SOLITARY AND GREGARIOUS. 129 
behind in the camp ; but Marius rejected them alto- 
gether, and had no use of them at all. And ever 
since this, is observed ordinarily, that there was no 
standing camp or leaguer wintered at any time with- 
out a pair of eagle standards.”* 
Josephus and Pliny, however, were wrong if they 
thought the ensign of the eagle peculiar to the Ro 
mans; for the golden eagle with extended wings 
was borne by the Persian monarchs,}t from whom 
it is probable the Romans adopted it, as it was sub- 
sequently adopted from them by Napoleon and the 
United States; while the Persians themselves may 
have borrowed the symbol from the ancient Assy- 
rians, in whose banners it waved till Babylon was 
conquered by Cyrus. ‘This may serve to explain 
why the expanded eagle is so frequently alluded to 
in the prophetical books of Scripture.{ Referring, 
for example, to the king of Babylon, Hosea says, 
“he shall come as an eagle;’’§ and Ezekiel de- 
scribes Nebuchadnezzar as ‘‘a great eagle, with 
great wings, long-winged, full of feathers which 
had divers colours;” and the king of Egypt as 
‘“‘another great eagle, with great wings and many 
feathers.”||' It was, no doubt, on the same account 
that the eagle was assigned in the ancient mythol- 
ogies as the bird of Jove, a notion which Lucian, 
with his usual satire, ridicules without mercy, ma- 
king Momus tell Jupiter he may think himself well off 
if it do not take a fancy to build anest on his head. J 
So far as size and appearance are concerned, as 
well as in power of flight, the eagle (Aguila chry- 
saeétos, KLEIN) must yield the palm to the condor of 
America (Sarcoramphus gryphus, Dumerit), while the 
head of the latter, “ the likeness of a kingly crown 
has on.” The condor, however, has not the honour 
* Holland’s Plinie, x., 4. + Xenophon, Cyrop., vii. 
¢ Paxton, Illus. of Scrip., ii., 13. § Hosea, viii., 1. 
|| Ezek. xvii., 3-7; and La Roque, Voyage. 
GY Ocwv ExxAnotu, g. 
