53 



EAGLE LORE. 



CURIOUS STORIES OF THE OLD-TIME FAITH IN THE "KING OF THE FEATHERED 



TRIBES." 



Birds were trusted, honored and made 

 the symbols of wisdom and power in the 

 old time, and they have not, at least in 

 their emblematical signification, been 

 neglected in modern times. The eagle, 

 in particular, is exalted to a high and po- 

 tential distinction. On the banner of a 

 hundred States he is displayed as a con- 

 quering symbol and floats to-day over 

 many a fair realm where Rome's imperial 

 standard never penetrated. 



The eagle has always been considered 

 a royal bird, and was a favorite with the 

 poets. They called him king of the air 

 and made him bear the thunderbolts of 

 Jove. Euripides tells us that "the birds 

 in general are the messengers of the gods, 

 but the eagle is king, and interpreter of 

 the great deity Jupiter." 



The eagle figures in the early legends 

 of all people. When the ancient Aztecs, 

 the mound-builders of the Mississippi 

 Valley, were moving southward under 

 Mexi, their king, their god, Vitziputzli, 

 whose image was borne in a tabernacle 

 made of reeds and placed in the center of 

 the encampment whenever they halted, 

 directed them to settle where they should 

 find an eagle sitting on a fig-tree growing 

 out of a rock in a lake. After a series of 

 wanderings and adventures that do not 

 shrink from comparison with the most 

 extravagant legends of the heroic ages of 

 antiquity, they at last beheld perched on a 

 shrub in the midst of the lake of Tenoch- 

 titlan a royal eagle with a serpent in his 

 talons and his broad wings opened to the 

 rising sun. They hailed the auspicious 

 omen and laid the foundation of their cap- 

 ital by sinking piles into the shallows. 

 This legend is commemorated by the 

 device of the eagle and the cactus, which 

 forms the arms of the modern Mexican 

 Republic. 



A goose, it is said, saved Rome once 

 upon a time, but it was an eagle that di- 

 rected the selection of the ancient Byzan- 

 tium — now Constantinople — as the capi- 



tal of the Eastern Empire. The site of 

 ancient Troy had been settled upon by 

 Constantine, and the engineers were en- 

 gaged in surveying the plan of the city, 

 when an eagle swooped down, seized the 

 measuring line, flew away with it and 

 dropped it at Byzantium. At any rate, 

 this was the story told to the soldiers and 

 marines, in order to reconcile them to 

 the change of plan, which they might 

 otherwise have deemed an unfavorable 

 omen, though the splendid situation of 

 the new capital and its long prosperity, 

 prove how admirably sagacious was the 

 choice of its founder. 



In the reign of Ancus Martins, King 

 of Rome, a wealthy man, whose 

 name was Tarquin, came to that city 

 from one of the Etruscan States. Sitting 

 beside his wife in his chariot, as he ap- 

 proached the gates of Rome, an eagle, it 

 is said, plucked his cap from his head, 

 flew up in the air, and then, returning, 

 placed it on his head again. Not a few 

 suspect that the eagle was a tame one and 

 had been taught to perform this trick. If 

 so, however, the apparent prodigy lost 

 none of its efifect in the popular belief, 

 and Tarquin succeeded Ancus as King 

 of Rome. The eagle's head on the Ro- 

 man sceptre, and later on its standard, 

 took its origin from this occurrence. 



Plutarch, in his life of Theseus, relates 

 that when Cymon was sent by the Athen- 

 ians to procure the bones of that hero, 

 who had long before been buried in Scy- 

 ros, to reinter them in his former capital, 

 he found great difficulty in ascertaining 

 the burial place of the ancient monarch. 

 While prosecuting his search, however, 

 he chanced to observe an eagle that had 

 alighted on a small elevation and was try- 

 ing with his beak and claws to break the 

 sod. Considering this a fortunate omen, 

 they explored the place and discovered 

 the cof^n of a man of extraordinary size, 

 with a lance of brass and a sword lying 

 by it. These relics were conveyed to 



