Riddle me This.

Wilberforce Riddle

"Samuel Wilberforce was a British clergyman who rose eventually to become the Bishop of Oxford. In 1859, Charles Darwin published "On the Origin of Species", advancing the theory of evolution. There was a tremendous backlash from the church, especially Wilberforce, and a debate was staged in 1860, wherein both parties would argue their points. Darwin was too sick to attend, and sent acolyte Thomas Huxley in his place. Wilberforce and Huxley locked horns, while neither definitely "won" the debate, most would say Huxley came out on top, even causing a religious woman to faint at this statement: "I am not ashamed to have a monkey for an ancestor but I would be ashamed to be connected with a man who used his great gifts to obscure the truth."

Besides his career in the service of the church, Wilberforce was fond of writing, and riddles in particular. When he died in 1873, he left this one behind, no one knows the answer..

"Sweetest of sound, in orchestra heard,

Yet in orchestra never had been,

Bird in light plumage, but less like a bird,

Nothing in nature has ever been seen,

On earth I expire, in water I die,

Yet I run, swim, and fly,

If I cannot be guessed by a boy or a man,

A girl or woman I certainly can!"

The clues are highly intriguing, and several theories have been put forth (perhaps most notably,  that he was referring to a whale), but the answer most certainly died with the bishop."