SIXTH DAY. 97 



heavily, and the folding of its great wings; so I cautiously 

 looked round, and saw the bird sitting on a dead branch a 

 hundred paces off. Seizing my rifle, I aimed and fired, and 

 the eagle spread its wings and flew aw r ay low over the ground, 

 disappearing among the bushes. I had got the shot off so 

 well, and the bird had flown so very low, that both the 

 forester and I made sure that the ball had hit it ; but though 

 we carefully searched near the nest, all our trouble was in 

 vain. 



I now returned to my attendants, and as they had never 

 seen the eagle leave the wood after the shot, our opinions 

 were confirmed ; so we sent them off to look again. While 

 under the nest, I had heard two shots from my brother-in-law, 

 about a mile away. This seemed to me a bad sign, but I was 

 soon reassured when the sharp crack of his Werder rifle rang 

 through the wood about half an hour afterwards. 



As soon as all my men had gone off to search, and even 

 the climber was rummaging about, the forester and I walked 

 along the meadows by the edge of the wood to the Bega Canal. 

 A few hundred yards down it I found a Black Stork's nest on 

 an old oak near the edge of the cover. The long-legged bird 

 had built on the lower branches of the tree, and I could see 

 its red bill protruding over the edge of the nest ; so I posted 

 myself in a good position close to the wood and sent the 

 forester to the stem of the tree ; but his attempts to frighten 

 it off by making a noise were ineffectual, nor have I ever 

 seen any of our larger woodland birds so confiding and 

 tame. 



As all our efforts were fruitless, I fired my first barrel at 

 the long bill of the stork, and unfortunately only with too 

 good an aim, for it hung down broken, and the bird, quite 

 disfigured and bewildered, flew out straight over my head, the 

 second barrel bringing it to the ground. 



A few minutes afterwards the male came cruising high 



H 



