand doth hide
7
fforgetting that the Travellor’s foot may Cruſh
Forgetting that the traveler’s foot may crush
Forgetting that the Travellor’s foot may Crush
8
Their Tender Shell, nor doth Shee Care a Ruſh
Critical Note
The preceding account closely tracks the biblical book of Job 39:14–18, in which the ostrich is described as scorning the horse and rider and being negligent of her offspring: she “leaveth her eggs in the earth, … and forgetteth that the foot may crush them.”
Their tender shell; nor doth she
Gloss Note
care at all
care a rush
Their Tender shell, nor doth shee
Gloss Note
as for something of little or no value or importance (OED P.2)
Care a Rush
9
Though Shee her young doe never See again
Though she her young do never see again.
Though shee her young doe never see again
10
And thus Shee lays and labours all in vain
And thus she lays and labors all in vain,
And thus shee lays and
Critical Note
Pairing “labours” with the action of egg-laying suggests both labor as childbirth and as physical or manual exertion. The ostrich lays her eggs only to leave them in the sand and never see them hatch, while her prideful actions betray a lack of godliness.
labours all in vain
11
Cauſ God hath Underſtanding her deni’de
’Cause God hath understanding her denied.
Critical Note
The substance of Pulter’s description of the Ostrich in lines 3–11 is drawn directly from the Bible. Job 39: 13–18 gives this account: “Gavest thou the goodly wings unto the peacocks or wings and feathers unto the ostrich? / Which leaveth her egges in the earth, and warmeth them in dust / And forgetteth that the foote may crush them, or that the wilde beast may breake them./ She is hardened against her yong ones, as though they were not hers; labour is in vaine without feare: / Because God hath deprived her of wisedom, neither hath hee imparted to her understanding. / What time she lifteth up by her selfe on high, she scorneth the horse and his rider.” Pulter uses this description to emphasize the ostrich as a careless mother, willing to leave her eggs to incubate in the sand and risk them being crushed by a passing traveler rather than sit on them herself. She has no sympathy for, nor intelligence enough to understand, the risk to her young.
Caus God hath Understanding her deni’de
12
ffor Love, and Wiſdome, never will Reſide
For love and wisdom never will reside
For Love, and Wisdome, never will reside
13
With Arogance for they Are from above
With arrogance, for they are from above,
With Arogance for they Are from above
14
ffrom God who is the ffountain of all Love
From God, who is the fountain of all love.
From God who is the fountain of all Love
15
The Estrich then the Cuckow is ffar worſs
The ostrich than the cuckoo is far worse,
The Estrich then the Cuckow is far worss
16
ffor Shee doth onely put her Egs to Nurſs
For
Gloss Note
Many cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, who feed (“nurse”) them.
she doth only put her eggs to nurse;
For shee doth onely
Critical Note
The cuckoo was understood to lay its eggs in the nests of other birds, a practice known as brood parasitism. Pliny describes: “These lay alwaies in other birds nests, and most of all in the Stock-doves, commonly one egge and no more (which no other bird doth besides) and seldome twaine” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, X.IX, p. 275). Pulter’s ambivalent representation of the cuckoo is consistent with The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94].
put her Egs to Nurss
17
Hard is her Meat but harder is her Heart
Gloss Note
The flesh of the cuckoo is tough for humans to eat.
Hard is her meat, but harder is her heart,
Hard is her Meat but harder is her Heart
18
That with her new lay’d Ovums thus can part
That with her new laid
Gloss Note
eggs
ovums thus can part.
That with her new lay’d
Gloss Note
eggs. The word “ovum” is directly from Latin and predominantly appears in scientific texts in the early modern period. Pulter’s literary use is notable, if not unusual.
Ovums thus can part
19
Oh my Sad Soul this mak’s my Heart e’ne bleed
Oh, my sad soul: this makes my heart e’en bleed!
Oh my sad soul this mak’s my Heart e’ne bleed
20
None but baſe Engliſh and Cams curſed Seed
None but base English and
Gloss Note
