^°1908^^] Cameron, The Golden Eagle in Montana. 265- 



ences in expanse of wing and body size must not be lost sigkt of in 

 estimating the carrying power of eagles. When writing of a larger 

 bird, the Bald Eagle {Halmetus leucocephalus), at page 12, Mr. 

 Oberholser quotes Mr. William Brewster as follows: "A Brant 

 or Duck is carried off bodily to the nearest marsh or sand-bar,, 

 but a Canada Goose is too heavy to be thus easily disposed of. 

 The two great birds fall together to the water beneath, where the 

 Eagle literally tows his prize along the surface until the shore is 

 reached. In this way one has been known to drag a large Goose 

 for nearly half a mile." ^ Mr. Harting (op. cit.) has another 

 interesting fact bearing on the present question and guaranteed 

 by the name of that eminent ornithologist, Mr. A. O. Hume. Writ- 

 ing of Pallas's Sea Eagle (Haliceetus leucoryphus) Mr. Hume 

 says: " A Grey Goose will weigh on the average 71b. (much heavier 

 are recorded), but I have repeatedly seen good-sized grey geese 

 carried off in the claws of one of these eagles, the bird flying slowly 

 and low over the surface of the water, but still quite steadily" 

 (p. 336). A carp of 13 lbs. proved too big a job for an eagle of this 

 species to tackle (ib., p. 337). 



Lamb stories relating to eagles, and current in the Western Isles 

 of Scotland during the first half of the 19th century often refer to 

 the White-tailed Eagle (Haliwetiis alhicilla), which surpasses its 

 more spirited congener both in expanse of wing and in bodily 

 weight. Alex Clark, late estate servant at Jura, had a vivid 

 recollection of the time when the shepherds on Tarbert farm, now 

 deer forest, were supplied with guns and encouraged to shoot these 

 eagles by a reward of so much per head. A similar war of extermi- 

 nation was waged in other islands, and notably in Skye, where my 

 uncle Donald Charles Cameron, then of Glenbrittle, killed during 

 his lifetime 90 eagles, including both species, to his own gun, as 

 mentioned in 'The Auk' for April, 1905. The fact that these 

 Skye eagles only carried to their eyries leverets, grouse, and small 

 lambs — -''helpless creatures easily overpowered" — led the late 

 Mr. Seebohm to describe the motions of the Golden Eagle as 

 "sluggish, cowardly and tame compared with the death swoop of 

 the Peregrine" — a somewhat sweeping verdict which few people 

 will endorse. 



1 BuU. Nutt. Ornith. Club, V 1880, pp. 57, 58. 



