152 NOTES ON NEW ENGLAND BIRDS 



a muskrat on the calm sunny surface a great way off. 

 So perfectly calm and beautiful, and yet no man look- 

 ing at it this morning but myself. It is pleasant to see 

 the zephyrs strike the smooth surface of the pond from 

 time to time, and a darker shade ripple over it. 



The streams break up; the ice goes to the sea. Then 

 sails the fish hawk overhead, looking for his prey. 



Oct. 22, 1852. When I approached the pond * over 

 Heywood's Peak, I disturbed a hawk (a fish hawk?) on 

 a white pine by the water watching for his prey, with 

 long, narrow, sharp wings and a white belly. He flew 

 slowly across the pond somewhat like a gull. He is the 

 more picturesque object against the woods or water for 

 being white beneath. 



Nov. 17, 1854. I think it must have been a fish hawk 

 which I saw hovering over the meadow and my boat (a 

 raw cloudy afternoon), now and then sustaining itself 

 in one place a hundred feet or more above the water, 

 intent on a fish, with a hovering or fluttering motion of 

 the wings somewhat like a kingfisher. Its wings were 

 very long, slender, and curved in outline of front edge. 

 I think there was some white on rump. It alighted near 

 the top of an oak within rifle-shot of me and my boat, 

 afterward on the tip-top of a maple by waterside, look- 

 ing very large. 



Apmll5, 1855. The Great Meadows are covered, ex- 

 cept a small island in their midst, but not a duck do 

 we see there. On a low limb of a maple on the edge of 

 the river, thirty rods from the present shore, we saw a 

 fish hawk eating a fish. Sixty rods off we could see his 



1 [Walden Pond.] 