In the Bible, Ham’s son Canaan is cursed by his grandfather, Noah (Genesis 9:20–27) causing his descendants to become subject to Israelites. Numerous early modern texts suggest that Ham’s dark-skinned lineage populated Africa.
Ham’s curséd seed
None but
Critical Note
morally low; despicable (OED I.2). As the English Civil War raged and Cromwell invaded Ireland, Royalist prisoners and the poor were often shipped to the West Indies as labor. It is important to note that none of these political prisoners endured lifelong bondage in the form of slavery, but instead had finite contracts for servitude that ended usually after a period of seven years. However, much of the rhetoric surrounding this practice was of outrage that even noble English citizens were treated like common criminals or subhuman animals. A particularly scandalous case of this political trafficking was that of two Royalists, Marcellus Rivers and Oxenbridge Foyle, who were forcibly transported to Barbados in 1655. The popular pamphlet, Englands Slavery, or Barbados Merchandize that related their ensuing petition to Parliament, also described the inhuman treatment the pair suffered at the hands of the planters to whom their contracts were sold. Pulter’s tone towards this practice resonates with the petition’s argument that this practice was “a thing not known amongst the cruell Turks, to sell and enslave these of their own Countrey and Religion, much lesse the Innocent” (7). Pulter makes explicit reference to the Parliamentarian practice of exiling captured Royalists to Jamaica and elsewhere in Phalaris and the Brazen Bull (Emblem 50) [Poem 115], a political emblem against Cromwell. For further information on Pulter’s relationship to English colonies in the Caribbean, see Jonathan Koch’s curation for that poem, Pulter and Jamaica. For forced labor practices in the interregnum, see Carla Gardina Pestana, The English Atlantic in an Age of Revolution, 1640–1661(2004).
base English and
Critical Note
In Genesis, Ham’s (also spelled Cham) son Canaan is cursed with servitude by Noah as a punishment for Ham seeing Noah naked: “And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger sonne had done unto him. / And he said, Cursed be Canaan: a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren” (Gen. 9: 24–25). Eardley notes that this story is often conflated with a curse of blackness upon Ham’s other son, Chus. (Alice Eardley, “An Edition of Lady Hester Pulter’s Book of ‘Emblemes’”. PhD diss., University of Warwick [2008], 128).This conflated curse was also for many years used as an explanation for blackness and a justification for the enslavement of Africans, especially throughout the transatlantic slave trade. At the same time that indentured servant labor was being transported to the islands, the African slave trade to the Caribbean, especially Barbados, was also increasing. While Pulter does not explicitly equate Black Africans with the enslaved Canaan in this line, she also uses this phrase in Aristomenes (Emblem 45) [Poem 110] to refer to an Ethiopian biblical character. This would certainly suggest that Pulter had some associations between dark-skinned inhabitants of African nations and slavery. For more on the curse of Ham and its relationship to slavery, see David M. Goldenberg, Black and Slave: The Origins and History of the Curse of Ham (2017).
Cams cursed seed
doe
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21
Doe Sell their Children ne’re to See them more
Do
Critical Note
Eardley suggests that this line might refer to the sale of royalist political prisoners, criminals, and Irish to the West Indies as indentured servants or slaves in the 1650s.
sell their children, ne’er to see them more!
Doe
Critical Note
It was often the poor and vagrant (including children) who would be selected, willingly or not, for transportation to both the North American and Caribbean colonial holdings. Henry Cromwell, Oliver Cromwell’s son and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, at one point proposed that one thousand Irish girls and two thousand boys be transported to Jamaica to work in the colony (“Henry Cromwell,” ODNB). The kidnap and transport of children as labor forces was a particular source of anxiety for the public, as stories circulated of even well-off English children being kidnapped for labor.
sell their Children ne’re to see them more
22
Such Barbariſme all Christians muſt deplore
