THE EAGLE. 



The erne : a dirty iron colour above, an iron 

 mixed with black below ; the head and neck 

 ash, mixed with chestnut ; the points of the 

 wings blackish ; the tail feathers white ; the 

 legs naked. 



The black eagle : blackish ; the head and 

 upper neck mixed with red ; the tail feathers, 

 the first half white, speckled with black ; the 



and desolate landscape. Its most favourite haunts in 

 Britain are the northern coasts of Scotland, where the 

 headlands reach a stupendous height, are perpendicular 

 on the face, and where the shelves and ledges selected 

 for a breeding or roosting place, can be tenanted secure 

 from the inroads of an aggressor, either from above or 

 beneath. Here he resides constantly at one season, or 

 he finds a safe shelter during the night, after his more 

 extended hunting excursions ; his screams scarcely 

 sound above the noise of the surge below, or the storm 

 which may rage around the rocky pinnacles ; but the 

 occasional shriek heard in a moment of quiet, tells forci- 

 bly on the imagination while viewing such scenes, and 

 the noble bird himself alone attracts the eye amidst the 

 numerous sea-fowl his companions, his pale gray tinted 

 plumage and pure outspread tail, being marked /objects, 

 when opposed to the dark green sea, or the deep and 

 rich shades of many of these splendid precipices. In 

 such situations the eyries are most frequently found, 

 and the nest is there reared, and the young are hatched 

 in safety, notwithstanding the bribes offered for their 

 destruction. The nest is also sometimes placed in more 

 inland sites. The precipitous crags overhanging some 

 alpine loch are often chosen, and such is " Eagles' 

 Craig," among the lakes of the English border, and the 

 " Eagle's nest," at Killarney. Trees are also selected, 

 though much less frequently. We visited a nest placed on 

 an aged larch, growing on one of the romantic islands in 

 Loch Awe. It was a large fabric of sticks placed about half 

 way up the tree, (the nest of a sparrowhawk was a model 

 of it in miniature,) built close to the stem, very flat, but 

 strongly composed of sticks and roots, and lined in a 

 very miscellaneous manner; wool formed the greatest 

 part, moss also, and a child's bonnet, and a part of a 

 bridle were in its structure. The eggs are generally 

 two in number, larger than those of the golden eagle, 

 round in form, and pure white, or with very pale indis- 

 tinct blotches. In England the breeding places of the 

 sea eagle are now very rare, perhaps not more than one 

 or two. The birds themselves are, however, not unfre- 

 quently met with and shot, both in the south and in the 

 border counties of Scotland, which are also beyond their 

 breeding range ; but the greater part of the birds thus 

 killed are in immature plumage. 



From its occurrence in greatest numbers near the sea, 

 or in the vicinity of some extensive piece of water, the 

 commonly used name has been gained for this bird; but 

 though delighting in fish, and often procuring this kind 

 of food, we have no record by an eye-witness how the 

 scaly prey is seized ; it is not a true fisher like the 

 osprey, its structure is very different, and we have no 

 authority for believing that it plunges. Its congener 

 in America, we know, depends entirely on the prowess 

 of another bird for the fish it procures, and is, moreover, 

 very awkward in the attempts which it has been seen to 

 make upon fish in their native element. But though 

 fish is certainly the most favourite food, nothing seems 

 to come far amiss; dead animals are sometimes even 

 eaten, and he can be easily trapped by a bait of raw or 

 newly killed meat. In confinement we have observed 

 no nicety whatever, xcept in discriminating a fish from 

 any other kind of food ; and a female which has been long 

 in our possession, comes much more eagerly to the front 



other half blackish ; the leg feathers dirtj 

 white. 



The sea eagle : inclining to white, mixed 

 with iron brown ; belly white with iron col- 

 oured spots ; the covert feathers of the tail 

 whitish ; the tail feathers black at the extrem- 

 ity; the upper part of the leg feathers of an 

 iron brown. 1 



of her cage, and appears more alert than usual when a 

 trout is presented to her view. 



The general colour of the plumage of the adult sea 

 eagle is a chaste hair brown, of a peculiar dull or opaque 

 tint; on the head and upper parts it is palest, the centre 

 of the back and under parts being considerably darker; 

 the head and upper part of the neck are covered with 

 lanceolate shaped feathers, which are raised on excite- 

 ment or irritation, and the tint here is remarkably clear, 

 appearing at a distance, when shone on by the sun, 

 almost white ; the quills are blackish brown, with a 

 purplish tinge, and have the shafts pale; the upper tail 

 coverts and tail are pure white, and in all the attitudes 

 of the bird are conspicuously seen. This mark of per- 

 fect plumage is considered to be completed about the 

 third moult, but the female above alluded to had not 

 a perfectly pure tail at the age of five years, the outer 

 feathers retaining a considerable portion of the brown 

 mottling, which is seen in the second year's plumage. 

 Now, at the age of seven years, the tail is unsullied ; the 

 bill and cere are straw yellow, the latter of a darker, 

 rather greener tint: the iris is remarkably beautiful, of a 

 pale grayish honey yellow, very brilliant and expressive. 



The plumage of the young bird, or cinereous eagle of 

 authors, is generally of an umber brown, of a grayer tint 

 beneath, the feathers tipped with a paler shade, and often 

 white at the base ; the tail is mottled with pale brownish 

 white and clove brown, and with the successive moults 

 the proportion of pale colour increases, prevailing most 

 at the base and centre of the tail ; the colour of the bill 

 is less clear, more mixed with green, and the iris is pale 

 chestnut brown, but of a clear expression. The form of 

 this species is less compact and firm than that of the 

 golden eagle, and when at rest it appears more sluggish, 

 from the greater coverts being brought forward and kept 

 in a hanging position over the quills, covering the thighs 

 and a portion of the side of the bird. Naturalist's lib- 

 rary, by Sir W, Jardine. 



1 The sea-eagles form a less noble as well as a less 

 typical group than the true eagles, from which they re- 

 cede considerably both in organization and habits. The 

 ridge of their beak, instead of being somewhat angular, 

 is convex and compressed ; and their legs, instead of 

 being plumed down to the very toes, are naked in their 

 lower parts, the upper half of the tarsi alone being 

 covered with short close-set feathers. The cere 

 in which the nostrils are perforated is slightly hispid : 

 the wings are long and powerful ; the anterior surface 

 of the tarsi is scutellated ; the toes are free throughout 

 their whole extent; the outer one is capable of taking a 

 retroverted direction ; and the claws are of unequal size, 

 strongly curved, and furnished with a deep internal 

 groove. They have all a greater or less tendency to 

 change in a remarkable degree the colour of their plum- 

 age on the head and neck as they advance in age, evin- 

 cing in this, as in several other respects, an approxima- 

 tion to certain South American groups, in which those 

 parts are feathered in the young state and partially de- 

 nuded in maturity, and through them to the vultures, in 

 which the head and neck are in all stages of their growth 

 covered only with a silky down. 



In the choice of their food the sea-eagles are far less 

 scrupulous than their brethren of the land- Inhabiting 



