246 HOW HE TREATS INTERLOPERS. 



the bird had satisfied his hunger I went up to the cage, which 

 was very roomy, and observed that he sat on the uppermost 

 perch ; and that a full-grown cat, which had passed between 

 the bars, was eating with great appetite of the refuse of the 

 offal. I remained passive, to see how the matter would end. 

 The eagle, with his head inclined downwards, seemed narrowly 

 to watch the movements of the intruder. But when the cat 

 had finished her meal, and was about to move off one-half of 

 her body being indeed already outside of the bars of the prison 

 the royal bird, with incredible quickness, struck one of his 

 talons into her side, and drew her back into the cage again. 

 The cat made a most desperate resistance, and attempted to 

 bite her assailant's leg, on which the eagle seized her by the 

 head with the other talon in such manner, that a claw pene- 

 trated each eye, and forced both out of their sockets ; and in 

 this posture the bird remained until poor Grimalkin was dead. 

 But as all this took place near to the side of the cage, and as 

 the eagle probably from fear of interruption would never 

 touch anything unless he was in the centre of the cage, he 

 therefore withdrew the talon inserted in the cat's head, and, 

 with the other still deeply embedded in the body of his victim, 

 walked or rather stumped away with the cat to his accus- 

 tomed feeding-place. His first act was to draw out the 

 tongue, which he immediately devoured. Afterwards he 

 made an aperture with his beak below the breastbone, and 

 eat part of the lungs ; but the remainder of the cat was left 

 until the following day, when he finished it. Several times, 

 when the eagle was supplied with a dead cat, I made the 

 remark that, provided the jaws of the cat were not immo- 

 vably fixed, he, in the first instance, always devoured the 

 tongue, A dead pig was his favourite food. He was also 