Such barbarism all Christians must
Gloss Note
lament
deplore.
Such Barbarisme all Christians must deplore
23
Cruell’s the Eſtrich crueller their heart
Cruel’s the ostrich: crueller their heart
Cruell’s the Estrich crueller their heart
24
That with their dear bought Children thus can part
That with their
Gloss Note
obtained at a great cost
dear-bought children thus can part,
That with their dear bought Children
Critical Note
The repetition of the construction of this statement, beginning on line 23 and mirroring lines 17–18, creates a refrain that emphasizes the negative traits of both the ostrich and the Cromwellian government. Though the ostrich’s “hard heart” toward her young has already been emphasized, those who would willingly send children into servitude are even worse than this bad mother.
thus can part
25
When as the Stork her Young doe bear & feed
Gloss Note
When; seeing that
Whenas the stork her young do bear and feed,
When as the stork her Young doe bear & feed
26
Physical Note
“ich” appears written over earlier letters
Which they Retaliate in Age and Need
Gloss Note
The young storks support their parents when old. Here, “retaliate” means to repay a kindness or service.
Which they retaliate in age and need—
Which they
Gloss Note
to repay a kindness or service; to reciprocate (OED 2.b)
retaliate
Critical Note
In opposition to ostriches, storks exemplify the ideal parent-child relationship as the parents care for their young, and young storks do the same for their parents as they age. Pliny: “Storkes keepe one nest still from yeare to yeare, and never chaunge: and of this kind nature they are, that the yong will keepe and feed their parents when they be old, as they themselves were by them nourished in the beginning” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, XXIII, p. 282).
in Age and need
27
By which the Noble Reader plain may See
By which the noble reader plain may see
By which the noble Reader plain may see
28
That ffooliſh Creatures least indulgent bee
That foolish creatures least indulgent be.
Critical Note
The mirror of this statement appears in Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76], “The wisest creatures most indulgent be,” placing the ostrich in opposition to the good animal parents described in that poem. See also Elizabeth Kolkovich’s Curation for Emblem 10, Indulgent Parenting.
That foolish Creatures least indulgent bee
29
Let Parents then to theirs extend their Love
Let parents then to
Gloss Note
their offspring
theirs extend their love,
Let Parents then to theirs extend their Love
30
Seeing Naturall affection’s from above
Seeing natural affection’s from above.
Seeing
Critical Note
Parents extending care to their children, even if indulgent, is natural, as opposed to the unnatural mothering practices of the ostrich. Gouge’s Of Domestical Duties (1622) uses this same language to shame mothers who do not care for their infants: “It is noted as a point of vnnaturalnesse in the Ostrich, to leaue her eggs in the earth, and in the dust” (507). This phrase also mimics the “naturall affection” mentioned in 2 Timothy 3:3, further emphasizing the Christian nature of familial care.
Naturall affection’s from above
31
Then Gracious God into my Soul infuſe
Then, gracious God, into my soul infuse
Then Gracious God into my soul infuse
32
Thy Love and Wiſdome that it may diffuſe
Thy love and wisdom, that it may diffuse
Thy Love and Wisdome that it may
Critical Note
Pulter here uses “diffuse” (to send forth an immaterial thing in many directions [OED 1]) in a similar way as in The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71]. Lara Dodds describes in the Amplified Edition headnote that Pulter prays “that she may serve as an intermediary between the divine and her relations on earth.” Pulter mirrors that concept here, in another indulgent-parenting poem, in which she asks God to “infuse” her with his love and wisdom, so that she may share it with her children.
diffuse
33
To all my Children great as well as leſs
To all my children, great as well as less;
To all my Children
Gloss Note
older as well as younger
great as well as less
34
Then ô my God that Love and Wiſdome bleſs.
Then, O my God, that love and wisdom bless.
Then o’ my God that Love and Wisdome bless.
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Transcription

