76 HALIAETUS ALBICILLA. 



years ago ; and in a few places in Galloway, individual 

 still occur, according to the statement of Mr Macder- 

 mid, who, in his " Sketches from Nature," has given an 

 interesting description of the eagles of that region. 



The distribution of this bird in Scotland is daily be- 

 coming more limited. In the Outer Hebrides, Skye, 

 Mull, Rum, many of the other islands, and in most 

 parts of the northern division of the country, it is still 

 pretty numerous. In the western part of the middle 

 division, and here and there in the Grampian range, it 

 occurs in diminished numbers ; but in the southern 

 division it has been almost extirpated. Mr Bushnan, 

 writing in 1834, doubts whether a pair of eagles is to 

 be found wild in Dumfriesshire, or more than a dozen 

 in Galloway, between the Nith and the Mull. 



Propagation. — The White-tailed Sea-eagle begin* 

 to prepare its nest some time in March. It usually 

 places it on a shelf of some vast cliff overhanging the 

 sea, or in the cleft of a rock in the inland solitudes, 

 sometimes on rocks by the margins of lakes, and more 

 rarely still in islands on lakes. I have seen two of its 

 haunts in Harris, in rocks not forty feet high, and one 

 on a flat island in a small lake ; but, in general, it is 

 careful to choose as inaccessible a retreat as possible. 

 The diameter of the nest is about five feet, and it con- 

 sists of sticks, heath, sea-weed, and other materials of 

 a like nature, arranged in the same slovenly manner as 

 the straws in a hen's nest, together with grass, wool, 

 and feathers. The central part of the nest is but 

 slightly hollowed. There are generally two eggs, 

 sometimes only one, but I never heard of three ha- 



