THE WHITE-HEADED EAGLE. 53 



rapid and graceful, and is often prolonged for hours with 

 apparent ease. It feeds upon wild-fowl, wild geese, and 

 small animals, and is very partial to fish, which it robs from 

 the Fish Hawk (P. Carolinensis), and finds cast upon the 

 shore, dead. 



Wilson, in describing its attacks on the Fish Hawk, 

 says : 



" Formed by nature for braving the severest cold ; feeding 

 equally on the produce of the sea and of the land; possessing 

 powers of flight capable of outstripping even the tempests them- 

 selves ; unawed by any thing but man ; and, from the ethereal 

 heights to which he soars, looking abroad, at one glance, on an im- 

 measurable expanse of forests, fields, lakes, and ocean, deep below 

 him, he appears indifferent to the little change of localities or 

 seasons ; as, in a few minutes, he can pass from summer to winter, 

 from the lower to the higher regions of the atmosphere, the abode 

 of eternal cold, and thence descend, at will, to the torrid or 

 the arctic regions of the earth. He is therefore found at all 

 seasons in the countries he inhabits, but prefers such places as 

 have been mentioned above, from the great partiality he has for 

 fish. 



" In procuring these, he displays, in a very singular manner, 

 the genius and energy of his character, which is fierce, contempla- 

 tive, daring, and tyrannical, attributes not exerted but on par- 

 ticular occasions, but, when put forth, overpowering all opposition. 

 Elevated on the high dead limb of some gigantic tree that com- 

 mands a wide view of the neighboring shores and ocean, he seems 

 calmly to contemplate the motions of the various feathered tribes 

 that pursue their busy avocations below, the snow-white gulls 

 slowly winnowing the air ; the busy tringce coursing along the 

 sands ; trains of ducks streaming over the surface ; silent and 

 watchful cranes, intent and wading ; clamorous crows ; and all the 

 winged multitudes that subsist by the bounty of this vast liquid 

 magazine of nature. High over all these hovers one whose action 

 instantly arrests his whole attention. By his wide curvature of 

 wing and sudden suspension in air, he knows him to be the Fish 

 Hawk, settling over some devoted victim of the deep. His eye 

 kindles at the sight ; and, balancing himself, with half-opened wings, 