 Editorial note

In these transcriptions we preserve as many details of the original material, textual, and graphic properties of Hester Pulter’s manuscript verse as we have found practical. Whenever possible, for instance, original spelling, punctuation, capitalization, lineation, insertions, deletions, alterations, spacing between words and lines, and indentation are all maintained; abbreviations and brevigraphs are not expanded; and superscript and subscript representations are retained. See full conventions for the transcriptions here.
Elemental Edition

 Editorial note

The aim of the elemental edition is to make the poems accessible to the largest variety of readers, which involves modernizing spelling and punctuation as well as adding basic glosses. Spelling and punctuation reflect current standard American usage; punctuation highlights syntax which might otherwise be obscure. Outmoded but still familiar word forms (“thou,” “‘tis,” “hold’st”) are not modernized, and we do not modernize grammar when the sense remains legible. After a brief headnote aimed at offering a “way in” to the poem’s unique qualities and connections with other verse by Pulter or her contemporaries, the edition features a minimum of notes and interpretative framing to allow more immediate engagement with the poem. Glosses clarify synonyms or showcase various possible meanings in Pulter’s time. Other notes identify named people and places or clarify obscure material. We rely (without citation) primarily on the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the Oxford Reference database, and the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible. When we rely on Alice Eardley’s edition of Pulter’s work, we cite her text generally (“Eardley”); other sources are cited in full. The result is an edition we consider a springboard for further work on Pulter’s poetry. See full conventions for this edition here.
Amplified Edition

 Editorial note

I have utilized a semi-diplomatic transcription convention and maintained original spelling, except where the double ff has been reduced to a single f throughout. Abbreviations have been expanded and brevigraphs preserved. I have maintained original punctuation and capitalization from the manuscript so that the reader might interpret the potential significance and ambiguities of those scribal choices on their own. In any cases where the capitalization is ambiguous, I have defaulted to lowercase.. All biblical quotations are from the 1612 King James Version.
Elemental Edition

 Headnote

The mother ostrich in this emblem is doubly vain, since her high self-regard (or vanity) coincides with her deeply inadequate parenting skills, such that “she lays and labors all in vain.” While the speaker might first play the haughty ostrich for laughs, this emblem’s primary concern connects with several deeply serious poems by Pulter on the importance of loving (or even “indulgent”) parenting. Examples of birds who exhibit better and worse mothering are woven throughout this heartfelt critique of English parents who “sell their children, ne’er to see them more”—a shocking claim that brings into the poem’s orbit the slave trade in Africa and the English subjection of the Irish. These moral and social failures provide a sharp contrast to the divine parent-child relations she posits as a model for the wisdom of her attachment to her own offspring. The speaker ends with a humble plea to God to let her be an instrument to reproduce not just children but the blessing of love.
Amplified Edition

