GOLDEN EAGLE. 15 



forests on the plains. It is met with in India, and various 

 parts of Asia, as well as in every part of the continent of 

 Europe, and also in North America, in greater or less numbers. 

 It was formerly far from uncommon in England, and in still 

 more ancient times, in all probability, was much more frequent. 

 In Yorkshire, one has been recorded by Arthur Strickland, 

 Esq. as having occurred in the East Riding, and a second was 

 killed by Admiral Mitford's gamekeeper. Another was shot in 

 1847, at Littlecott, the seat of Mr. Popham, near Hungerford, 

 in Berkshire: it had glutted itself on a dead deer, and was 

 unable to fly away on the approach of the keeper, who fired 

 six times before he killed it. Another was captured in Cheshire, 

 in the year 1845, at Somerford Park, the seat of Sir Charles 

 Peter Shakerley, Bart., and another, in the same county, a 

 few years previously, near Eaton Hall, the seat of the Marquis 

 of Westminster. 



It has been known to breed regularly, even up to a com- 

 paratively recent date, in Cumberland and Westmorland, and 

 also formerly in Derbyshire; in which county one was captured 

 alive, near Glossop, in some severe weather, in the year 1720; 

 another, about the year 1770, was shot at Hard wick Park, a 

 seat of His Grace the Duke of Devonshire, one of the foun- 

 dations of the celebrated 'Bess of Hard wick,' another about 

 the year 1820, near Cromford, and another was seen at 

 Matlock in 1843, but, though frequently shot at, it was not 

 procured. They are still not very unfrequently to be seen in 

 the highlands of Perthshire and Sutherlandshire, chiefly in the 

 north and north-west parts, and on the mountains of other 

 counties in Scotland, such as Ben Lomond, and Ben Nevis, 

 and still more frequently on the mountains of Ireland. Thirteen 

 or fourteen were, killed between the years 1828 and 1832, in 

 the county of Donegal, and some have been in the habit of 

 breeding in the Island of Achil, as well as near Killarney, 

 and at Rosheen, near Dunfanaghy : others have been met with 

 near Belfast, Tralee, Monasterevan, the mountain of Croagh 

 Patrick, and in many other parts of that island, as also on 

 the Scottish border, and in the highlands of Wales, as well 

 as, though but rarely, in Shetland. 



The flight of the Golden Eagle, when not pursuing its prey, 

 is at first slow and heavy like that of the Heron, and when 

 sailing in the air, much resembles that of the Common Buzzard. 

 It often ascends to a vast height when looking out for food, 

 and on perceiving its quarry, descends upon it like a flash of 



