FABLE AND FOLKLORE 35 



chicken to this day by the fellaheen. By "eagle" in Semitic 

 (Biblical) legends is usually meant the lammergeier. 



Prussia had kept a single-headed eagle as her cog- 

 nizance in remembrance of her previous "Roman" great- 

 ness; and it was retained by the German Empire when 

 that was created by Bismarck half a century and more 

 ago. From it the Kaiser designated the two German 

 military orders — the Black Eagle and the superior Red 

 Eagle; and Russia and Serbia have each instituted an 

 order called White Eagle. The traditional eagle of 

 Poland is represented as white on a black ground. It was 

 displayed during the period of subjection following the 

 partition of the country in 1795, with closed wings, but 

 now, since 19 19, it spreads its pinions wide in the pride 

 of freedom. 



In the years between 191 4 and 19 19 an allied party of 

 hunters, enraged by their depredations, zvent gunning for 

 these birds of prey, killed most of them and sorely 

 wounded the rest! 



Although several species of real eagles inhabit the 

 Mediterranean region and those parts of Europe and Asia 

 where these nations lived, and warred, and passed away, 

 and are somewhat confused in the mass of myth and tra- 

 dition relating to them, the one chosen by Rome was 

 the golden eagle, so called because of the golden gloss 

 that suffuses the feathers of the neck in mature birds. 

 Now we have this species of sea-eagle in the United 

 States, and it has been from time immemorial the honored 

 War-eagle of the native redmen. If it was needful at 

 our political birth to put any sort of animal on our seal, 

 and the choice was narrowed down to an eagle, it would 

 have been far more appropriate to have chosen the golden 

 rather than the white-headed or "bald" species — first be- 