 Headnote

Hester Pulter’s “The Ostrich” (Emblem 41) is numerically the last of what Elizabeth Kolkovich terms her indulgent parenting emblems, following The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71] and Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76]. Beginning with an account of the ostrich, who arrogantly leaves her eggs in the sand to hatch on their own, Pulter compares this form of bad parenting to the cuckoo, subject of The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94]. For Pulter, the ostrich is far worse than a bird who leaves her eggs for another species to hatch, as abandoning her eggs to the sand to incubate is tantamount to selling her children into slavery, a brief but startling reference to contemporary practices of forced labor in the English colonies. Pulter offers an alternative animal exemplar in the stork, whose children return the care that their parents gave them when the elders age. Ending with a typical Pulterian prayer that she receive holy wisdom so that she may pass it along to her own children, Pulter crafts a scale of animal parenting to which any mother could compare herself.
The ostrich has a surprisingly prominent place in Renaissance and early modern popular culture, the subject of many myths and folk legends that made it a rich source for metaphor and images. Its feathers and eggs, especially, were regarded as luxurious goods that could be found everywhere from the fashions of the nobility to church decorations. Ostriches were also thought to be able to consume and digest anything, even metals, a myth invoked by Jack Cade in William Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part II: “I’ll make thee eat iron like an ostrich and swallow my sword like a great pin, ere thou and I part.”
Gloss Note
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare 7th ed., ed. David Bevington (New York: Pearson, 2014), 4.10.28–29.
1 They were the subjects of emblems by both Geoffrey Whitney in 1586, who emphasized the hypocrisy of a bird who cannot fly, and George Wither in 1655, who used the ostrich’s plumes to warn against trusting ostentatious courtiers. Instead of following many of the popular conceptions of the ostrich, Pulter emphasizes the bird as a neglectful parent, a portrayal that can also be found in William Gouge’s parenting guide, Of Domestical Duties (1622). Pulter relies on the biblical description of the ostrich that appears in the Book of Job (39: 13–18) for her portrayal in this poem, largely eschewing Pliny the Elder’s History of the World, which first appeared in translation by Philemon Holland in 1601 and has been noted as a source in many of Pulter’s other emblems. In the biblical description and Pulter’s, the ostrich is portrayed as a vain and arrogant mother who leaves her newly laid eggs in the sand, leaving them vulnerable to being crushed by passerby. This careless act of pride betrays the ostrich’s actions as sinful. Good parents, argues Pulter, would never abandon their children as this callous bird does.
Emphasizing the need to both be a loving parent and devout Christian, Pulter also invokes a political practice of exile and servitude that was deeply rooted in the English colonial endeavor as the poem turns further outward in line 20. She condemns the “base English” who would dare sell their own young into servitude. During the Interregnum, forcibly transported indentured servants and Royalist political exiles made up a significant percentage of the labor force sent to colonies in the Atlantic, including the Caribbean and the Americas. Royalist soldiers captured by Parliamentarian armies could be placed into a seven-year labor contract and transported to Jamaica or Barbados. This practice existed in tandem with an increasing trade in enslaved people from Africa, also held up as an example in this poem. Pulter condemns the neglectful ostrich mother with the same vigor that she does the Cromwellian government’s practice of sending prisoners to labor in British colonial holdings. The transport of prisoners, poor, and convicts to labor in the colonies was especially prevalent during Cromwell’s conquest of Ireland, a plight in which Pulter may have had a particular interest given her Irish connections. Her stark comparison between a neglectful parent and forced labor practices emphasizes the dire implications of parenting without a deep love for the child. For this ostrich, whose great vanity and thoughtlessness endangers her young, neglectful parenting can be equated with exiling innocents to thankless labor.
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 Gloss note

gorgeous or showy (“gallant”) brilliantly fine or ornate (“gaudy”) feathers
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 Critical note

Describing the ostrich’s feathers as “gallant” (gorgeous or showy in appearance [OED 1]) and “gaudy” (brilliantly fine or colourful, highly ornate, showy [OED 3]) attaches signifiers of boasting luxury to the bird. Ostrich feathers were fashionable and expensive, appearing on headdresses and helmets of the nobility. Pulter emphasizes them as a sign of wealth and excess that the bird naturally carries, associating her with those traits. Ostrich eggs, too, were valued for their large size and pleasing shape, and they were collected as display items. See Joan Barclay Lloyd, African Animals in Renaissance Literature and Art (1971).
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 Gloss note

intellect
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 Critical note

understanding, intellect, reason (OED 1); Pulter is utilizing sarcasm here, as will become apparent when she derides the ostrich’s lack of intellect in lines 11–12.
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 Gloss note

since with
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and his
Amplified Edition
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and his
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concurrent, accompanied
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going together, accompanying (OED 1)
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 Critical note

The preceding account closely tracks the biblical book of Job 39:14–18, in which the ostrich is described as scorning the horse and rider and being negligent of her offspring: she “leaveth her eggs in the earth, … and forgetteth that the foot may crush them.”
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 Gloss note

care at all
Amplified Edition
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 Gloss note

as for something of little or no value or importance (OED P.2)
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 Critical note

