Aquila 33 



strength ; it passes its life round lakes. By pools 

 it chases water-birds, which dive from time to time, 

 until it catches them sleepy and weary. The con- 

 test is a sight to see, the quarry seeking refuge 

 on the shore, chiefly where reeds are thick, and 

 thence the Aquila drives it away with a stroke of 

 the wing and plunges in the lake as it swoops from 

 above, shewing its shadow to the bird as it swims 

 under water from the shore. Again the latter tries 

 a different place and comes up where it thinks that 

 it will least be marked. This is the cause of birds 

 swimming in flocks, for they are not molested when 

 in companies, and blind their enemy by splashing with 

 their wings. The Aquilae themselves, moreover, often 

 are immersed, not being able to support the weight 

 that they have clutched. Thus Pliny. 



All things that Aristotle and Pliny have attributed to 

 the bird Percnos so far well agree with the Balbushard of 

 the English 1 , if one may except its size alone, and if the 

 rest be present, that perhaps should not stand in the way. 

 Now the bird which I apprehend to be the Anataria, being 

 bigger and longer than the Buteo, with a white patch upon 

 the head, and nearly fuscous in colour, always haunts the 

 banks of rivers, pools, and swamps ; it lives by hunting 

 Ducks and those black fowls which Englishmen call Couts. 

 The conflict of which Pliny makes mention above between 

 this Eagle (if it should be called an Eagle) and the water-birds 

 I have seen often, and not I alone, but countless Englishmen 

 witness it daily. If anywhere a little space of ground rises 

 among the reed-beds, there the bird is wont to make a nest, 

 that, since in power of flight it is not very strong, it may 

 not be far distant from its prey. It suddenly attacks birds, 

 and thus takes them. It also sometimes butchers coneys. 

 Now whether this may be the Anataria or not I put it to the 

 learned to decide. 



1 The Bald-Buzzard or Marsh-Harrier (Circus ceruginosus). 