Pairing “labours” with the action of egg-laying suggests both labor as childbirth and as physical or manual exertion. The ostrich lays her eggs only to leave them in the sand and never see them hatch, while her prideful actions betray a lack of godliness.
Amplified Edition
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 Critical note

The substance of Pulter’s description of the Ostrich in lines 3–11 is drawn directly from the Bible. Job 39: 13–18 gives this account: “Gavest thou the goodly wings unto the peacocks or wings and feathers unto the ostrich? / Which leaveth her egges in the earth, and warmeth them in dust / And forgetteth that the foote may crush them, or that the wilde beast may breake them./ She is hardened against her yong ones, as though they were not hers; labour is in vaine without feare: / Because God hath deprived her of wisedom, neither hath hee imparted to her understanding. / What time she lifteth up by her selfe on high, she scorneth the horse and his rider.” Pulter uses this description to emphasize the ostrich as a careless mother, willing to leave her eggs to incubate in the sand and risk them being crushed by a passing traveler rather than sit on them herself. She has no sympathy for, nor intelligence enough to understand, the risk to her young.
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 Gloss note

Many cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, who feed (“nurse”) them.
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 Critical note

The cuckoo was understood to lay its eggs in the nests of other birds, a practice known as brood parasitism. Pliny describes: “These lay alwaies in other birds nests, and most of all in the Stock-doves, commonly one egge and no more (which no other bird doth besides) and seldome twaine” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, X.IX, p. 275). Pulter’s ambivalent representation of the cuckoo is consistent with The Cuckoo (Emblem 29) [Poem 94].
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The flesh of the cuckoo is tough for humans to eat.
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eggs
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 Gloss note

eggs. The word “ovum” is directly from Latin and predominantly appears in scientific texts in the early modern period. Pulter’s literary use is notable, if not unusual.
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 Gloss note

In the Bible, Ham’s son Canaan is cursed by his grandfather, Noah (Genesis 9:20–27) causing his descendants to become subject to Israelites. Numerous early modern texts suggest that Ham’s dark-skinned lineage populated Africa.
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 Critical note

morally low; despicable (OED I.2). As the English Civil War raged and Cromwell invaded Ireland, Royalist prisoners and the poor were often shipped to the West Indies as labor. It is important to note that none of these political prisoners endured lifelong bondage in the form of slavery, but instead had finite contracts for servitude that ended usually after a period of seven years. However, much of the rhetoric surrounding this practice was of outrage that even noble English citizens were treated like common criminals or subhuman animals. A particularly scandalous case of this political trafficking was that of two Royalists, Marcellus Rivers and Oxenbridge Foyle, who were forcibly transported to Barbados in 1655. The popular pamphlet, Englands Slavery, or Barbados Merchandize that related their ensuing petition to Parliament, also described the inhuman treatment the pair suffered at the hands of the planters to whom their contracts were sold. Pulter’s tone towards this practice resonates with the petition’s argument that this practice was “a thing not known amongst the cruell Turks, to sell and enslave these of their own Countrey and Religion, much lesse the Innocent” (7). Pulter makes explicit reference to the Parliamentarian practice of exiling captured Royalists to Jamaica and elsewhere in Phalaris and the Brazen Bull (Emblem 50) [Poem 115], a political emblem against Cromwell. For further information on Pulter’s relationship to English colonies in the Caribbean, see Jonathan Koch’s curation for that poem, Pulter and Jamaica. For forced labor practices in the interregnum, see Carla Gardina Pestana, The English Atlantic in an Age of Revolution, 1640–1661(2004).
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 Critical note

In Genesis, Ham’s (also spelled Cham) son Canaan is cursed with servitude by Noah as a punishment for Ham seeing Noah naked: “And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger sonne had done unto him. / And he said, Cursed be Canaan: a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren” (Gen. 9: 24–25). Eardley notes that this story is often conflated with a curse of blackness upon Ham’s other son, Chus. (Alice Eardley, “An Edition of Lady Hester Pulter’s Book of ‘Emblemes’”. PhD diss., University of Warwick [2008], 128).This conflated curse was also for many years used as an explanation for blackness and a justification for the enslavement of Africans, especially throughout the transatlantic slave trade. At the same time that indentured servant labor was being transported to the islands, the African slave trade to the Caribbean, especially Barbados, was also increasing. While Pulter does not explicitly equate Black Africans with the enslaved Canaan in this line, she also uses this phrase in Aristomenes (Emblem 45) [Poem 110] to refer to an Ethiopian biblical character. This would certainly suggest that Pulter had some associations between dark-skinned inhabitants of African nations and slavery. For more on the curse of Ham and its relationship to slavery, see David M. Goldenberg, Black and Slave: The Origins and History of the Curse of Ham (2017).
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 Critical note

Eardley suggests that this line might refer to the sale of royalist political prisoners, criminals, and Irish to the West Indies as indentured servants or slaves in the 1650s.
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 Critical note

It was often the poor and vagrant (including children) who would be selected, willingly or not, for transportation to both the North American and Caribbean colonial holdings. Henry Cromwell, Oliver Cromwell’s son and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, at one point proposed that one thousand Irish girls and two thousand boys be transported to Jamaica to work in the colony (“Henry Cromwell,” ODNB). The kidnap and transport of children as labor forces was a particular source of anxiety for the public, as stories circulated of even well-off English children being kidnapped for labor.
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 Gloss note

lament
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obtained at a great cost
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 Critical note

The repetition of the construction of this statement, beginning on line 23 and mirroring lines 17–18, creates a refrain that emphasizes the negative traits of both the ostrich and the Cromwellian government. Though the ostrich’s “hard heart” toward her young has already been emphasized, those who would willingly send children into servitude are even worse than this bad mother.
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When; seeing that
Transcription
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 Physical note

“ich” appears written over earlier letters
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 Gloss note

The young storks support their parents when old. Here, “retaliate” means to repay a kindness or service.
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to repay a kindness or service; to reciprocate (OED 2.b)
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 Critical note

In opposition to ostriches, storks exemplify the ideal parent-child relationship as the parents care for their young, and young storks do the same for their parents as they age. Pliny: “Storkes keepe one nest still from yeare to yeare, and never chaunge: and of this kind nature they are, that the yong will keepe and feed their parents when they be old, as they themselves were by them nourished in the beginning” (1601 trans. Philemon Holland, XXIII, p. 282).
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 Critical note

The mirror of this statement appears in Wisest Creatures (Emblem 10) [Poem 76], “The wisest creatures most indulgent be,” placing the ostrich in opposition to the good animal parents described in that poem. See also Elizabeth Kolkovich’s Curation for Emblem 10, Indulgent Parenting.
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 Gloss note

their offspring
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 Critical note

Parents extending care to their children, even if indulgent, is natural, as opposed to the unnatural mothering practices of the ostrich. Gouge’s Of Domestical Duties (1622) uses this same language to shame mothers who do not care for their infants: “It is noted as a point of vnnaturalnesse in the Ostrich, to leaue her eggs in the earth, and in the dust” (507). This phrase also mimics the “naturall affection” mentioned in 2 Timothy 3:3, further emphasizing the Christian nature of familial care.
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 Critical note

Pulter here uses “diffuse” (to send forth an immaterial thing in many directions [OED 1]) in a similar way as in The Manucodiats (Emblem 5) [Poem 71]. Lara Dodds describes in the Amplified Edition headnote that Pulter prays “that she may serve as an intermediary between the divine and her relations on earth.” Pulter mirrors that concept here, in another indulgent-parenting poem, in which she asks God to “infuse” her with his love and wisdom, so that she may share it with her children.
Amplified Edition
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 Gloss note

older as well as younger
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